People sat back and watched newspapers die, and we've let TV become what it is.
Don't know how we can inspire the sense of ownership the reading public needs to see the value in Internet-based content. Maybe the concept of "content" is part of the problem. There may be no magic solution for all audiences, and for all kinds of media.
Have you ever considered "recieving company donations" for product reviews? or have them buy a stake in icrontic to advance there agendas, like a dedicated Nividia section/blog or something similar?
Mr T. The problem with that is that a site like icrontic will instantly lose credibility and it's ability to be impartial. Cornerstone principles that are required. So many other publications already do that (publicly and privately). It's a downward spiral
The internet has been free for so long in relation to easy access to information, advertisement revenues are down but most readers will never realise the absolute cost of running the show is driven directly from them. Readers demand great content. That means people have to work full time on it to achieve that but the writers/editors have got to make a living as well as pay the bills for the site. It's not a site, it's a business.
In the UK, the times newspapers have started charging for access to their online content. Why? Because the newspaper model is dying and they have a business to run. The online ad market is shrinking in a tough economic climate. Coupled with much better advertisement opportunities embedded in apple or android applications. Don't discount the value of direct targetted ads from the mobile marketplace.
So a subscription model is a possible way but when audience has access to the content for free for so long, its hard to ask them to suddenly pay for it. Certainly the times has had an awful backlash for their new pay for online access model.
I think we need a balance. A freemium model that gives paying users exclusive benefits. Said model kind of works like a profit-sharing situation where paying users get the inside scoop of everything going on in Icrontic headquarters, so if you guys have the latest 6G smartphone - stream video for your paying users to see what it looks like. Hell, if you have extra phones, share them amongst members if you can.
The Internet will eventually float like any other regular business. Companies get money from consumers and investors. The money coming from both sides gives each financially-supporting members benefits afforded by the other. Investors or advertisers get eyeballs and the ability to control content. Subscribers get exclusivity and discounts from sponsored agents. Yada yada yada...
Wherever there are value propositions, there is only two answers - YES or NO. As the business owner, allow your paying people tell you if you are doing a good enough job or not.
Shorty's right about the newspapers in the UK. I was listening to the BBC radio service and they were discussing exactly what was brought up here: that people are so used to online content being free (including newspapers that put their content online and only "charge" via advertisements) that they would resist any subscriptions for the content they're already used to.
They also referenced that a US-based newspaper tried the same thing a few years back, and failed miserably. I think it was the New York Times. They had that "freemium" model that Hubert mentioned, where they would have a bunch of plain-vanilla content, but the more juicy stuff was behind the subscriptions (or at least, that's the gist the BBC conversation gave me).
In my opinion, "free" content providers like reddit (and quite possibly Icrontic) may just have to be creative and come up with something new. Perhaps something gimmicky, who knows. Maybe we -do- need a subscription service, and offer things like entrance to contests, offer behind-the-scenes articles, or even have live chats with the editors once in a while via uStream or a text-based chat.
I don't know, it's tough to come up with ideas that actually WORK. Even harder to entice people to pay for it.
Have you ever considered "recieving company donations" for product reviews? or have them buy a stake in icrontic to advance there agendas, like a dedicated Nividia section/blog or something similar?
Corporations have money...
Just a thought....
That's a common model, it's called advertorial content or sponsored content. "This post sponsored by..."
Mr T. The problem with that is that a site like icrontic will instantly lose credibility and it's ability to be impartial. Cornerstone principles that are required. So many other publications already do that (publicly and privately). It's a downward spiral
I disagree. Much like sites who used to run banner ads in the early days "lost credibility", it was more of a culture shift: people had to get used to the idea that just because you are making money doesn't mean you are selling out.
Advertorial content can work in a community like this because we are trusted; we've built that trust over ten years and it's as good as gold.
It's a thin and weird line between paid product reviews and sponsored content. The solution is to make clear to your sponsors that you will not be dishonest.
