Would the moderators of the site be kind enough to inform us members about the financial contribution is going to be made by our gold sponsor as they do for the amount needed for developing and running the site?

Hi maker1! Sponsorship means that publicity is provided for the sponsor company in exchange for financial support to iSLCollective.com. We are not authorized to disclose financial details, since such information represents the confidential business information of the sponsoring entity. We are happy to have been able to found this sponsorship for the next two months, since we can put these new funds toward running iSLCollective, and preparing for the fast growth of the membership this year.
Bless up, Peter

Now, somehow this does not sound fair to me. Secret agreements are being made on a site which has grown soo big with the help of the contributors not only with their self created materials but also financially; without whom you wouldn't be finding these sponsors. I joined this site with the belief that it was totally non-profitable sharing site. Still you are the creators of the site and I guess that is how you see fit. Therefore there is only one thing left for me which is to say farewell to your wonderful site and take my exit once again.....

Well, dear Maker 1,
As a great contributor - & as a wonderful person - I'll ask you not to. We DO need people like you ... ;-)
Sylvie

Please don't be overly concerned about this member. I recalled a year ago this member bid a farewell to eslprintable in very much the same manner... just for a different reason. Maybe his / her membership tenure of this site is simple over. Islcollective continue to do the great work you are doing...

Hey Peter, are you going to be a millionaire??? Good for you, I say.

Good news to start 2013: we’d like to acknowledge a fellow teacher, Dave Wingler, as the sponsor of iSLCollective.com for January-February.

iSLCollective.com is a place which helps teachers enjoy the benefits of technology and serves as a marketplace of new ideas. In that spirit, I'd like to bring your attention to the iPad applications developed by Dave, which help English language classes learn in a fresh and exciting way. Inspired by the success of his co-created Futaba Classroom Games, Dave just launched his new app: Astroloquiz.

Astroloquiz teaches pupils the star signs and the personality traits associated with them. In a quiz brought to life by 8 voice-over artists, pupils imagine how they would react to the 48 real-life situations, eventually, to find out their "true" star sign. Along the way, they can look up the meaning of 90 personality adjectives. If you have one or more iPads handy, it is a cool way to let our students explore their personality and the personality of those around them, while the situations easily lend themselves to frank and thought-provoking conversations developing learners' conversational fluency.

To download Astroloquiz click on the banner on the right. For more info about the app or to discuss how to bring your curriculum to life on Apple devices, please contact him at http://togetherlearningmedia.com. If you have any tips on using this app or others in class, we invite you to reply to this forum thread.

Thank you, Dave, for supporting iSLCollective!

Bless up,
Peter

i think we should be grateful for having this wonderful site, thank you peter..

As far as I can see sponsorshp wiil let us avoid fundrising or postpone it, right?

absolutely agree) It's a great help for teachers

Dear Members!

Let me address the subject of the Astroloquiz ad and the broader issue of what it means for iSLCollective. There is a two-month deal between a small app developer company and a niche (specialized) website for language teachers. We’re not YouTube or Yahoo, and what the Astroloquiz ad brought in is a small fraction of the costs we will be having this year. Costs which nobody is quite sure how much they will be. So it's help, but in no way does it change the fact that we need to rely on member contributions, fundraisers to run and develop the site. Unless, anyone can bring in 10 major advertisers, like Oxford or Berlitz, and we plaster the site with ads all over.

This company was the first one ever that contacted us to advertise on the site, and we said yes, as we found the content to be useful and valuable to language teachers. The rationale behind accepting this advertisement for two months is to supplement our 2 annual fundraisers to prepare for the big boost in membership expected this year. Just to give you an idea: when we started the previous fundraiser in October we had 202,000 members, now we have 285,000. Clearly, the growth is accelerating. What this means is that the costs will likely explode at some point, and we need to be prepared for that.

Fast growth is very risky for every website and there are many which fail to cope with it. There are a lot of things to be managed - hosting, development, finances, administration (e.g. we’re getting to our limits in coping with administration, corresponding with users and providing technical support to them, and sooner or later we will need to hire assistants), etc. This is also the reason why we decided to keep the Donate button after the fundraiser. Every little counts.

We try to do our best to prepare for the future and develop iSLCollective into the best FREE sharing site for teachers. I hope you will understand our efforts and accept the ad with a kind heart.

Bless up,
Peter

Thank you very much for answering) To tell the truth, I knew the answer. I just wanted the others who have doubts to get the answer. Adds on sites is a norm nowadays. If it is related to teaching and learning languages it can also be helpfu for members and their students. Besides, it helps to keep this site free. Thank you guys, for everything you do)

Your site is fantastic, please do what you need to keep it up for free! Good luck!