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MAY 2023 FINANCIALS UPDATE   As previously stated, I'm here if anyone has any questions on these financials/want to know what these things are saying. Speng asked me to make a chart to detail out donations versus payouts to help people that are more visual learners:  Essentially, blue is how much money that came out of the fund. Green is what is naturally being added from subscribers, and yellow is from people doing one time donations. The difference between blue and green is what we need to make up in yellow to break even on the month. And as you can see, we came FAR from that in May! We had a massive amount of requests come in during May, and while we have fulfilled all but 1 of them, though that last one is for $1000 due by the end of the month. Our cash situation is a bit dicey right now, it'd be a lot dicier if not for a cashapp donation of $500 from this morning, but our situation is a bit worrisome with the beginning of the month coming up. It feels so weird to say that after the amazing April we had and the fundraising we had, but it has all gone to goons in need - who cannot control when life careens off and they need help. If anyone isn't opposed to it, we may need to do another fundraiser, though we need to plan it out and our current idea needs admin buy-in before we can go live with it. We are planning to buy a banner ad tonight to try and get the word out about the fund - we feel like we have done a good job advertising for people in need, it's just a matter of getting in recurring donations that we need to advertise a bit better on. Why do we feel like we've done a good job on advertising for people in need? Because the posters who have requested money have recently been from forums outside cspam. Posters that have been posting for a long time in Games, GBS, TGR, D&D, PYF, and of course CSPAM. In regards to fees, Stripe is still the only recurring way to give. The cheapest for us is still Venmo, followed by Cashapp, but this has to be a cash transfer - it can't be through a card. As for 501c3 status... that's on me! I need to dedicate time to going through the paperwork and filing the drat thing.
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Jun 1, 2023 02:40
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Please donate because I'm moving in August and actually will need the $564 I fronted the fund, thank you
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Jun 1, 2023 02:57
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sincere thank you to the fund for helping me during an especially lovely time (gf has been unable to work for a few weeks due to having surgery -- part-time nonprofit jobs ftl -- so bills are hitting especially hard right now). going to be looking for a better job this summer and refinancing my debt and can hopefully start kicking back into the fund at that point. thanks a bunch for what you all do.
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Jun 1, 2023 16:19
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So we are down to about $99 in our bank account, with $42 in the venmo account and $195.55 in the cashapp. We are tapped out of essentially all requests except through cashapp, and that may be gone by the weekend's end. As expected from the early part of the month, we've already given $625 since yesterday! We did have someone give $100 this morning via stripe, but that's likely not going to hit our bank account until Tuesday, the 6th. If anyone is able to contribute, it would be super appreciated! Otherwise we will not really be able to provide for urgent requests (vast majority of requests ask for funding within 2-3 days).
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Jun 3, 2023 00:01
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Gave a bit via venmo to reduce fees. Hopefully that helps cover any emergencies that might pop up over the next few days. Also fun note for folks that have avoided venmo because they have paypal: That weird quirk from around the time when paypal bought venmo and didn't like having a single bank account hooked up to both ages ago has been solved. Coolness Averted has issued a correction as of 01:08 on Jun 4, 2023 |
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Jun 3, 2023 01:49
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I updated the OP but I wanted to make a post to update people as well. Until the fund situation improves, the committee has instituted a cap of $125 per request for the time being. Your request will stay active until we get the funds to fulfill your request fully in the future. Active requests made before the new cap were given a max of $200 and are going to be considered satisfied until we have the funds to fulfill it. I have also made an outreach thread in gbs as I, and the commitee, believe that we are bringing in people who need help from all over the site... but not people wanting to help. So we are going to try and see if we can get more people to help out. Hopefully this will help the cspam goons that have done their best to keep the fund afloat the past few months.
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Jun 4, 2023 01:00
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I didn't expect this to come through for me, but thank you. I made a request around last month because of unexpected dental work, and while we're not going to do all the work I should get right now, the $200 is still going to be a huge help. If I ever sort myself out and get employment again I'll try to pay it forward.
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Jun 4, 2023 06:22
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Any chance of getting a forums announcement that links to the GBS thread or this one?
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Jun 5, 2023 04:07
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vortmax posted:Any chance of getting a forums announcement that links to the GBS thread or this one? while the admins and Jeff have been generous to allow us to have a few stickied threads, we also need to make it clear due to past events and baggage that this fund isn't in any way officially sponsored by Jeff or the forums admins. That's a long way of saying it's a cool idea, but I think as the committee we'd be pushing our luck to request something like that outright. If the admins want to do it of their own volition of course that would be awesome, but it's not something I would expect as that might be viewed as some kind of official an endorsement.