Let's use real-world Icrontic examples:
Think back to this review of the Sumo Gamer. We spent hours writing it, photographing it, editing it, and publishing it. It has been seen by tens of thousands of people. At no point did anyone ever suggest that we were selling out by including an affiliate link on it. You like what you see? You buy the bag, we get a cut. That's fair, right?
Pretend for a moment that Sumo paid us for that writeup. Would it change your opinion of it? After reading it, do you somehow think differently knowing that we received compensation for it? We would have stated at the beginning: This post sponsored by Sumo Lounge Furniture (we're required by law to do that if it comes down to it). Something like: "We received compensation for this article."
My answer to that is: no, not really. The fact is, we technically DID receive compensation for it by having an affiliate link in there; in addition, we get to keep the bag (another form of compensation). Are we 'sellouts'? Is our integrity impinged because of that?
If you feel that it is, then Icrontic (and most other sites you read about products on) are probably not for you. The sad truth is, we need to make money somehow, or sites like us will either cease to exist, or go back to being nothing more than a closed community of the same 30 people talking to each other every day (something which has been supplanted by Twitter and Facebook).
The culture shift that needs to happen is thus: People need to start recognizing that sites like Icrontic are providing a valuable service. Do the events, friendships, laughs, TF2 server, WoW Guild, massive Steam group, contests and giveaways, and culture mean anything to you, do they add value to your life? If they answer is yes, then what is it worth to you, financially?
My old fallback is this: You spend money on a lot of stupid crap (like 12 packs of diet coke or something) that adds far less value to your life than the service that sites like Icrontic provides. It's a realigning of priorities. Why should Coke or Pepsi or cigarettes get all of your leisure cash instead of cutting off a piece for Icrontic?
And if you're not willing to pay, then you have to be willing to trust us that the money we may take for sponsored content is "clean". It's really nothing more than that.
You misunderstand. I am merely discussing the concept of giving a poor product an excellent review for the sake of a few bucks. Not something that i believe icrontic would do. Sumo stuff rocks!
The thin line between paid reviews and sponsored content is an easy one: you don't do sponsored reviews of products you don't genuinely endorse.
If the site doesn't believe in a product and wouldn't buy it for themselves or a family member, then you don't write it.
You don't take money to write the review because you want the money. You take the money to write the review because you believe in the product so much that you would have written about it anyways.
//EDIT:
For example, nobody on god's green earth could convince me to write an article on Samsung hard drives for money. I don't believe in that product and I wouldn't recommend them to others. If, however, someone wanted to pay me to write an article on a Western Digital drive, then yes, I might consider it.
The other thing to remember is that paid content doesn't necessarily exclude criticism. A product with niggling issues can still come across as broadly recommended.
Exactly. There is no way I would have written anything different than what I wrote for garbage like the Addlogix LAN GUARD, or the Raidmax Skyline case.
If those companies had approached me for sponsored advertorials, I would have reviewed them (as I did), and said to them: I can't say anything good about this. I recommend other products instead. If you still want to sponsor a post, let's let it not be about your product. Let's be creative. Here's a fictional scenario:
Today we closed our spyware forum after years of providing sketchy free service to random google users. I say sketchy because we don't have the staff or resources to make it reliable. Now, imagine that we could keep it open by paying people some small amount of money, like $5 per closed case or something, and ADDLOGIX sponsored that.
"Icrontic's spyware forum sponsored by ADDLOGIX, makers of LAN GUARD", with a link to their website. We're not endorsing them, we're simply selling them the same thing as banner space. The way it works right now, hell, we could indeed BE selling them banner space and I wouldn't even know it.
ADDLOGIX would pay us a monthly charge, and we would use that to compensate the helpers.
I can tell ADDLOGIX: Hey, your product that you sent me stinks; here's what's wrong with it. I can't say anything good about it. I'm publishing a terrible review of it. If that changes your mind on the spyware forum sponsorship, so be it.
