I'm trying to rack my brains for ideas. Some of these are bound to be bad ones - I'm only brainstorming.

We're a little slow with the auction. High end items don't sell very well, because most of us don't have the money. It's my feeling the little things would add up, and people don't have a problem buying something for $10 - $20. Of course the problem with this is we'd have to continue putting stuff up.

Benefit concerts - more for fundraisers than continuing income.

Having donation jars at gigs, sessions, your favorite bar.

CD. We've talked about this before, but it seems like it's too difficult to get off the ground, and there's money required up front. A quality CD of 'Catters, perhaps singing songs from the DT. A CD of people singing Mudcat songs is fine, if you only want to sell the CD to hard-core Mudcatters.

Digital Tradition CD. It's quite likely Dick feels like he shouldn't charge more for this than it costs him to make, but most folks - even us poor ones - wouldn't have a problem with paying at least $15 - $20 for a copy. (Plus it's still down-loadable for free.)

I'm forgetful and lazy. If there were a way (and I will check on this) to have my bank automatically send $10 a month to Mudcat, I'd do it.

Mudcat Coffeehouse. Have it once a month, and don't pass around a can for donations - charge admission. $3 - $5.

The banner adds may be a necessity in the end, but Max can choose whose add(s) he puts up. Most sites seem to have sponsors of some sort, and I'll understand if he goes that route.

Naemanson - lottery?!?!? We could do that, if it were easier to physically get the money to Max. Nobody's going to want to write a check for $1. One idea is to have a drawing for something like a song or tunebook. Folks in various areas could publicise it and sell tickets. We collect the tickets and donations and send them to Max, he does the drawing and makes sure the winner gets the prize. Of course, this would require more work and responsibility on our parts than would be reasonable, sensible, or likely to happen.

I don't know that the problem is the willingness to donate rather than the difficulty in donating smaller sums of money. If there were an easy way for folks to drop a dollar or two on occasion, it would make things a lot easier, but I can't see one.