Serious concern over this here. I regularly visit and contribute whatever I can (although it is little in comparison to others). Is the shutting down to "encourage" contributions under threat of closing going to occasionally happen going forward? Is there any sort of plan or idea on how to handle the funding situation in such a way to prevent shutdowns?

By no means take this post as raging or hating on admins or any of that. For all of us regular visitors if there might be some plan in place that we might be able to contribute to with some regularity or help in some way to prevent emergency situations, which add stress to all on the operational end and seems rather unnecessary, that would be nice to know.

It's a legit concern since this is the second shutdown in 6 months or a year. I can't exactly remember when the last one happened. Last time the admins said they had a new advertising scheme in place to prevent shutdowns. Guess that did not work.

The pledge drive happens several times a year. Has been for years. ya get used to it....

Not surprised since the help page said the exact same thing last time.

On the other hand, you CAN download almost any album you'd want, and even unreleased sessions, for free. So there is that.

Damn straight which is why I donated.

I donated $50 around May if I recall correctly (there's definitely a record somewhere, I just forget exactly when it was) and was not given a lifetime mass downloads account (the amount had been lowered from $100 to $50), nor even Donator status.