Who knows what they'll say about that, but it behooves them to get their link out to eyeballs, and that is something we CAN provide.
If they pull their sponsorship because of the review? Shrug, we close the spyware forum or find another sponsor. What else can we do? If we lie about the product, it will come back to bite us in the ass. "Yeah, I bought this based on Icrontic's (false) review and it is a pile of shit that killed my internet connection". You can't hide from that, so there's no way we would even bother lying about a product in print.
Those are the kinds of creative campaigns that sites like ours need to engage in to stay afloat.
Shorty's right about the newspapers in the UK. I was listening to the BBC radio service and they were discussing exactly what was brought up here: that people are so used to online content being free (including newspapers that put their content online and only "charge" via advertisements) that they would resist any subscriptions for the content they're already used to.
Not to mention the competition, the beeb's online services (news/sports/radio and TV streams) are all free.
I'm sure there are a few who can't live without their paper's own particular bias but who's going to pay for what can (mostly) be got for nowt?
The one thing you do have is a lot of members and visitors with a lot of computers. You could make a flash type app that would use about 10% of a visitors cpu power to do mathematical computations in the background. You then rent out that number crunching power to science labs and corporations. Kinda like a folding at home application with financial benefits. That's my hard to do suggestion. Possible but not really probable for now.
I am concerned about the internet and the future of quality articles. Even CNN is showing a lack of funding online. I'm catching typos left and right everyday. Sometimes multiple typo's in one article. Why? Because now that the internet boom is over and the bean counters are looking at the bottom line, jobs are being cut. My guess is fact checkers and proof readers are the first to go.
Lastly, a pay for content system could work. But I think icrontic would need to join up with 20 other tech websites to really make it worth it. I know that may sound like a horrible idea, joining forces with a competitor, but do you think you'll be able to generate enough compelling articles to start a subscription based service? If Icrontic was part of a larger tech-site package it would be a much easier sale.
Recently, I had to make a business decision I didn't like but it turned out great. I was dumping a lot of money and time to compete with another creator on a line of similar products. His pockets are deeper than mine and he is established. Long story short, I'm now offering his products with some of my design twists on them. So now my enemy is my friend. It's become that whole, "can't beat them, join them," kinda thing.
Reach out to your enemies. I'm sure they are struggling with the same type of problems.
You can only go so far with advertising, creative sponsorships, and wild suggestions like sneaking cpu cycles.
Monetization can more cleverly be done by simulating your analytics data and selling the results to marketing companies. Most sites that generate significant traffic are sitting on gold mines of information and struggling to survive on broken copper mines of advertising revenue.
Prime you can contact me if you want some advice on how to tweak and sell your analytics.
One problem with subscriptions to news/reviews first is that there are still many sites doing it for free. So you would be directly competing against them. Unless you are reviewing products or scooping products other sites aren't getting.
Another option is to put in banner adds into technical support sections with a subscription removing them. I know some sites doing this that appear to work for them.
But probably the most advantageous and long term way of generating revenue is through merchandising, paid events and just getting bigger in general. Possibly branching out into other mediums as well to grab revenue streams there. Like advanced video/pod casts through subscription.
Ultimately it's going to be a question of running the site as something you do on the side or running the site as what you do.
One problem with subscriptions to news/reviews first is that there are still many sites doing it for free. So you would be directly competing against them. Unless you are reviewing products or scooping products other sites aren't getting.
We don't currently have plans to include exclusive members-only news and reviews.
Another option is to put in banner adds into technical support sections with a subscription removing them. I know some sites doing this that appear to work for them.
Subscribers will see NO display ads on the site at all.
But probably the most advantageous and long term way of generating revenue is through merchandising, paid events and just getting bigger in general. Possibly branching out into other mediums as well to grab revenue streams there. Like advanced video/pod casts through subscription.
