Irish Envy GoFundMe

[Cackalacky2.0]

All Irish Envy Members:

Irish Envy has been a home to many of us for a great many years. We have all made some great friends and shared many a moment together as relates to most all things Notre Dame. As you may be aware several of us have taken up ownership of the site and are planning to shepherd it into the future and improve the home we all know and love. As such the site needs a good bit of upgrading and enhancements. We have undertaken the upgrading of the platform and will be looking to improve functionality as we can.

With this in mind below is a GoFundMe link for the Irish Envy Website Improvement. Donations are very much welcome. All proceeds will go into the costs of upgrading and maintaining the site as needed and any additional funds will be used for future enhancements. Please visit the GoFundMe link and help us keep the wonderful place....wonderful. Go Irish.

[IrishLax]

The most important thing for us was ensuring that this was a community owned and operated site so that we would be empowered to make the updates people want. This is starting with upgrading the vBulletin software, and will go beyond that as funds allow. If there is a specific site functionality you'd like to see added, please drop us a line on that so we can look into it. All funds contributed by users will go towards operating expenses and upgrades. Initial donations will go to the vBulletin updates we're starting and paying for out of pocket.

[Southside Sully]

Done, thanks guys

[AllTimeIrish]

I donated as one of the anons.

[ulukinatme]

Done and done!

[Irish#1]

Done

[Cackalacky2.0]

You guys are amazing. Thanks!

[IrishInFl]

I just donated. I've been on this site for over 13 years. This forum is a community for Irish sports fans that needs to stay for years to come. Thanks to eveyone that has put in the effort to preserve the site. I might not post too often, but the site has been a part of many of our lives and I would hate to see that go. Long live IE.

[IrishLax]

Thanks everyone! To give an update, we contracted a professional last night to make some immediate fixes. Going to irishenvy.com should no longer give an Internal Server Error it should redirect to the front page. There is a LOT more debugging that needs to be done to fix load times, etc. but we're already making progress and the site is way more stable now than it has been the first few days.

After we're feeling good about the site stability and baseline function, we're going to start working on the user interface and user experience aspects of the site.

[goldandblue]

Thanks everyone! To give an update, we contracted a professional last night to make some immediate fixes. Going to irishenvy.com should no longer give an Internal Server Error it should redirect to the front page. There is a LOT more debugging that needs to be done to fix load times, etc. but we're already making progress and the site is way more stable now than it has been the first few days.

After we're feeling good about the site stability and baseline function, we're going to start working on the user interface and user experience aspects of the site.

Sounds good. I will donate soon.

[Blazers46]

Does my donation make me a minority owner of IrishEnvy?

[notredomer23]

Does my donation get me access to the Varsity Club premium plus board that the non-donating poors don't get to post/troll on?

[RDU Irish]

I donated two cents per post - seemed appropriate. Have some fun with it guys.

[Green Mountains]

I rarely post...but Irish Envy and Sons of Sam Horn (Red Sox) are my must reads everyday.

Thanks for keeping us moving forward.

[NDLS_USMC]

Just hit you with $100 for many years of enjoying banter and info free of charge! Keep up the good work, Gents.

[Irish#1]

Come on you knuckleheads. Almost to the $1,000 goal, but to be honest, it will take more than that for the guys to keep the site humming properly. Even if it's only $5 or $10 every little bit helps. I promise no one will rat you out to your wife! lol

[Irish du Nord]

Done, thanks guys. The new site is coming into its own, glad everything went well.

[notredomer23]

Come on you knuckleheads. Almost to the $1,000 goal, but to be honest, it will take more than that for the guys to keep the site humming properly. Even if it's only $5 or $10 every little bit helps. I promise no one will rat you out to your wife! lol

Yeah, that was my thought too that $1,000 probably isn't enough, and we can expect upgrades to be needed in the future as well. While I jest about a premium subscription because I don't want to line Cack and Lax's pockets (kidding), it might be worth while after this initial relaunch to explore a small monthly type of subscription totally optional that goes to a fund for this site. Just my $0.02, and have no idea how difficult that would be to set up.

[ulukinatme]

Yeah, that was my thought too that $1,000 probably isn't enough, and we can expect upgrades to be needed in the future as well. While I jest about a premium subscription because I don't want to line Cack and Lax's pockets (kidding), it might be worth while after this initial relaunch to explore a small monthly type of subscription totally optional that goes to a fund for this site. Just my $0.02, and have no idea how difficult that would be to set up.

