I wanted to clear up something concerning revenue on the website since there has been some confusion after my last blog on the former member who used the stolen credit card...

When Samantha (Savant) and I first worked on the Saviis project for the website, the combination of hosting fees, donations, and ad revenue, were just about breaking even with costs of keeping the collection of websites alive. Saviis were meant to be a fun investment of time into the website that would help increase traffic to DSiPaint.com, and, in turn, the revenue. I don't know if it was the Saviis, other new features on DSiPaint.com (since not much has changed on the other website), or something else, but traffic started to really increase over the past few months.

Also, I made some changes to the ads across all the websites, trying to remove types of ads that are inappropriate and lessening the chance of repetitive and irrelevant ads. The combination of all of this has caused ad revenue to almost double. Saviis, hosting, and the occasional donations, ended up being just a small percentage of all the revenue for the past couple months. Since pay-outs for the ads are delayed about 6 weeks, we are just starting to see those changes this month. The first decent payout came right after I was hit with the $60.00 of fees and $14.00 of reversals for the credit card fraud.

So, to make a long story short: These websites aren't huge money makers, but they are now paying for themselves and provide a little extra. Sure, it would be great to make tons of money doing something we enjoy, but a supplemental income that covers the cable bill is nice. If I could, I would dedicate 40 hours a week to these websites.

Don't feel like you are obligated to donate, just because of a single setback. I have decided to permanently remove the donate button from the website after seeing the revenue increase. Thank you to everyone who has donated.

Hosting will continue, and Savii Bucks will continue. I will also keep the CafePress account active. I would like to thank everyone who supported the websites through those.

I will build up some of the funds from all of the revenue sources for a planned server upgrade early into next year. All this recent growth is pushing the server to its limits. Next year will be big with the release of 3DSPaint.com (as more than just a mirror site), so the server needs to handle all it can. I will provide more information on this website early into the year.