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Meetup.com Ends Free Meetups
jalefkowit writes "It was nice while it lasted... massively popular social-organizing service Meetup.com has announced that from here on out, they will be charging a $19/month fee to the designated organizer of each Meetup registered with the service. Regular users (those other than meetup organizers) can continue to use it free of charge, though they suggest that some organizers may wish to split the cost with their members. Users who paid for the Meetup+ service get the fees waived for one group of their choice (if they're not organizers, they can pass this benefit on to someone who is). Here's more information about the move and why they made it."
There are much better ways to organize "real people". Meetup.com was fun while it lasted, but I'll be one of the first to remove links to it from my site.
They offered a decent service while it lasted, and _yes_ they should get something for their efforts; but they _shouldn't_ sabotage their users to get compensation.
They'll die unless they re-create or re-evaluate their efforts within the next 3 weeks.
Don't think that a small group of dedicated individuals can't change the world. It's the only thing that ever has.
Once again, Slashdot advertises for a service that:
A) Has no bearing on my life
B) Has no bearing on most of the SlashDot community
C) IS probably being paid for to mention
D) Means nothing to anyone except the author
E) All of the above
Of course, my spam "modifier" (i.e., biased opinion of the moderators) will send this post to -1 hell, but thanks anyway guys - that just means that you proved my point and I'm correct.
Good going.
Here's some of what's new:
Wait...people can send e-mail to each other instead of to a group address? Who'd've thunk it?
Custom, professionally-printed offline materials for your group-- shipped (real mail, not email!) to Organizers for free!
I could make a lot of photocopies for $19 a month.
Optional online tools to make it easy for Organizers to receive money from their members.
If these members are motivated enough to sign up with a Meetup payment system, why wouldn't they just go with PayPal, which they can use for everything else as well?
We expect the number of Meetups will go down at first, but the community will rebound stronger than ever. The Group Fee will weed out less committed groups; the community will be smaller in the near-term, but it will be made up of the best Meetup Groups. ...
Oh, I get it. If you're smart enough to figure out a more productive use for $19 a month, you're just not "committed" enough. Since when was being stupid with money a sign of moral fiber?
What a troll. This was to point out that Meetup is now charging for what was once a free service. It's not an ad. It's just informative. Personally, I'm the organizer of the Current TV group in Milwaukee. We just got off the ground, but now we're going to have to end this unless Current can pay. I heard about the fact that they were charging from this very article (Meetup also sent out an email but I hadn't checked it yet). Meetup was great while it lasted. Now we'll probably just move to a different site.
Take off every sig. For great justice.
Never heard of it before, but I figured I'd peek anyways just for fun...
In a city of near a half million people here's the top groups:
Pagan Meetup Group - Meet other local Pagans, Wiccans, Druids, all walks of pagan life - exchange lore, legends and learning. 23 members.
All I can say is WTF?
Darren Hayes Meetup Group; 6 members.
Who the F is that anyways? And why would anyone want to get together to talk about some singner is beyond me.
Next is a vegan meetup group with a whole 3 members. I see no interest in meeting with people based on what I eat. What's next? A steak eaters group?
And it just gets worse... Like a psychic meetup group (or is that a group for people who hear voices?), a vampire group, a witches group... Like WTF is up with that?
Wow! That is one amazingly useless site! I didn't know there were so many mentally retarded people around here, thanks!
I'd rather just hang with normal people, TY.
Did you look at the team members and board of directors in the "about meetup" section? They are going to need to pull in a heck of a lot of money to keep all of those people gainfully employed. You could probably set up and run the whole operation with one manager and a couple of designers, maybe an external accountant contacted once a year to do up the wages.
I wouldn't deny anyone providing a valuable service the right to make money from that service, but their operation is waaay too bloated to stay afloat. Dot bomb, anyone?
What he can't kill, he has sex on. Trent.
Hobby is a polite way of saying "addiction" in this case. What we really need is a Slashoholics Anonymous Meetup. Oh, and probably a Doublestorypostaholics Anonymous for certain editors...
You can only drink 30 or 40 glasses of beer a day, no matter how rich you are.
-- Colonel Adolphus Busch
Note that most "groups" have a very small number of "members". Also, the number of members is vastly inflated because of a trick. You must become a "member" to get information about where the next meeting will be held. There may be many, many groups with "members" who decided they had no interest in the group, and never visited the group online again, or did anything with the group.
How many people will pay $228 U.S. each year to try an idea of developing a group? The value of the U.S. dollar is dropping fast because the Bush administration is rapidly borrowing money, but the dollar is not worthless.
Would you pay $2,280 over ten years to find other people in your area with an interest in a special breed of cats, for example? Especially when you never attract more than 4 people, and some of them are not very interested?
Also, some groups may have fake members entered by organizers attempting to attract people by making it seem that there is more interest than there really is. I visited one group that showed photos of two very beautiful women who said they were enthusiastic about the group. However, neither of them visited the group again, according to their statistics. A $228 yearly fee makes dishonesty more likely.
A web site for meetings is a good idea, but we need a non-adversarial method of making that happen.
This always happens with closed-source, proprietary solutions. Sooner or later the proprietor becomes abusive.
It's certainly the deathnell for the Las Vegas wifi Meetup! I took over as organizer of it about six months ago, when the previous organizer dropped out. He had it being held at a Starbucks, and I moved it to a nearby Coffee Shop with free wifi.. We're probably like many small meetups, 20-30 people actually registered with the group, but only a tiny subset of that who actually come to the the monthly meets. In fact, the last couple of months, It's been me and one other guy showing up. In fact, tonight's the monthly meeting, and after reading this, if the turnouts like usual I'm gonna pull the plug tommorrow.... I certainly am NOT going to pay $9 or $19/mo to these bloodsuckers.. Now, if we had a thriving meetup, and I could get everybody to chip in, maybe.. Goodbye, Meetup.. Greed got ya in the end..
THANK YOU, Edward Snowden!! Americans owe you a debt of gratitude (whether they know it or not..)