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Jun 5, 2023 23:28
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speng31b posted:while the admins and Jeff have been generous to allow us to have a few stickied threads, we also need to make it clear due to past events and baggage that this fund isn't in any way officially sponsored by Jeff or the forums admins. like the first thing ppl said in that gbs thread was 'you should move it out of cspam to somewhere more appropriate' even tho cspams where it started and afaik the only place that's done this in particular for it to be officially endorsed or promoted it would probably have to be sterilized into its own forum and have some of the site staff in the loop or people would argue and try to ruin it to make a point and w/e i can already see it from my pov not being close to any of this as it's happened, best thing for it right now is to just continue being stable and drama free and build distance from anything that people have yelled about before, and reach out to other forums occasionally bc the previous meltdown is still in people's memories and i think the most common goon telephone version is, falsely, that plinkey was just robbing everybody and from hearing that and without looking in closer, assume it's a repeating cycle of goons getting robbed or something like that but that'll go away w time as long as this keeps running as it is side thought: for a post, games might work better than GBS? because games & gbs don't have a History and the overall vibe is more communal ( shared interests, the various goonsquads ) and less adversarial, no politics etc. might be worth giving a shot later after that one mayb
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Jun 6, 2023 19:28
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FirstnameLastname posted:games ... less adversarial I'm sorry to have to break this to you but...
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Jun 6, 2023 20:24
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Some of them are coop, I'm sure
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Jun 6, 2023 20:34
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okay ive looked over your numbers and it seems to me the issue is this: youre giving too much money away to too many goons
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Jun 7, 2023 07:06
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As a second opinion I've reviewed the financials and come to the conclusion that you are receiving too little money from too few goons
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Jun 7, 2023 16:25
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really queer Christmas posted:I updated the OP but I wanted to make a post to update people as well. Until the fund situation improves, the committee has instituted a cap of $125 per request for the time being. Your request will stay active until we get the funds to fulfill your request fully in the future. lol, do you want some advice? e: ive been here before Plinkey has issued a correction as of 11:37 on Jun 10, 2023 |
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Jun 10, 2023 11:27
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speng31b posted:while the admins and Jeff have been generous to allow us to have a few stickied threads, we also need to make it clear due to past events and baggage that this fund isn't in any way officially sponsored by Jeff or the forums admins. lol, what baggage? Past events were shown to be clearly just a bunch of bored rear end goons destroying something good because they could. I'm not trying to relitigate the past, but this continual shaming of the Plinkey fund is some bullshit. I hope this fund does great things and has a giant amount of success, but statements like "past events" and "baggage" aren't helping you. See, my takeaway is you are talking about the original fund, maybe you are talking about the people that went completely insane and destroyed it? I don't know. Squishy words like that are dangerous, you are using them because you are trying to dance around an issue, just say what you mean. I honestly don't know if you can even get the original donor base back because a lot of them aren't even on SA anymore. It takes time to build up a large donor base giving small donations that equate to a large pool of money... I personally have a few goons that I venmo money to now, so I won't be doing recurring donations to the fund like I was in the original one. I doubt I'm alone. This is a case of you broke it, you fix it.
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Jun 10, 2023 13:46
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Yeah I hear you. What I am trying to say is -- we have been specifically requested by the admins not to make this have the appearance of a forums official thing. Stickies seem fine so far, but I would not expect anything beyond that. Just explaining the situation, that is all. speng31b has issued a correction as of 16:09 on Jun 10, 2023 |
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Jun 10, 2023 14:13
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Pohl posted:lol, what baggage? Past events were shown to be clearly just a bunch of bored rear end goons destroying something good because they could. I'm not trying to relitigate the past, but this continual shaming of the Plinkey fund is some bullshit. How very leftist of you to gloat about people starving because your friend was asked to provide basic accountability. Plinkey posted:lol, do you want some advice? Huh I thought landlords weren't allowed to post in cspam
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Jun 10, 2023 14:28
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Fajita Queen posted:How very leftist of you to gloat about people starving because your friend was asked to provide basic accountability. Please do not do this here.
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Jun 10, 2023 14:35
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Fajita Queen posted:How very leftist of you to gloat about people starving because your friend was asked to provide basic accountability. I wasn't gloating. Why are you so defensive that you instantly had that takeaway?
