Introducing: Blocktopia Premium™
Blocktopia has always been a close and non-profit community, created for friends to enjoy themselves together. But today, I am to announce a major shift in this community’s operations. After recent alarming threads in our Staff Forums ("omg bt is diein guys ;_;"), Blocktopia has come to the decision to steadily monetise our service.
What will this change?
We have slowly been taking small steps to work towards making Blocktopia a profitable organisation that is able to continue to provide quality experiences for you, the player. Across the next month, these changes will take effect. While we may introduce further measures later in the year, the finalised alterations are as follows:
Staff will get paid
In order to guarantee motivation and dedication in our team of server Directors, a quarterly wage will be given, dependent on server performance. For those interested, these wages will be influenced by statistics such as average player count, server stability, and number of staff. While at this point in time only Directors will receive a wage, should this scheme prove to improve Blocktopia’s overall popularity and performance, this offer may be extended out to Controllers. You may wonder from where the funds for these payments will be sourced, which brings us to the introduction of the next feature.
Blocktopia Premium™
While this idea has been the victim of mockery and satire, the fact remains that Blocktopia Premium™ provides a strong business model for us here at Blocktopia. This will be able to be bought by any member using our custom web-based shop, which will occupy the ‘blocktopia.net’ address upon its completion (Hence why the server information hub regrettably had to be removed). Upon purchase, you will pay S90.00 a month for 3 months. With a low figure of just approximately $3 a day, this is an affordable and sustainable method of maintaining the servers. After this period you will become a normal member again or you may choose to extend your premium membership with another 3 months. Being a premium member gives you many advantages, including the following:
-> Access to an exclusive Premium subforum
-> The ability to make status updates, avatars, signatures, conversations and other messages "Premium-Only', which will make it so only Premium members can view them.
-> A "Premium" title on the forums.
-> In-game perks such as unlimited blocks, just like classic (Rituals of Fire). Optional ref-mode (Army of Darkness), Teleportation (Dusk of Discordia) and ability to use Command Blocks (Buildbox).
-> Access to PTNT 2.0 Beta testing period, with full access to all features.
Blocktopia Premium+™
For those fortunate to have a strong source of income, Blocktopia Premium+™ is available, which extends upon the features of Blocktopia Premium™ for a small increase in subscription cost ($175.00 a month for 3 months. which can always be extended of course), namely:
-> Non-negotiable unbans from any of our Minecraft servers (maximum of 5 per subscription period)
-> The ability to permanently remove three non-staff members from the community.
-> A ‘sparkle effect’ on your name in the Forum User list
We are very excited about this and hope you will join us in a completely new and exciting experience. While this news may be concerning to many of you, please do bear in mind the sheer effort that goes into maintaining our servers for your enjoyment. In taking these steps, it is hoped that we, the Administration, will be able to not only help the community grow closer, but also to fund meetings without fear of outlandish German beer prices or EasyJet baggage costs, which will allow Blocktopia to run smoother, get bigger, last longer, and be more fun!
A Q&A session will be held after the meeting this Friday for you to voice any opinions or give further suggestions.
And as always,
Stay classy, Blocktopia.