We're not 100% decided on a premium content model; video/podcast content may be a part of that equation. merchandise is also an option we are considering, but that is separate from the subscription discussion.
subscription services make me hesitate. the reason is there is no guarantee i will like the content, or that i will use it enough.
a suggestion that i DID like was merchandising. I would totally pay 30 dollars for an icrontic themed something that costs 5 bucks. definitely makes me feel like i paid because i take pride and ownership in the community, and i get something cool to show i supported. plus it gives people a chance to collaborate and be part of it. maybe a sweet t-shirt design contest for the t-shirt you guys decide to sell in the fundraiser, or a sweet set of icrontic wallpaper designs. Everyone who wants to designs them, and we sell the whole pack of high res designs as a fundraiser.
I use the word fundraiser because I feel like we would be selling more than a t-shirt, we are selling ownership and support and getting something in return to feel like you belong to the community. GETTING to give back a little to a site that has given so much to you is a cool thing.
I'd definitely buy Icrontic merch (well, as long as it was worthwhile merch). It also has the added benefit of being advertising for the site. Not that I don't do enough advertising as it is, always blabbing about the TF2 lulz and the amazing time I had at EPIC.
I too would love Icrontic merch, particularly if it was functional. For example, I LOVED the Oktoberfest glasses. They look awesome, but I actually USE it too.
Same would go for Icrontic decal sheets, shot glasses, mousepads and other cafepress-type things, etc. Like, for the decals, they could be simple -- just the Icrontic fedora logo. Perhaps the website below it in small white text. Whatever else that can help us show our love of Icrontic to others (even weird "conversation pieces") would be great ideas.
Merch is not really a profitable venture at the level we operate at: Profit margins are so small on stuff at these quantities that it's not realistic.
We could realistically sell maybe 40-50 glasses? T-shirts? Maybe 100?
You have to sell merch in the hundreds to make it worth the time that it takes to get involved with it.
You guys think you'll all buy merchandise, but that's a one-off, one-time purchase. Sure, it may make us a few hundred dollars one time, but it's not a sustainable source of revenue.
Merch is not really a profitable venture at the level we operate at: Profit margins are so small on stuff at these quantities that it's not realistic.
I don't think we were thinking of merch as a profit source for Icrontic, so much as a feature for Icrontic fans to use. More of a marketing, help spread the word kind of deal by putting the logo and site name on things people could use. For example, if we have Icrontic case badges, others may ask at other LAN parties about Icronitc, which would spark a conversation.
As for the one-time purchase part, that's a very good point. Perhaps continue to do like what you did with the Oktoberfest glasses - do a limited-run batch of them, and sell it to us IC fans as kind of a service or promotion. Or maybe even save this as a sign-up gift for people that subscribe for a year or more. Point is, I understand it's not going to make you guys lots of money, but it may be good for something else anyways.
As long as you guys at least break even in the end, it honestly may be worth it to try. The "free" marketing we'd all get and fan-service alone may be worthwhile. Just my opinion.
It takes no capital to upload a nice copy of the IC logo to cafepress. If people buy, some money comes in, if they don't, it doesn't. There is no way to lose money, if you use a one-off place like cafepress. Not that I think it'll make more than a few dollars per month, but it is possible, and it is super-duper easy.
For example, I threw this store together in five minutes one afternoon when one of the players in a tactical role-playing game I was running said it would be cool to have t-shirts. I think I sold that one t-shirt, a couple of mousepads, and I bought myself one of the mugs, and that was all I ever sold. I made about $10. Pretty good for five minutes.
primesuspect
Beepin n' BoopinDetroit, MI Icrontian
Comments
Don't know how we can inspire the sense of ownership the reading public needs to see the value in Internet-based content. Maybe the concept of "content" is part of the problem. There may be no magic solution for all audiences, and for all kinds of media.
Corporations have money...
Just a thought....
