Some people have shown interest in donations, and I haven't forgotten about them. But it would be very tedious to set up, because some laws probably apply to it, and finding Danish laws for this specific situation isn't easy. I've found out that some lawyers offer help for free in various places at various times, but only if you meet up, so I should probably ask them some day when I have time.
This is my plan for the principles that the donations would have to run on:
- Donations should be entirely voluntary and not grant any benefits to the individual who donates. Anyone who donates can still be banned the next day if they break the rules badly.
- 100% of donations will go into covering future server costs and/or upgrading it. No donations will be spent on anything other than Blacraft.
- If donations happen, publicly available information will list all donations, the people who donated (although being listed as anonymous would be an option), and the server expenses.
- Discussions and polls on the forum will be the basis for determining how the donations should be spent, but Bla will have the final say, as long as they're spent on Blacraft.
- No-one has the right to a refund (unless there's a way to set that up).
- In case Bla cannot run Blacraft, excess donations should be spent on 'temporary' worlds etc. possibly administered by others from the community who have time, or if possible and desired, be refunded to the donors instead.
I might, with my current economic situation, consider the current monthly cost a base that I pay each month, and then let donations fund any expenses above that. But upgrading after one small donation probably wouldn't be a good idea, because if nobody donates afterwards, one month later I'll stand with a higher expense and probably be forced to downgrade again. An accumulation process would probably have to take place so we don't have to do tedious upgrade/downgrade processes for single months, for example by deciding a community goal like one-year upgrade to 2 GB RAM after hitting x money and then do the upgrade when the goal is reached.
Thanks to people who showed interest in donating, though. With that said I personally find the hardware ok to satisfy the needs atm, but not everyone agree here I know.