Monetizing the Cartographers Guild

[Sathurn]

Looking at the request at the top of the page for 700 dollars I had a thought.

What if all the artist who take a paying job from the map request board, were to kick back 10% of the commission to the guild. Since making it legal requirement would be more paperwork than the administrators need it would need to be based on a honor system.

I will be the first to say, as a freeloader here I don't, at present, have any skin in the game.

The question is what if there is more $7,000 worth of commerce moving through the board? do we use the extra to make paying contest? carry forward to next year? is 10% to high?

[Sapiento]

It seems this idea comes up again and again in one form or the other.

How do you control who takes which job? And how will you force the artist to pay?

Since I'm active here I have gladly and voluntarily donated each year to the server fund and I have no desire to be forced to do this (taxes are bad enough). And I can't imagine that my professional colleagues have a monumentally different opinion.

[Diamond]

Yep, I got to agree with Sap. Enough of us value the CG enough to contribute funds to make the necessary upgrades each year; if we monetize beyond that, I really think it'll suck the life and fun out of this place.

I've seen it happen before.

Now, if someone wanted to, on their own, pony up a cash prize or something for a challenge, I'd enter.

[mearrin69]

I'm more than happy to voluntarily give something back...did last round though I haven't yet this round. Will do, though, and continue to in the future.
M

[torstan]

The amount paid on cartography commissions is often at or below the minimum wage, especially when starting out and the commissions take longer than they would after some practice. As a result I think requiring, or even encouraging, a percentage kickback from most users who pick up commissions is not reasonable. However, the users of the forum do tend to chip in over the year for the hosting costs, and so far the forum has not come up short on hosting bills. This way, the costs are born as much by the users who come here for the maps as by those who come here to sell maps.

An alternative structure would be to require companies posting commissions over $500 (or some other threshold fee) to pay a small surcharge to post a job. ConceptArt did this - but I'm inclined against that approach too, as it's likely to dissuade companies from pitching larger jobs here, rather than going directly to a cartographer they like.

It's certainly something that comes round every now and again. That's my personal view on it, rather than any view on behalf of the CG.

[krasimir]

Why not make advertisers pay, IF they get someone to take on their project. Or it could be a small fee for the privilege to post a RFM. Alternatively, artists could be asked to pay for some kind of an easy portfolio mini site but that's already available in a clunky sort of way via the forum itself.