The internet has been free for so long in relation to easy access to information, advertisement revenues are down but most readers will never realise the absolute cost of running the show is driven directly from them. Readers demand great content. That means people have to work full time on it to achieve that but the writers/editors have got to make a living as well as pay the bills for the site. It's not a site, it's a business.
In the UK, the times newspapers have started charging for access to their online content. Why? Because the newspaper model is dying and they have a business to run. The online ad market is shrinking in a tough economic climate. Coupled with much better advertisement opportunities embedded in apple or android applications. Don't discount the value of direct targetted ads from the mobile marketplace.
So a subscription model is a possible way but when audience has access to the content for free for so long, its hard to ask them to suddenly pay for it. Certainly the times has had an awful backlash for their new pay for online access model.
It's a catch 22.
The Internet will eventually float like any other regular business. Companies get money from consumers and investors. The money coming from both sides gives each financially-supporting members benefits afforded by the other. Investors or advertisers get eyeballs and the ability to control content. Subscribers get exclusivity and discounts from sponsored agents. Yada yada yada...
Wherever there are value propositions, there is only two answers - YES or NO. As the business owner, allow your paying people tell you if you are doing a good enough job or not.
They also referenced that a US-based newspaper tried the same thing a few years back, and failed miserably. I think it was the New York Times. They had that "freemium" model that Hubert mentioned, where they would have a bunch of plain-vanilla content, but the more juicy stuff was behind the subscriptions (or at least, that's the gist the BBC conversation gave me).
In my opinion, "free" content providers like reddit (and quite possibly Icrontic) may just have to be creative and come up with something new. Perhaps something gimmicky, who knows. Maybe we -do- need a subscription service, and offer things like entrance to contests, offer behind-the-scenes articles, or even have live chats with the editors once in a while via uStream or a text-based chat.
I don't know, it's tough to come up with ideas that actually WORK. Even harder to entice people to pay for it.
That's a common model, it's called advertorial content or sponsored content. "This post sponsored by..."
It's a model we're thinking of delving into.
I disagree. Much like sites who used to run banner ads in the early days "lost credibility", it was more of a culture shift: people had to get used to the idea that just because you are making money doesn't mean you are selling out.
Advertorial content can work in a community like this because we are trusted; we've built that trust over ten years and it's as good as gold.
It's a thin and weird line between paid product reviews and sponsored content. The solution is to make clear to your sponsors that you will not be dishonest.
Let's use real-world Icrontic examples:
Think back to this review of the Sumo Gamer. We spent hours writing it, photographing it, editing it, and publishing it. It has been seen by tens of thousands of people. At no point did anyone ever suggest that we were selling out by including an affiliate link on it. You like what you see? You buy the bag, we get a cut. That's fair, right?
Pretend for a moment that Sumo paid us for that writeup. Would it change your opinion of it? After reading it, do you somehow think differently knowing that we received compensation for it? We would have stated at the beginning: This post sponsored by Sumo Lounge Furniture (we're required by law to do that if it comes down to it). Something like: "We received compensation for this article."
My answer to that is: no, not really. The fact is, we technically DID receive compensation for it by having an affiliate link in there; in addition, we get to keep the bag (another form of compensation). Are we 'sellouts'? Is our integrity impinged because of that?
If you feel that it is, then Icrontic (and most other sites you read about products on) are probably not for you. The sad truth is, we need to make money somehow, or sites like us will either cease to exist, or go back to being nothing more than a closed community of the same 30 people talking to each other every day (something which has been supplanted by Twitter and Facebook).
The culture shift that needs to happen is thus: People need to start recognizing that sites like Icrontic are providing a valuable service. Do the events, friendships, laughs, TF2 server, WoW Guild, massive Steam group, contests and giveaways, and culture mean anything to you, do they add value to your life? If they answer is yes, then what is it worth to you, financially?
