Future of MACCA Radio in Jeopardy

[Mike]

It's sad to report that donations for the month of October is the grand total of $10 a month, thanks to JennyWren. Canada has finally sorted out copyright fees and I will be hit with a whack of fees. Without your support I may have to pull the plug on MACCA Radio. Silence The Voice of The Beatles.

I will be going live on-the-air several times today and try to make the case to the listeners to contribute now while you can. The minute I get hit with the added fees is the minute I pull the plug unless I can actually pay the fees and it's safe to say I personally will not be financing this station so everyone (except one person, JennyWren) can listen for free.

I am trying to get a grip on how much the fees will be but I can safely say, I will no longer be subsidizing the radio station and the $10 a month income from it as of today, will surely mean the death of MACCA Radio. The buck literally stops here, with me as it is totally my fault for not being a good fund raiser. I tried a point scheme that rewards contributors to be able to request additional songs but that did not seem to help. I have hourly announcements to remind listeners to donate to keep the station on-the-air. I have done what I can at my end to reduce costs and short of putting a lot more of myself and dedicating a great deal of personal time to attempt to plead with the listeners to contribute, in others words, beg, I'm near the end of the line.

I truly thank all those of you who felt The Voice of The Beatles was worth a little bit and you made that decision to contribute in the past. Just like a political campaign, funds are needed for the present. Donations of the past have been helpful but we need your help again. For those who have not contributed and may or may not be regular listener of the station, I urge you to consider.

[linclink]

Mike: First of all let me just say a HUGE THANKS from myself, & I'm sure many others here too! I must also apologize as to having been (& still am) a person who has ridden for free here. I am going to be taking over a full time Acupuncture Practice, but that won't happen until Feb.. So March would be my earliest available time to contribute. The last three years have been "beans & rice" grad school budget.
How much is your monthly budget goal? I love being able to tune in, and prefer this to other Beatles internet stations that I'm aware of, but never listen to. That said I own most all of what is here and while I'll miss it if it goes, I'll feel much worse for younger fans who come here and get an extraordinary education about the enormous breadth and depth of the amazing Beatles careers (solo & together).
As I've retold here many times I've never stopped being a huge Beatles fan, and Lennon & Harrison guy, but... Macca's 80's plunge, and Ringo's plunge after the mid-70's had be stop buying , or listening to their stuff, ironically, at right about the time they were starting to turn things around and both blossom into late career renaissances that literally helped me get through grad school .
It was 2005 when I went back to buying their albums and over the past three years have pretty much (minus the odd Macca side project that I know, but still need to get hard copy of) caught up with everything. Macca-Central, and MaccaRadio have been a integral & special part of that journey. I was a massive, and unexpected surprise to actually love the material that both of them were doing...Ringo surprised me more, and I love Paul's material more. I am very grateful to the whole community here, but of course, especially to you Mike. You are the heart & soul, the driving force and creator of all the possibilities that exist here for all of us. I would hope that somehow these challenges could be overcome, but if not then I salute you for our glorious past here, and look forward to however Macca-Central is able to continue. Blessings Of Love & Light To All!

[Plastic Soul Man]

Sorry to hear about this. I guess we all just take people's efforts and hard work for granted or think somebody else will contribute.

I have just made a small donation and urge people to do the same.

[Mike]

Thank you Plastic Soul Man

linclink congratulations on your new Acupuncture Practice !

[linclink]

Thanks for the congrats Mike. Like I said March is really my first month of much breathing room financially. What little I already do to local Spiritual causes, has me tapped & is probably more than I should be doing already, but...if we know a specific goal, and can actually get close to it as a community I'd do my best to give my "nickel & dime" type of contribution now to see what we could manage... otherwise it's really more of a late Winter/early Spring possibility for me personally. Even if people aren't
putting there money where there mouths/keyboards are Mike, hopefully putting our heartfelt thanks into words will make the sting a little less. You certainly seem like enough of a giving type of good soul, wherein I assume it does/will. Blessings!

[Genuine_Indian_Guru]

Mike, would it be possible to do a live MACCA Radiothon?

[JumpinJoe49]

Mike...............

I know that this must be an urgent situation. Is there any kind of time line or time frame that you can identify for us. This would be a great time for all regular listeners (including myself) to step up and assist in the "Raising of the Funds" project. None of us have any idea what the possible cost of your fees might be. Do you have a certain figure ($$$AMOUNT) that is needed to keep MACCA going? If it is a realistic figure, then as a collective group we might all be able to pitch in and get the current situation stable.

