Quote Originally Posted by osiris
...Just a few questions, 1 - how secure is my data? (e.g. cant CC payments be traced? Where are your servers, are they in the US? ); 2 - what exactly are the goals of this site? I know this seems picky but if its just aimed at smokers of cannabis then it isnt gonna do much to influence those who arent already drawn here; 3 - Is that $20 a lifetime membership or annual?
1. Credit cards are processed and much of the data, in particular credit card numbers, by a U.S.-based 3rd party service that meets the privacy/security rules set forth by the major credit card companies; much of the data is *not* stored on any of our servers at all - we don't have direct access to credit card numbers.

1A. All our servers are located in the U.S.

* Note that we also accept money order and cash for cafe membership - details, including mailing address, are on the upgrade to cafe membership page.

2. Inform and educate people about cannabis - many folks stumble upon these sites out of curiousity ... while some others get here through one or more of hundreds of domain name redirectors, and finally the parent company of the Marihemp Network operates Drug Abuse Help - http://www.drugabusehelp.com/ ... some of the people there eventually come to visit the Marihemp Network too.

3. $20 USD (or approx equivalent in GBP, CDN, Euro) is for one year - annual membership.

Quote Originally Posted by osiris
...just seems to me maybe you could do more with that money, perhaps get seedbanks and headshops that advertise here to agree discounts to cafe members (in exchange for a reduction in their advertising costs or something similar). Just an idea!
Cafe Membership fees help supplement revenue, which allows us to add/improve service faster/better than we could otherwise.

Interesting idea ... a few advertisers already offer discounts to Cafe Members, but they don't receive any discounts for doing so. Demand for advertising is high and thus we offer very few discounts except mainly to those advertisers who pre-pay for 3 months or more in advance; most pay month to month.
http://www.marihemp.com/advertising/

Hope that answers your questions

Ron