My old fallback is this: You spend money on a lot of stupid crap (like 12 packs of diet coke or something) that adds far less value to your life than the service that sites like Icrontic provides. It's a realigning of priorities. Why should Coke or Pepsi or cigarettes get all of your leisure cash instead of cutting off a piece for Icrontic?
And if you're not willing to pay, then you have to be willing to trust us that the money we may take for sponsored content is "clean". It's really nothing more than that.
If the site doesn't believe in a product and wouldn't buy it for themselves or a family member, then you don't write it.
You don't take money to write the review because you want the money. You take the money to write the review because you believe in the product so much that you would have written about it anyways.
//EDIT:
For example, nobody on god's green earth could convince me to write an article on Samsung hard drives for money. I don't believe in that product and I wouldn't recommend them to others. If, however, someone wanted to pay me to write an article on a Western Digital drive, then yes, I might consider it.
The other thing to remember is that paid content doesn't necessarily exclude criticism. A product with niggling issues can still come across as broadly recommended.
If those companies had approached me for sponsored advertorials, I would have reviewed them (as I did), and said to them: I can't say anything good about this. I recommend other products instead. If you still want to sponsor a post, let's let it not be about your product. Let's be creative. Here's a fictional scenario:
Today we closed our spyware forum after years of providing sketchy free service to random google users. I say sketchy because we don't have the staff or resources to make it reliable. Now, imagine that we could keep it open by paying people some small amount of money, like $5 per closed case or something, and ADDLOGIX sponsored that.
"Icrontic's spyware forum sponsored by ADDLOGIX, makers of LAN GUARD", with a link to their website. We're not endorsing them, we're simply selling them the same thing as banner space. The way it works right now, hell, we could indeed BE selling them banner space and I wouldn't even know it.
ADDLOGIX would pay us a monthly charge, and we would use that to compensate the helpers.
I can tell ADDLOGIX: Hey, your product that you sent me stinks; here's what's wrong with it. I can't say anything good about it. I'm publishing a terrible review of it. If that changes your mind on the spyware forum sponsorship, so be it.
Who knows what they'll say about that, but it behooves them to get their link out to eyeballs, and that is something we CAN provide.
If they pull their sponsorship because of the review? Shrug, we close the spyware forum or find another sponsor. What else can we do? If we lie about the product, it will come back to bite us in the ass. "Yeah, I bought this based on Icrontic's (false) review and it is a pile of shit that killed my internet connection". You can't hide from that, so there's no way we would even bother lying about a product in print.
Those are the kinds of creative campaigns that sites like ours need to engage in to stay afloat.
Not to mention the competition, the beeb's online services (news/sports/radio and TV streams) are all free.
I'm sure there are a few who can't live without their paper's own particular bias but who's going to pay for what can (mostly) be got for nowt?
I am concerned about the internet and the future of quality articles. Even CNN is showing a lack of funding online. I'm catching typos left and right everyday. Sometimes multiple typo's in one article. Why? Because now that the internet boom is over and the bean counters are looking at the bottom line, jobs are being cut. My guess is fact checkers and proof readers are the first to go.
Lastly, a pay for content system could work. But I think icrontic would need to join up with 20 other tech websites to really make it worth it. I know that may sound like a horrible idea, joining forces with a competitor, but do you think you'll be able to generate enough compelling articles to start a subscription based service? If Icrontic was part of a larger tech-site package it would be a much easier sale.
Recently, I had to make a business decision I didn't like but it turned out great. I was dumping a lot of money and time to compete with another creator on a line of similar products. His pockets are deeper than mine and he is established. Long story short, I'm now offering his products with some of my design twists on them. So now my enemy is my friend. It's become that whole, "can't beat them, join them," kinda thing.
Reach out to your enemies. I'm sure they are struggling with the same type of problems.
Monetization can more cleverly be done by simulating your analytics data and selling the results to marketing companies. Most sites that generate significant traffic are sitting on gold mines of information and struggling to survive on broken copper mines of advertising revenue.