Is it possible to put put a running total donation figure on this site showing how much is raised on a regular basis and how close we are coming to the figure needed? Just a thought. But if we have no idea what the value of "X" is, none of us will know what is needed to "Save the Day". How many $25.00 donations would be needed to keep you and MACCA going?........If it is beyond the reach of all of us collectively, then it might be too late. But if it is attainable by all of us pulling together, then we will know what the target is and all of us can make the push needed.

I am one of the listeners to this site and I love it. Proud to say I was around when the Beatles first came on the scene and have enjoyed their solo careers. As an old timer, I want to help anyway I can. As you know, the U.S. is going through a very difficult time at the moment. But I am a firm believer that we will pull out of it. But this only happens when people pull together and have a "Game Plan" to make something work.

Please let us know. I shall pass the word to anyone I can and try to find ways to try and make something happen. We don't want to see MACCA go into "Forecloser".................

EVERYONE....Put your thinking caps on.............

Hang in there Mike...........If we don't know the Time, we may already be too late..................LONG LIVE THE BEATLES..........
Keep the faith Mike. Lets no go down without a fight.........

Wishing you the best and all you have done and hopefully all you will do in the future.

[Genuine_Indian_Guru]

Mike...............

I know that this must be an urgent situation. Is there any kind of time line or time frame that you can identify for us. This would be a great time for all regular listeners (including myself) to step up and assist in the "Raising of the Funds" project. None of us have any idea what the possible cost of your fees might be. Do you have a certain figure ($$$AMOUNT) that is needed to keep MACCA going? If it is a realistic figure, then as a collective group we might all be able to pitch in and get the current situation stable.

Is it possible to put put a running total donation figure on this site showing how much is raised on a regular basis and how close we are coming to the figure needed? Just a thought. But if we have no idea what the value of "X" is, none of us will know what is needed to "Save the Day". How many $25.00 donations would be needed to keep you and MACCA going?........If it is beyond the reach of all of us collectively, then it might be too late. But if it is attainable by all of us pulling together, then we will know what the target is and all of us can make the push needed.

I am one of the listeners to this site and I love it. Proud to say I was around when the Beatles first came on the scene and have enjoyed their solo careers. As an old timer, I want to help anyway I can. As you know, the U.S. is going through a very difficult time at the moment. But I am a firm believer that we will pull out of it. But this only happens when people pull together and have a "Game Plan" to make something work.

Please let us know. I shall pass the word to anyone I can and try to find ways to try and make something happen. We don't want to see MACCA go into "Forecloser".................

EVERYONE....Put your thinking caps on.............

Hang in there Mike...........If we don't know the Time, we may already be too late..................LONG LIVE THE BEATLES..........
Keep the faith Mike. Lets no go down without a fight.........

Wishing you the best and all you have done and hopefully all you will do in the future.

JumpinJoe49, that was an extremly nice gift of encouragment you'd given to Mike. We gotta all follow suit and man up!

Thanks Mike.

[jgkojak]

I think if we see the cold hard reality in front of us (i.e. how much fees will be on a monthly basis) we could all commit to something. I work in the non-profit arena- and I can tell you that when we fundraise, we don't get anywhere without a specific NEED and GOAL stated.

[Mike]

lamaya1222 yesterday donated $30, thank you.

A $500 monthly budget is the short-term goal. That's just 20 people paying $25, or 25 people each paying $20, or 50 people paying $10 monthly. So that is very realistic. In order to get more monthly donations, we need to increase listeners as well to. It's a numbers game, the more listeners the more royalties to be paid, but there will be more of a base of people that will likely help out. What will happen if the monthly goal exceeds what I need that month ? If the station numbers, listeners & revenue, it will go directly to production, in other words features that would benefit the radio station and website, such as more interviews. I could possible hire a part-time someone to be a producer for more original content like daily news. I don't personally have the extra money to travel to the places where Beatle people are.

I did have a monthly account of dollar amounts and goals and even a thermometer graphic but I took it down after it got embarassingly low. I can put it back up and make the interface to donate much easier in a variety of denominations. I have not yet put this in the news section of the site where a lot of people who don't come to the BLOG frequent. I have said this many times, I am not a financial kinda guy, I'm the nuts and bolts. So if there is a way to raise funds externally on behalf of this site, I of course am more than willing to give the title and authority for someone to do that. The short-term goal is just $500 monthly but we can do much, much more than that with someone with fund raising experience. It would be so very nice to be in the position to have a problem of what to do with excess funds. I would like very much for this website to sponsor a needy children, one at a time. Have a running total of children sponsored. This is my goal. Have a site like MACCA Central do more than be social and information site. I want to make a difference one child at a time.

I am so very encouraged by those who have read this part of oBLOBdi-oBLOGda and have responded.