The forum is more than functional and has been for a long time. As I said, earlier, you could easily buy xenforo software, and to be honest, I don’t see what the current software here offers that that does it… It has so many things built into it that you don’t need to do all these different upgrades.
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Between all the server fund auctions, paid sponsorships, ad revenue, and member donations, how is that not enough to keep this forum running? If you read what he saying, it sounds like he wants to make this his full-time job and all of us pay for it. I am in different on the matter to be honest, but I’m just saying, don’t make it seem like this place can’t run itself without people having to dig more and more in their pocket.
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Nobody is saying it doesn’t currently run on what it makes. Clearly, it does, or we wouldn’t have the ability to have this conversation. I have read exactly what he was saying. He said he wants the ability to drop half his full-time job hours and use that time to be on OG taking care of things. If folks have some kind of issue with that, then they can just not support the site. Many don’t and still get the benefits of the site. Its all up to each member to decide what they do here.
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You are not “in different,” you are asserting you are indifferent. Reading through your recent comments, however, you don’t seem indifferent. Honestly, you seem to have quite strong feelings.
It’s okay to have strong feelings. I certainly do too.
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I need that in a few colors
Just make sure to get bigger size stuff everyone don’t fit a smedium
Personally, I don’t see an issue with that even if that is the case, the man works hard to provide use with a service so we can all connect and share what we love to do. I can respect any mans hustle expecally when it adds value to my life. Hes not making us support, he’s asking and if he makes something off it so be it, he deserves it.
Every cannabis forum makes money in some way or another but none are driven by the community like overgrow is. None would allow us to have this much dialoge without stepping in, I appreciate what overgrow and LJ have done.
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I got one. Can we not have the subject of a pm auto filled with the title of the thread it came from? I have about 9,000 pm’s with the title “cannabiscrusader’s dank doodle bin”
It makes it near impossible to keep any of them straight
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I’m glad you are here to tell me how I feel LMAO. I don’t care one way or another what happens. That’s why I said I am indifferent. I simply made a few statements beyond that and there are zero strong feelings attached to that:rofl:. Calm down buddy 
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No one said that you need to see an issue with it, but it doesn’t mean that other people can’t have a different opinion about it.
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Non-profits have paid employees. Parks have paid employees. Churches have paid employees. Community groups have paid employees. I’ve only been around for a couple of months, but in my (admittedly limited) view, it seems that LemonadeJoe takes more of a custodial type role than an overbearing “I’m the owner, my way or the highway” type role.
Being paid for doing the unappreciated custodial work, even if this was 100% a non-profit community is a completely reasonable thing. Having a full-time (or half-time) employee for a community to keep things running is incredibly helpful!
I have been a member of a lot of communities that would have run so much more smoothly if they’d had one (or more) paid people helping keep everything running.
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Your completely correct. Thats the difference I was trying to make between OG and other forums.
We, as in you, I and the rest of the community, can be involved in something a bit bigger than just our plants. That we by all means have no right to be involved in and I think thats fantastic.
By no means was it a stab at you, nothing but respect. 100%
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This is why I always try to edit the title if I’m the one starting the DM. At the very least I try to put my username at the end so it’s easier to distinguish in the giant list.
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Thats because you are a civilized person that appreciates the finer things in life. A leaf floating down to the forest floor, the simplicity of organized chaos in the gears of a clock…
Your doodle is ready btw
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Oh, now that is a metaphor I can relate to. Bravo.
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I think having Overgrow merchandise is definitely a good thing. It helps extend our presence beyond the computer screen and into the real world, but I don’t see it becoming even minor source of revenue.
In the past, I’ve done large series of silk-screen prints, as well as a calendar and posters for another website. While these projects brought a lot of joy, there wasn’t much profit once you factored in the costs, including design.
OG Store on Redbubble is great because it offers a wider range of products and saves me the trouble of handling everything myself. Of course, the prints are digital, not silk-screen, and their services come with relatively high pricing for the products.
