Movies

The costs associated with keeping HSX as a hobby site are significant.  First and foremost, we'd need to buy the site.  If salvaged and successful, there will need to be a management team or board of directors to help facilitate its ongoing operations.  Those individuals would be working for free, out of love for the game.  

Server/hosting costs will be an ongoing expense, as well as maintenance and any bug fixes or new development needed along the way.

I know many of us have invested a lot of our lives into HSX and there's considerable love for this site.  With that in mind, I propose the following:

1. A board of directors, made up of current players and led by myself will be the equity owners and will conduct a crowdfunding campaign to save the site (and possibly bring back DMac)

2. The board will manage the crowdfunding campaign, and then if successful, the strategic direction of what HSX becomes.  The board will be made up of members of the community who can directly contribute their time to the future of HSX (web development, web programming, hosting, strategic planning, legal, etc) and members who contribute to the campaign above a certain threshold. 

3. I think a lot of us know the main purpose of the site is to sell the data to Hollywood, but since the owners are essentially letting the site die, there is likely very little revenue, if any coming in right now.  Therefore, we will need to generate new revenue from the site.  This will be the board's first priority.

4. The board's next priority, with feedback from the community, will be to update the site.  Since we would not be held to standards needed to collect data to sell to Hollywood, we can implement strategies (with DMac's expertise, we hope) to make the game more attractive to players who have left and new players.

5. The board will also brainstorm additional side aspects of the box office business, to inject new blood into the site; think Summer Pick 7 type side games. 

I have created a survey below to get some idea of how much folks are willing to contribute either to a crowdfunding campaign, the ability to pay to play the new HSX, or possibly both.  PLEASE FILL OUT THE SURVEY HERE:  https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/7V5B9GQ  It is anonymous and you don't need an account to take it.  You will see real time results as you finish it.  

We need to determine if there is even enough interest to make a go at this, so we need honest answers and maximum participation.  

I am willing to put a considerable amount of money into this site, but it's going to take more than I am willing to put up.  This is a last chance effort to see how bad the community wants to keep it around.  Please keep that in mind.

I plan to keep this survey active through the week and reposting this post as it rolls over.  I want to collect as many members input as possible.

Lastly, I am working with a couple members on this board that are highly respected, so please know thought and consideration are being put into a best effort attempt.  At the end of the week I will start inquiring with members who reach out and want to be part of the team to get this moving.  I will also post results at that time and see where we are.  AGAIN, THIS IS ALL DEPENDENT ON IF WE HAVE ENOUGH MEMBERS WILLING TO MOVE THE NEEDLE.

I sincerely thank all of you in advance for filling out the survey and for all the emails you've sent, as well as the responses below.

Stay safe and good luck to us all,
lobo