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Jun 10, 2023 14:36
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Pohl posted:I wasn't gloating. Why are you so defensive that you instantly had that takeaway? You too, please just let it go. This thread isn't a place to relitigate that fight.
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Jun 10, 2023 14:37
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How about an excuse to bump the thread with some much-needed positivity? Just put in a one-time donation and set up a small recurring payment as well.
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Jun 10, 2023 16:07
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Crescent Wrench posted:How about an excuse to bump the thread with some much-needed positivity? Just put in a one-time donation and set up a small recurring payment as well. hell yeah
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Jun 10, 2023 16:23
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Crescent Wrench posted:How about an excuse to bump the thread with some much-needed positivity? Just put in a one-time donation and set up a small recurring payment as well. I'd love for this thread and donations to take off. We have the legitimate framework in place, everyone give a few bucks, it adds up fast!
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Jun 10, 2023 17:54
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Crescent Wrench posted:How about an excuse to bump the thread with some much-needed positivity? Just put in a one-time donation and set up a small recurring payment as well. That's awesome, thank you.  It may be worth asking Pragmatica if she's willing to mention the thread in her monthly announcements about threads to check out. Not official staff association or endorsement but it gets a lot of eyes on it so it might be a nice middleground.
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Jun 10, 2023 19:03
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Couple things that have been on my mind recently. Sa-Mart might actually be the best forum for ongoing charity works: Its very clearly hands-off, mods/owners not invovled, but has standards and rules to make trades and exchanges easy. I think the best thing you could do is ask the mods nicely to bump the old goonfood threads and point people towards the new one. Lot of people probably have it bookmarked still. Something as simple as 'hey, another group of goons have banded together to start the next version of this differently and transparently, please update your vortmax posted:I switched to manual monthly donations via CashApp/Venmo to save on fees, but I know they can't count on that like a recurring donation no matter how much I swear I'll do it. I'm just gonna go ahead and say it: There's a few issues with the current fund • Donations are low • not enough people are donating • there's no real easy recurrining way to set and forget and still give • if only there were some way to get plinkeyfood donators to move over! I think the fund runners should strongly consider opening a goonfood patreon purely for ease of accessability. Is there a reason it hasn't been done? They have 501(c)(3) accomodations. Suggestions for patreon name: GoonFood2, GoonFoodBetter, GoonFood-501c3 Off the cuff, it looks like what you have here is not a failure to donate, its a coordination and accessabilty issue first! As a bit of advice. The government moves at molasses; but also at the speed of voicemail. Don't be afraid to file, then leave a message about an application two weeks later to follow up. Since it does seem to be a holdup/gatekeeper of nice things and benefits, sooner than later is probably better! Edit: 501c3 status also means you can ask for grants, and would also help the low funds issue. Plinkey posted:lol, do you want some advice? Since Plinkey is in the thread, I'll just ask: Hey Plinkey, would you be willing to reach out to your former donators and point them towards the new thread/patreon/support page? Something like 'Hey, if anyone wants to update their pledges, another group is doing what I did but actually incorporating as a nonprofit charity, they could use your help, i'm not involved, here's the link' (the reason I am asking is Plinkey had, fro Same question for the mods. 'here's the new thread' is pretty standard affair and its rather lacking from the closure of the original one. No drama, but its been 3 months it could use a pointer to the new one. Thats all! Other than that, I think the 'matching large and unusual requests with donators privately' is one of the more interesting things and something that set it apart from attempt 1. Good luck and I love what you all are doing! TheParadigm has issued a correction as of 19:57 on Jun 10, 2023 |
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Jun 10, 2023 19:55
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TheParadigm posted:there's no real easy recurrining way to set and forget and still give all of the links in the OP are for recurring except for one which allows one time donations. We are using stripe which is the same billing platform Patreon uses under the hood but with a significantly lower overhead.
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Jun 10, 2023 20:01
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It sucks that patreon takes a big cut BUT if that's the only way to easily get recurring donations then absolutely do it, don't let the perfect be the enemy of the necessary evil. Lowtax didn't use a Patreon years, then finally did and made a ton. Plinkey made a ton using Patreon. Think about it committee in charge of this  Argh Posted at same time as the previous post I know nothing about stripe, if that info is correct suggest explaining it more maybe?
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Jun 10, 2023 20:04
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Yeah, absolutely. If it's not clear that almost every donation link in the OP leads to an easy recurring donation option we should do more to make that clear.... maybe reorganize the info to highlight that?