Prime you can contact me if you want some advice on how to tweak and sell your analytics.
Icrontic: turning trolling into profit since 2010.
One problem with subscriptions to news/reviews first is that there are still many sites doing it for free. So you would be directly competing against them. Unless you are reviewing products or scooping products other sites aren't getting.
Another option is to put in banner adds into technical support sections with a subscription removing them. I know some sites doing this that appear to work for them.
But probably the most advantageous and long term way of generating revenue is through merchandising, paid events and just getting bigger in general. Possibly branching out into other mediums as well to grab revenue streams there. Like advanced video/pod casts through subscription.
Ultimately it's going to be a question of running the site as something you do on the side or running the site as what you do.
We don't currently have plans to include exclusive members-only news and reviews.
Subscribers will see NO display ads on the site at all.
We're not 100% decided on a premium content model; video/podcast content may be a part of that equation. merchandise is also an option we are considering, but that is separate from the subscription discussion.
Icrontic has been my full time job for over two years now
a suggestion that i DID like was merchandising. I would totally pay 30 dollars for an icrontic themed something that costs 5 bucks. definitely makes me feel like i paid because i take pride and ownership in the community, and i get something cool to show i supported. plus it gives people a chance to collaborate and be part of it. maybe a sweet t-shirt design contest for the t-shirt you guys decide to sell in the fundraiser, or a sweet set of icrontic wallpaper designs. Everyone who wants to designs them, and we sell the whole pack of high res designs as a fundraiser.
I use the word fundraiser because I feel like we would be selling more than a t-shirt, we are selling ownership and support and getting something in return to feel like you belong to the community. GETTING to give back a little to a site that has given so much to you is a cool thing.
After several sleepless nights, lots of sweat and sore fingers from typing, I put the final coat of paint on our day sponsor program.
I hope this is the beginning of the end for display ads on Icrontic. Believe me, nobody wants to have ads and in-text link ads go away more than me.
Same would go for Icrontic decal sheets, shot glasses, mousepads and other cafepress-type things, etc. Like, for the decals, they could be simple -- just the Icrontic fedora logo. Perhaps the website below it in small white text. Whatever else that can help us show our love of Icrontic to others (even weird "conversation pieces") would be great ideas.
We could realistically sell maybe 40-50 glasses? T-shirts? Maybe 100?
You have to sell merch in the hundreds to make it worth the time that it takes to get involved with it.
You guys think you'll all buy merchandise, but that's a one-off, one-time purchase. Sure, it may make us a few hundred dollars one time, but it's not a sustainable source of revenue.
I don't think we were thinking of merch as a profit source for Icrontic, so much as a feature for Icrontic fans to use. More of a marketing, help spread the word kind of deal by putting the logo and site name on things people could use. For example, if we have Icrontic case badges, others may ask at other LAN parties about Icronitc, which would spark a conversation.
As for the one-time purchase part, that's a very good point. Perhaps continue to do like what you did with the Oktoberfest glasses - do a limited-run batch of them, and sell it to us IC fans as kind of a service or promotion. Or maybe even save this as a sign-up gift for people that subscribe for a year or more. Point is, I understand it's not going to make you guys lots of money, but it may be good for something else anyways.
As long as you guys at least break even in the end, it honestly may be worth it to try. The "free" marketing we'd all get and fan-service alone may be worthwhile. Just my opinion.
Are you referring to the IC Oktoberfest glasses?
People always say they're going to buy, but they never buy. Or they don't buy in enough volume to make it profitable, or to make the costs reasonable.
I STILL have over 100 Joinfolding.com t-shirts in my basement... still in boxes.
For example, I threw this store together in five minutes one afternoon when one of the players in a tactical role-playing game I was running said it would be cool to have t-shirts. I think I sold that one t-shirt, a couple of mousepads, and I bought myself one of the mugs, and that was all I ever sold. I made about $10. Pretty good for five minutes.