Some football sites do a yearly donation drive format. Might be good to do that at the start of the season when traffic is high.

[goldandblue]

$94 dollars away from the initial goal.

[Cackalacky2.0]

CRAZY. YOU GUYS ARE AWESOME

[RDU Irish]

Some football sites do a yearly donation drive format. Might be good to do that at the start of the season when traffic is high.

When Rakes does their charity drive most folks make their donation amount to some silly stat line. Like ten cents per day since we last lost to USC or $37 for remember the six true score. Makes it more fun and interesting.

[notredomer23]

CRAZY. YOU GUYS ARE AWESOME

Live look at Cacky after draining the gofundme

[ab2cmiller]

Looks like Cancun

[Cackalacky2.0]

Why me lol?

FTR Im stupid when it comes to website building so fundraising was at least something I could contribute to.

[ab2cmiller]

Why me lol?

FTR Im stupid when it comes to website building so fundraising was at least something I could contribute to.

So no rolling around in a kiddie pool filled with a thousand singles?

[irishog77]

Got y'all to 1,000...and 1, bitches.

Anybody giving out free hand jibbers, ala Boyd Crowder when he ran Shelby's sheriff campaign?

[knight91]

Done. Thank you all for taking this on. Love this site.

[Bishop2b5]

Alright, I've spent enough time here and had enough fun to feel obligated to chip in some dough. I'll drop a few dollars in the jar tomorrow. BTW, how much would it take to get ACamp permabanned? Asking for a friend.

[ulukinatme]

Alright, I've spent enough time here and had enough fun to feel obligated to chip in some dough. I'll drop a few dollars in the jar tomorrow. BTW, how much would it take to get ACamp permabanned? Asking for a friend.

ACamp1900 ? Probably tree fiddy.

[notredomer23]

Bump, and also how much does Koon have to donate to get unbanned?

[RDU Irish]

Bump, and also how much does Koon have to donate to get unbanned?

How do you contribute a wooden spoon to GoFundMe?

[IrishLax]

How do you contribute a wooden spoon to GoFundMe?

lol......

[Cackalacky2.0]

Heh heh heh

[ulukinatme]

Bump, and also how much does Koon have to donate to get unbanned?

Hey! I paid good money to have koon banned...

[Irish#1]

Bump......You lurkers and members. If you haven't donated, it's time. The goal was reached, but it's going to coast more than what's been donated to maintain the site properly. Even if it's just $20. You'll blow that on a beer and burrito without blinking an eye.

[FightingIrishLover7]

Bump......You lurkers and members. If you haven't donated, it's time. The goal was reached, but it's going to coast more than what's been donated to maintain the site properly. Even if it's just $20. You'll blow that on a beer and burrito without blinking an eye.

Where was the money coming from under the previous owners btw?

[notredomer23]

Where was the money coming from under the previous owners btw?

They likely just opted in on the Google Display Network. Google kicks back a small percentage of the cost of the clicks that come from IE I believe... I do some GDN for a couple clients and I can't imagine a site like IE was getting nearly close to what they would need per month to properly maintain it. Maximum $200/month maybe? I could be totally off on that total, but I suspect that's likely why we saw a storm of bots signing up here a few years ago... more clicks on the ads = more money.

[IrishLion]

Where was the money coming from under the previous owners btw?

1. They weren't spending anything to maintain the site, other than paying their yearly fees for a server and vBulletin. They weren't investing in any vBulletin updates. That's why it was so badly behind, and why we've had some issues now that we're trying to update/upgrade.

2. Anything they were making was from Google AdSense, I'm sure, and I think they also owned other websites. I'm sure between all of their assets, the ad revenue was at least enough to keep the websites live, even though they weren't offering any other TLC.

[FightingIrishLover7]

1. They weren't spending anything to maintain the site, other than paying their yearly fees for a server and vBulletin. They weren't investing in any vBulletin updates. That's why it was so badly behind, and why we've had some issues now that we're trying to update/upgrade.

2. Anything they were making was from Google AdSense, I'm sure, and I think they also owned other websites. I'm sure between all of their assets, the ad revenue was at least enough to keep the websites live, even though they weren't offering any other TLC.

gotchya
I knew they weren't paying for updates, but wasn't sure who was keeping the lights on

[BeauBenken]

Yes, our biggest request from our users in the future will be to whitelist our page once we have Google Ads up and running!

