We have been astonished at the amount of donations and quality of letters of support that has flooded our office! This is the most successful hurry-up operation we've ever seen! The support we have received has been specifically directed towards the debt incurred by the server storage of LDS Friends Worldwide. We are keeping accurate records with all the letters and checks that we have received.
The ldsfriends.com server has paid the $825.96 that it owed by August 30, thanks to your donations. In all, all of y'all have paid for $932.00 of the $1,658.29 that was stated in the letter of July 24. Unfortunately, Downtown Web Productions still owes $726.29 on its other servers. If these servers are not paid off by August 30, then all the servers, including LDS Friends Worldwide, will be shut down.
In our late-night and morning haste to send off an appeal for donations, we failed to explain that not all the debt was specifically related to ldsfriends.com, although all the gifts are absolutely necessary for LDS Friends Worldwide to continue; it was because of this necessity that we made that mistake. For this we apologize. By August 2, we had received the $825.96 stated above. For those letters received after our amount had been reached, you have the choice to decide how the money will be used. Otherwise we will use it for maintaining and upgrading ldsfriends.com only.
Roger Brown, the webmaster, recently installed a database that will be the foundation for a new and improved site that will permit you to edit your listing anytime with your own password! The database will also include better search features such as searching for only those who have photos. The new site will be ready by the end of September.
Roger has worked thousands of hours on the LDS Friends Worldwide site since its beginnings in October 1995. Christian Adams has spent at least 100 hours on the site. If they hadn't spent so much time on this site, then he would have had more time to make other web sites to pay for the other servers' leases. We hope that you all can understand our challenge--it's more than just paying for the site, but also saving us time, and to make more features in the future!
Your donations are still appreciated by everyone who uses the site, because it will help to maintain and improve the site, i.e. the database. With the current jobs and sites that Roger and I are working on, we should be able to pay off the remaining $726.29. If you would like to contribute, please specify where you want the money to go.
Thank you,
Sincerely,
Christian Adams
Site Designer
cadams@ldsfriends.com
801-356-3739
Roger L. Brown
Webmaster
webmaster@ldsfriends.com
801-371-6358
LDS Friends Worldwide
670 E 800 N
Provo UT 84606
USA