SETI@Home needs your help - urgently!

[Simon]

Hi folks,

as you may know, SETI@Home is funded by donations only.

Right now, the project is in danger of running out of money! This means, no more Alien searching for you or me, lower chances of ETI's being discovered in our lifetimes, among others.

It also means that the hard work a lot of people have put into this project may be for nothing, after all, and I'd really hate to see that happen.

Now, here's how to help - if you can, donate to SETI@Home directly! This only works if you have a Credit Card, however.

A lot of people have complained (me among them) about the lack of other donation options. Some have started to do something about it (like PopAndBob on his site).

I'm in contact with Eric Korpela, project scientist at SETI@Home. Together with him, I've discussed and come up with a plan how to offer some more donation options.

Namely, I've installed a PayPal Donation page on this site - look on the top left next to the logo. Eric (who is one of the few direct project employees) has full access to the PayPal account receiving the donations (it's a new one I made just for this purpose).

All funds donated to this PayPal account will go IN FULL to the SETI@Home project, that has to be clear from the start.

PayPal charges a transaction fee, this will be charged no matter what, and be the only deduction - also, it will already be deducted by the time the funds are credited to the account, so again, what comes in does go out in full.

I can only urge you all to donate - be it a dollar or be it more - every little bit counts!

Also, please make sure you fill in your SETI@Home account number for every donation - whether you want your green star or not - to make things easier for the project to process.

[Pepo]

All funds donated to this PayPal account will go IN FULL to the SETI@Home project. I want to part of it for myself or this site, that has to be clear from the start. It's also why I definitely wanted Eric Korpela to have access to this account.

Hi Simon, please do not take me wrong, I know how clear you want to express your intentions.
If you can, you should repair one late-night typo in your message (otherwise someone could understand thay you want to take part on the payed money). I suppose you "wanted no part of it"...

Peter

[Simon]

Thanks Peter,

thanks for spotting that ugly typo! Could really be misconstrued...

Now all that's left over is for me to complete the nasty PayPal transaction infrastructure (custom PHP pages for entry/exit and data reproduction for the donor)...

Should be done within the next two days.

Regards,
Simon.

[Fuzzy Hollynoodles]

Thank you Simon, I'll make a note about this to all, I am in contact with. 

If you want, you can move my post from yesterday to this thread. I'll leave it up to you.

[NedLudd]

Simon,

Sorry to be a literary critic, but I'd drop the "I want no part of this" statement entirely.

"100% of the proceeds goes to SETI" really says what you want to say, and when you give people more words, it seems that you simply give them more opportunity to misunderstand.

Short is better.

-- Ned

[Simon]

You're probably right Ned, changed.

Regards,
Simon.

[SolAirQuebec]

Hi Simon,

Have you contact paypal to see if they can consider SETI as a non-profit organisation and charge no fee for the "donation", this can be a good publicity for them.

Jean
SolAirQuebec.

[arkham]

Already donated

I even have the funky green star to prove it:

http://setiathome.berkeley.edu/show_user.php?userid=18721

Adam

[popandbob]

Simon,

I appreciate the link being posted.I also was able to make my first donation today 

Thanks,
BoB

[pepperammi]

Any progress on the Paypal option?

[citroja]

Simon,

  There are a few threads in the S@H forums that that talk about additional ways to raise money for S@H.  One of them was to use Google Adsense on an un-official page and all proceeds from the adds would go to S@H (more details here)  I was wondering if you would/had considered putting adds on your page to do the same.  BOINC Synergy uses them on their page and they are not disruptive at all.  (view here)

  Just a thought.

-citroja

[SolAirQuebec]

Hi Simon,

I wait for the link for the PAYPAL donation, did you know when it will be ready?

Sol Air

[nastasache]

I tried to contribute, even with a minimal amount ($25; I am not at all a rich person),  unfortunately without success using cc payment page located at https://egiving.berkeley.edu/egiving/mainform.asp
Maybe this is a problem. Even I know I have a cc  - because I am from Romania - not accepted on some sites, I think, who know, if you fix that problem, some more money will go to the project from other people, too. There I suppose a cvv problem into merchant account it is.

[citroja]

If you were to set up 2 paypal accounts, 1 for CC payments and the other for direct paypal (merchant and standard) you can reduce/eliminate the fee for paypal-to-paypal transactions.

Just a thought.

-citroja

[Simon]

Sorry for the long wait guys.

I've been away on business and personal matters, so it took a little longer than intended.

Anyway, if you check the top left corner, you'll find a link to the PayPal donation page.

Please help SETI@Home with your donation!

Regards,
Simon.

There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics.

- Benjamin Disraeli