We definitely need to add more designs, including some that aren’t too cannabis specific. I would love to offer more if we had skilled designers in the Overgrow community. Just let me know if you can contribute in this area :).
We could even partner with some company to run a silk-screen series for us if they can handle the shipping as well. There’s a minimum order requirement for this type of printing, so we’d probably need to do a pre-sale.
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I think you’re a bit off about that. I’ve been on ICMag since day one, and the forums, the printed magazine (which was awesome, by the way), and the IC Cannabis Cup were always tied to Gypsy’s seed business (both his store and auctions). They had pretty strict content control from the start, and you couldn’t even mention a seedbank without having the post removed. I didn’t see anything wrong with it though, because it was all clearly stated upfront.
Also, you pointed out where it didn’t work well, which is cool, but how about giving an example of where you think things did work?
I’m not “turning” the site into anything. Keeping the site up to date with the latest software and security updates, ensuring it works properly in all major browsers, is simply the right thing to do.
Once again, you’re imagining things. You’re creating two hypothetical scenarios and then arguing against one of them. According to you, there’s a “good” scenario where costs are low, everyone is happy, and no effort is required, and a “bad” scenario where high costs spoil it all. Framing it like this, which is far from reality, makes it easy to argue in favor of the “good” option.
But that’s not how things work. There are only well-managed forums and poorly managed ones. The poorly managed forums are usually easy to spot: no one takes care of them, there’s no moderation, and they slowly fall apart. I’ve been involved in building forums for 25 years now, and I’ve seen many communities crumble. There were no revenue streams to cover the costs, and eventually, after a few years, the admins lost motivation and stopped caring. The community lost its vibe, and while a few core members stuck around for a while, even they eventually drifted away, essentially turning the forum into a ghost town.
Now, about the extra features… Maybe we add them because our members are asking for them? I get PMs all the time with ideas and feedback (and I actually enjoy it!). I’m not just throwing in features randomly - they’re based on what people want.
Also, I never said I was quitting my day job. I just mentioned it’d be awesome if I could cut back to part-time and see how things go. It’s tough juggling my current responsibilities along with a full-time job. Plus, it’s not exactly fun using vacation days to work on site upgrades, especially when my family and kid expect me to spend the nicest season of the year with them. That said I really do enjoy working on Overgrow (connecting with people, coding, tweaking, researching new possibilities) and it’s well spent time IMO. We live in exciting times when it comes to online communities and collaboration tools.
The forum might seem fine to you, which is great, but there have been issues with some of the latest devices. If you don’t keep up with browser and software updates, things can break. If you worked in software, you’d know there’s no time to rest. You always have a list of updates to deal with, and you work on the biggest problems first. Even hardware requirements constantly increase. You need to upgrade regularly to keep the resources available. Why do you think you need to buy a new phone every 3 or 4 years?
Lastly, the idea that monetization kills forums isn’t always true. Look beyond just cannabis forums. There are plenty of thriving, well-managed communities out there even around businesses or brands. A good example that comes to mind is TalkBass, which has been around since 1999. They run a model similar to Overgrow: core forum features are free, but they offer perks to paying Supporters. One perk is access to post in classifieds, which serves a huge community. Everyone can see classifieds and respond to them. Only Supporters can post new classified ads. There’s no listing fee or anything like that, just a subscription. It works smoothly and keeps the site running well.
From their website:
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As with any endeavor, you must balance the time with quality of life/ family. No one would feel good if even one person has to sacrifice personal time for folks to have a free chat. Now about the Bass … oops its not the fish , so im out.
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grey heather and yellow perfectly match, great colors.
A Pontiac symbol turned into a bong, the logo set to high. Nope. lol tacky .
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It seems in life that no matter what someone does, there will always be someone there to like it and also someone there that will completely be against it. Just have to do what we feel is right.
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