My goal once we get everything running smoothly will be to monitor traffic though and then seek out specific companies to advertise directly with us so that our ads won't be blocked by our several non-registered users and so that the ads are specific to our user base.

[Irish#1]

They likely just opted in on the Google Display Network. Google kicks back a small percentage of the cost of the clicks that come from IE I believe... I do some GDN for a couple clients and I can't imagine a site like IE was getting nearly close to what they would need per month to properly maintain it. Maximum $200/month maybe? I could be totally off on that total, but I suspect that's likely why we saw a storm of bots signing up here a few years ago... more clicks on the ads = more money.

Software gets updated one of two ways. The most common is paying the annual maintenance. I have no idea what that is for vBulletin, but it can range from a couple of grand on up. When you pay for the annual maintenance you get all of the upgrades and patches that are released. It also gets you some support help depending on what support is needed. If you do not elect to get the annual maintenance you have to pay for the software again to get the latest upgrade. There's probably a 90 day up to 12 month support agreement built into the initial purchase. Most are 12 months, then the annual maintenance fee kicks in. I think it's safe to say the former owners were not paying the annual maintenance.

[notredomer23]

My goal once we get everything running smoothly will be to monitor traffic though and then seek out specific companies to advertise directly with us so that our ads won't be blocked by our several non-registered users and so that the ads are specific to our user base.

I was gonna suggest this... Some direct buys, IE promo codes etc. etc.

[dublinirish]

1. They weren't spending anything to maintain the site, other than paying their yearly fees for a server and vBulletin. They weren't investing in any vBulletin updates. That's why it was so badly behind, and why we've had some issues now that we're trying to update/upgrade.

2. Anything they were making was from Google AdSense, I'm sure, and I think they also owned other websites. I'm sure between all of their assets, the ad revenue was at least enough to keep the websites live, even though they weren't offering any other TLC.

would it have been easier to just start a new site from scratch? than to have taken over IE?

[IrishLax]

Btw, these donations allowed us to contract a database professional this week to (hopefully) fix the site. If not, we're going to see if it's feasible to move the content over to a new platform.

Where we got fucked in this whole process is that we planned on running the site in its outdated state until we had a firm plan to upgrade it. Instead, the site was so outdated that it literally would not run on any modern server hardware so we were forced to push forward with the upgrade.... which means trying to debug everything on the fly...

[Irish#1]

Does vBulletin offer this as a cloud service? You basically pay a monthly fee and they take care of everything.

[ulukinatme]

Btw, these donations allowed us to contract a database professional this week to (hopefully) fix the site. If not, we're going to see if it's feasible to move the content over to a new platform.

Where we got fucked in this whole process is that we planned on running the site in its outdated state until we had a firm plan to upgrade it. Instead, the site was so outdated that it literally would not run on any modern server hardware so we were forced to push forward with the upgrade.... which means trying to debug everything on the fly...

If you're looking to move out of the vBulletin platform, might I suggest Invision? It's another good option and runs pretty well. It's what the Texas board uses and it's pretty slick (https://www.surlyhorns.com/board/). Works much like our current platform, but is possibly a smidge more user friendly even after our recent updates. I believe Invision also has options to port over existing message board data from other platforms too, I would image vBulletin would have to be one.

[IrishLax]

If you're looking to move out of the vBulletin platform, might I suggest Invision? It's another good option and runs pretty well. It's what the Texas board uses and it's pretty slick (https://www.surlyhorns.com/board/). Works much like our current platform, but is possibly a smidge more user friendly even after our recent updates. I believe Invision also has options to port over existing message board data from other platforms too, I would image vBulletin would have to be one.

Thanks for the recommendation, I like the look of that. What it really comes down to is a platform that will allow us to port over our existing information. Also looking at Xenforo.

[Irish#1]

Most software has the ability to port data, but it’s the mapping of the data for the import process that is key. For instance some fields like name = name are obvious. There may be fields in the old software that are named differently in the new and there may be fields in the old that are not in the new and vice versa.

make sure to ask questions like that as you look different platforms.

[Black Irish]

I think I can divert some funds from my drinking, gambling, & womanizing budget to support the cause.