2021 Accountability
Putting on a conference is a lot of work.
Organizing a full-on 3-day-long online-only conference for the second year has once again been a very educational and rewarding challenge for the planning squad.
Pulling this off relied primarily on many MANY hours of volunteer work from a variety of people who were very generous with both their time and expertise. No amount of money could afford this dedication and commitment and we are eternally thankful for their contribution.
We endeavored to keep most of the work DIY. In order to make things run smoothly and effectively we also needed some tooling and infrastructure to support us, and to ensure all participants have as smooth as possible an experience. The following is an accounting of the costs associated with these items.
Note: While we have an active store selling merchandise of interest to Summit attendees, we created these products because people asked and are excited about it, not to turn a profit, so all items are sold at cost and we do not make any money from their sales.
Expenses
$270.00 - Video conferencing and recording with Zoom (1 month)
$40.00 - Live captioning services with Rev (2 months)
$100.00 - Cloud storage and domain names with Google and Dreamhost (12 months)
$50.00 - Communication tools and automation with Zappier (2 months)
$40.00 - Merchandise sales and fulfillment with Printful and Storenvy (2 months)
$100.00 - Shipping and distribution with local mail services (one time fee)
$82.00 - Surveying services (2 months)
Total to date: US $682.00 as of October 19, 2021
Donations
To help us offset the expenses incurred, we have set up a PayPal pool to gather donations. We chose Paypal to keep transaction fees as low as possible so all donations could be maximally applied to offset the amount spent, as noted above.
Total to date: US $640 as of October 19, 2021.
We are not looking to raise a specific amount, only enough to offset the expenses accrued above. Paypal requires a number set for fundraising goal so we picked Anne Lister's birthday arbitrarily.
Donate now!
Our sincerest thanks to the following for their generosity and support: Victoria Neale, Cornelia Trem, Katherine Igoe, Elizabeth Johnson, Ellen Newell, Diane Halford, A Lemkin, Tracy Dale, Samantha Bennion, Jan Webster, Kay Pollock
Note: We will discontinue the Summit Purse through PayPal as that service is being retired on November 8, 2021 and will replace it with an equivalent option.
We expect that some of the expenses above should become an ongoing commitment as we continue to maintain the content created and plan further gatherings and other activities to support this growing community, so any donations that exceed current expenses will be applied towards future expenses.
We don't currently have a specific forecast for ongoing costs but a rough estimate of continuing with basic infrastructure for website, storage, domain names, occasional online meetings, etc, should amount to roughly $100/month.