Having worked in IT for over 25 years, I have learned that if a product on the internet is "free" then YOU are the "product". That is why platforms like Facebook, WhatsApp, Tik-tok, YouTube, etc. can be "free" as they own the content that you created and they also mine your information so that they can advertise and sell more products to you. What looks like it is free is actually costing you your privacy in a vast network of interconnected companies looking to exploit each person’s information to the max.
When we look at these household name platforms then we forget that there is a lot of technology and people involved to keep the systems up 24/7. Creating any kind of platform therefore doesn’t come free or even cheap. Even more so when looking at how to brake free from these behemoth organizations so that they have no say over what can be said on an independent platform.
The three main reasons why TTN exists is:
1. many people are having their social network accounts banned as they are speaking out against sin or governments
2. people are being forced to self-police their speech through fear that they will be persecuted if they speak out
3. I believe that a central platform is needed where questions can be asked and answered from many different viewpoints so that the Torah community can be more like the Bereans rather than splinter cells which each does as they see right in their own eyes
During June of 2021, I emailed 1,000 people in the Torah community to introduce TTN as a concept and to see whether it would be possible to get donations to create the platform as the cost for all the licenses and IT infrastructure was out of my budget.
I was hoping to get at least 1,200 people signing up to become users of the platform by August, but looking back I believe that there are just too many scams on the internet so very few people trusted my emails. There were however 34 people who signed up to become early adopters and I had email conversations with quite a few of them who were looking forward for the dream to become a reality.
Of those conversations two donations from two of our members here on TTN, @TomKulczycki and @MorehCharles, were received. It wasn't enough to start the platform, but they were so encouraging about the possibilities that our chats convinced my wife and I to take a large leap in faith.
Our hopes were that if we build TTN then believers would have more faith that it isn't a scam and would join us in building an online Torah observant community.
At that time, Beztec (which is the business that I run the platform under) only had a single server being used to host other commercial web sites and we had to contract another server specifically for TTN as the load would be increased significantly, if people did join. The company hasn't had any business since Covid started in 2020 so very strict limitations were in place on what we could build as funds are very limited. (This is one of the contributing factors why there had been so many system outages after the platform had been launched.)
To further limit the potential of creating an income from external sources, we didn't want to allow any external advertising as that would give these companies a view of who is using TTN and introduce a feature which we couldn't administrate in detail (adverts for inappropriate clothing, etc.). So the costs to run the platform can't be funded by external 3rd-party sources.
With more than 500 members, due to the answer of our prayers for the growth of TTN, we have been put in a position to take an even bigger step of faith as we had to increase the server count further to create a more stable platform. That has put us under an even larger financial burden just so that we could bring TTN to fruition.
At this point in time to keep TTN running each month, it costs me and my family £2,500; something we cannot sustain indefinitely. Today, 3 August 2021, contributions account for 2% of the running costs of TTN.
I have always maintained that TTN is not a ministry, but a platform where Torah observant members can come together and share our beliefs. Even with that said, please do not see your financial contribution as merely paying for a service, but rather that you are contributing to help the community come together.
I have tried to make most features free on TTN and would endeavour to make even more of the paid services free as funding comes in. In the meantime though, certain features like voice and video chat and uploading large content like videos, audio, files and images (except for your profile and cover images) comes at an additional cost to me which I cannot keep covering.
The entry contribution price is lower than a cup of takeaway coffee per month so that it is affordable for most people; at least those in the Western world.
However TTN is for the community and as such, if you cannot afford a monthly contribution and really want to contribute valuable material to the community then please contact me, @RhyBez, via chat as I would gladly upgrade your account at no cost so that you can share with the community.
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