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Jun 10, 2023 20:08
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Its not a question about ease of links, ease of 'well, do I have to sign up for a new thing to manage it or can I just do it from what i have already'. See Steam vs Origin vs Good Old games. first adopter advantage basically. What I meant to focus on was: You have 3000$/month in people who are already your customers/donators/support what you're doing and aren't aware the shop is open again. The trick is making it seamless and easy to use, and nothing is easier than whats already in use. Basically, its not about the links in the op being easy, its about another service to manage an sign up for. If they open you up to a greater stream, how much of a loss/net gain for doing good is it really? TheParadigm has issued a correction as of 20:46 on Jun 10, 2023 |
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Jun 10, 2023 20:38
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I think there's two main differences between this fund and the last one: 1) This fund takes in significantly more money, iirc the old fund had monthly income of just under $4000 after several years, whereas depending on whether the "one time donations" bit is cumulative or discrete on that graph, this one appears to make potentially that much and up to several times more 2) This fund accepts pretty much all requests regardless of size, whereas Plinkey would have turned down $1000+ requests as being outside the scope of the old fund No conclusions drawn, just observing. Actually, one conclusion: full transparency doesn't seem to have enticed many people who were skeptical to start donating regularly.
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Jun 10, 2023 20:48
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This goonfund putting up a Patreon after all of the poo poo surrounding the end of the last one will create walls of meltdowns that will absolutely not help anyone.
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Jun 10, 2023 20:50
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you don't sign up for anything to do the stripe recurring donations, you just enter your card info and email directly after clicking the link, and it sends you email info you can use to cancel it later or whatever. As I mentioned it is the same payment system Patreon uses under the hood we just don't have to pay Patreon fees on top of the processing fees. speng31b has issued a correction as of 21:29 on Jun 10, 2023 |
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Jun 10, 2023 20:51
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I think it is one of those things that just takes time. Time for people to learn about, time for people to trust it, time for a steady amount of monthlies to build up and also just economically, a lot of people need help. Stripe really is just incredibly easy at least.
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Jun 10, 2023 20:52
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Between the interim and the official one, I've personally put down Interim: $1850 Regular: $3833.33 since late December. Those specific numbers can be what they are because I'm a single computer toucher and I have that money to give but I'm guessing that I'm at least one of the top handful most owned people if this fund isn't more or less succeeding at what it intends to do. At a point, goons need to either just donate or stop complaining about old goon projects, how they don't want to do another service or whatever thing they want to throw out for why they don't want to.
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Jun 10, 2023 21:13
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Shiroc posted:This goonfund putting up a Patreon after all of the poo poo surrounding the end of the last one will create walls of meltdowns that will absolutely not help anyone. Patreon is also loving over its customer base constantly and would get jettisoned in a heart beat if there was a better option for most creatives. There's no way to run a charity where the service that just transfers money immediately via electronics takes a 30% cut.
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Jun 10, 2023 21:28
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pentyne I'm not going to read your post but you of all people should just absolutely shut the gently caress up and stay out of this
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Jun 10, 2023 21:32
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Started up a recurring donation for this. Thanks for doing this work, guys
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Jun 10, 2023 21:37
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silicone thrills posted:I think it is one of those things that just takes time. Time for people to learn about, time for people to trust it, time for a steady amount of monthlies to build up and also just economically, a lot of people need help. Yeah it takes like 30 seconds to set up a donation. Not hard at all
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Jun 10, 2023 21:41
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Cup Runneth Over posted:I think there's two main differences between this fund and the last one: The graph is discrete. As of May 31st, we had about $1515 per month in recurring. That's gone up a little bit since then. It was $1545 as of yesterday, and we added $65 today - so $1,610 a month from people who are just doing recurring through stripe. The only reason we made it through last month was because of 1. the April Fundraiser we did 2. Shrioc TheParadigm posted:Its not a question about ease of links, ease of 'well, do I have to sign up for a new thing to manage it or can I just do it from what i have already'. Stripe is super easy and doesn't require any account setup. You click one of the links and you put in your card and email and... done. It charges you and you never have to remember it again. Hell, if you do remember and want to change something, I have our goonfund email in the OP that you can email and we can fix anything that's wrong. We have already had a couple emails from people wanting to cancel/change card/contact info/resend receipts, etc that we have handled. Patreon is simply out of the question. Our overhead would quadruple - which would mean we'd need that much more in funding to make up for it. And I don't see us getting thousands more in funding from Patreon to justify it when there is a super easy way to subscribe as is. And, not to mention, would destroy the fund from the justifiable drama it'd bring.
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Jun 10, 2023 22:37
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