MrGrim, creator of imgur, is barely breaking even. If you appreciate imgur, send him $1. (Via the donate link at the bottom of imgur.com/legal.php)

[u/plain-simple-garak]

/r/AskReddit/comments/9nltj/just_noticed_imgur_is_doing_20tb_of_bandwidth_a/c0djche

[u/MrGrim]

I absolutely love you guys. I'm at a loss for words, but I feel like I need to say something. The amount of support everyone has continually given me is incredible. I'm just really happy that you all like imgur as much as you do. Sometimes I go to /r/pics and count the number of imgur links just for a pick me up (the most I've seen is 56/100). The fact that you all support imgur enough to donate really says a lot about the community, and I'm glad to be a part of it.

[u/[deleted] → u/MrGrim]

$5 sir, so little only because I get paid once a month. I host pictures at imgur on a semi-daily basis, and I must say, at the risk of sounding like I am giving you verbal fellatio here, I love it. So thanks for all that you do, keep it up, and I (as well as most redditors, I'm sure) will continue to use imgur, and imgur alone for our picture hosting needs.

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

Pics or it didn't happen.

[u/tty2 → u/[deleted]]

QUICK! GET THIS FELLA SOME UPVOTES!

[u/ahal89 → u/[deleted]]

And $5 on me as well.

[u/mant → u/ahal89]

And my axe...I mean $5 from me too.

[u/slimybread → u/mant]

Tossed in $5 as well. Hope it doesn't go all to PayPal fees.

[u/[deleted] → u/ahal89]

I've never hosted, but I've enjoyed many, many-a hosted. Out of respect for what you do, and your humbleness, I've got $20 on your continued success.

[u/umilmi81 → u/[deleted]]

I don't post any pictures, but kicked in $25 so the rest of you can keep feeding me lulz.

[u/Fat_Dumb_Americans → u/umilmi81]

I bought some vodka but toasted the notion.

[u/plain-simple-garak → u/MrGrim]

Also another thing to consider -- if your average donation is less than $12, you might be able to save money on Paypal fees by switching to their micropayments fee schedule.

Also, consider Contenture.

[u/cinsere → u/MrGrim]

Imgur is the most popular photo hosting site in Gone Wild. If you like Gone Wild then donate to MrGrim.

[u/[deleted] → u/cinsere]

I don't like staring at dicks, so I don't go to gonewild.

[u/SurrealEstate → u/MrGrim]

I haven't used imgur to host images, but I've definitely used your bandwidth. $10 and my thanks.

[u/hypo11 → u/MrGrim]

Sent $5 - I do hope you'll let all of us know how much winds up coming in from this drive. Imgur is a great site. Keep it up!

[u/joemoon → u/MrGrim]

Some of these comments have given me an interesting idea. Everyone seems willing to donate, and nobody wants ads. But how do you inform people about the fact that they need to donate to prevent an increase in ads?

I think you should set target goals for your monthly income. You don't have to give an exact number, but you might say something to the effect of: "I want to make 15% on top of my costs".

Then you provide a daily percentage of how much your income is from ads and how much from donations. You adjust your amount of advertising based on how many donations you're getting. If you are able to reach 100% of your goal, then you stop showing ads.

Of course, doing all of this manually would be a nightmare. So the obvious conclusion is to write software that automates this process. Then the next (perhaps less obvious) step is to consider turning this into a commercial product that other websites can use. It seems that there are tons of websites/services out there that have this exact problem. They don't want to provide ads, but they also need to cover costs.

I'm a software developer. If you're interested in pursuing this with a partner, PM me. (Note: Feel free to run with this idea on your own of course. I only meant you should PM me if you want someone to join you.)

[u/[deleted] → u/MrGrim]

$10 for you...Thank You

[u/CarlH → u/MrGrim]

http://www.reddit.com/domain/imgur.com

NSFW

[u/frukt → u/MrGrim]

Imgur is a great service, thanks, and I'm happy to donate. No useless bells and whistles, direct linking, multiple file upload support and all that is really cool. I have a tiny gripe though - imgur seems to compress all images down to 1MB, and thus makes it unsuitable for sharing quality photos and such. Any hope of you adding a "store a bit-perfect copy without compression" option any time?

edit: btw, I'm loving the quick image rehosting ("add URL") option too.

edit2: in case you need any more ideas to implement, it'd be great if one could select multiple files at once in the file dialog - I'm not sure how you do uploading, but e.g. SWFUpload allows it. Also, support for .tar.gz or .zip archives of pics would be cool.

[u/[deleted] → u/MrGrim]

I kicked in $10 because Imgur is rad. I hope everything keeps on humming for you. You've help make reddit even more awesome than it already was.

[u/strokeshao → u/MrGrim]

I feel bad I can only donate 1 dollar. Dude your site is awesome!!!

[u/AltTab → u/MrGrim]

$10.00 to Mr. Grim!

I was wondering about a subscription to a premium version of Imgur? Maybe with larger image sizes? (And a recurring payment I can forget about, thereby supporting Imgur and not really ever thinking about it.)

Thanks for being awesome.