If you like this website and want to see it continue, please consider becoming a supporting member. That’s the quick pitch, if you want the longer version you can jump below.

We have three tiers of membership and all of the packages contain the exact same perks:

The Perks

• Dark Mode: Supporters have access to an exclusive dark mode theme that lets you browse the website with a black and slate color scheme. This theme works on both the main website and in the forums.
• No Ads: Regular members see sponsored advertisements around the website. This is one way we pay to keep running the website. However, if you’re a supporting member — those ads won’t show up anywhere. This also improves the loading time of the website substantially.
• Bookmarks: Ever see a post in the forums you want to remember to come back to? Supporters get post bookmarks to save any post on the website to a bookmark list. Perfect for recommendations, funny jokes, or whatever you’d like to save and search later.
• Supporter Forum: You’ll get access to a special forum just for supporters. This section can be a nice getaway from the the busier portions of the forum and provide a place to chat with other website supporters. We’ve got special supporter only threads created for sports, politics, sharing music recommendations, playlists, discussing the latest podcast episodes with the hosts, and much more. This forum is also where I’ll post special announcements first — like limited merch runs, music rumors I hear, and things like that.
• Exclusive Content: Each week you’ll have access to the supporter Q&A version of the newsletter post. This article usually contains technology tips or cool things I discovered throughout the week, a roundup of music, movies, books, and TV shows I enjoyed, thoughts on unreleased music, a ten song playlist of songs I loved during the week, and a variety of other tidbits.
• Linked User Titles: You can specify a URL for your user title to link to.
• First Listen Blogs: I sometimes do “first listen” blogs in the supporter forum. This is where I’ll listen to an album, usually before its release day and usually during one of the first few times I’ve heard it, and I’ll live blog my thoughts on the songs and answer questions from readers about the music. The first impressions will be archived on the main website a few days later.
• Special Access to Me: I know it’s a little weird, but, I really want to be able to build up a special relationship with those that are helping support this website. You are the reason the website exists and this is one way I can say thank you. I’ll be participating in the supporters forum on a near daily basis: answering questions, sharing stories, doing Q&As, sharing product and story recommendations, and all sorts of stuff. While the main website is where I’ll be focusing most of my writing — this is where I’ll be participating most in the discussions. I want anyone that has questions for me, or really wants to get my attention about a specific topic, to be able to have a place where we can have a detailed back and forth discussion. This forum is where I’ll want to bounce article ideas off people, talk out crazy rumors about bands, and things like that.
• Cover Photos: Being a supporter gets your profile access to cover photo images.
• Supporter Badge: You’ll get a special blue “supporter” badge that will display on all of your posts, profile, and mini-profile in the forums. You can remove this if you’d like.
• Unlimited Conversation Participants: Our private conversation system is a great way to chat, privately, with a few select friends on the website. Regular members can create private groups with a max of 8 participants, supporters have the ability to create private conversation groups with unlimited participants.
• Free Username Changes: If you ever want to change your username, just message me.
• Good Karma: A big part of being a member is knowing that you’re helping to power this website and supporting its continued existence.
• Other Things I Think Of: As I come up with other ideas to enhance the membership program current members will automatically be included in on those as well.

The Pitch

Making something and putting it out into the world is terrifying. Will anyone like this? Will anyone care? Will I be able to do this for a living? When I made the decision to create this website and write independently, I asked myself these questions over and over again. In a brief moment of clarity, I realized my bigger regret would be not reaching for my dream and taking the leap. That doesn’t mean I’m not scared shitless I’ll fail. But it does mean I’m willing to try.

I’ve been writing and publishing online for over 15 years and starting Chorus has been the most fulfilling and exciting work of my entire life — I want to keep doing it for as long as possible. When I first started AbsolutePunk.net, the business model was I write, I sell some ads, and the money we made from ads was how I made a living. But publishing and the online landscape has changed a lot since then and we’ve moved into a world where online advertising just doesn’t bring in the same kind of revenue as it did in the past. And chasing pageviews leads to pumping out content where quantity matters more than quality. No one wins in that scenario. Instead, I want to be completely upfront with how we make money here. The first is through display advertisements on the website. The second is through direct support from our readers.

I firmly believe that if you love something and want it to continue, the best way is to help support it. I want to keep writing about music, technology, pop-culture and, hopefully, you want to keep reading what we put out. To make that happen we have put together a way for you to directly support this website by becoming a patron. Your support allows us to keep existing. Compared to the entire internet we’re a small website, and instead of aiming to be the biggest website, we want to be your favorite. And we believe that if we can find a group of dedicated readers that love what we do and want to visit us on a regular basis, and a percentage of those readers help support us, we can keep doing it indefinitely. That means if we get enough support from our readers we don’t have to worry about advertising. We’re not interested in chasing pageviews and clickbait. And we’re never going to compete with Facebook or Google either. Instead we can focus on producing the best content for you to read and the best community for you to participate in.

I want to always be completely upfront with everyone about how we make money and what our goals are. We’ve put together a few tiers of support that range from basically pennies per day to going above and beyond. Most of the packages can be purchased on this page in under a minute using a credit card and all of your information is completely private and we will never share it with anyone.

Here’s what it all boils down to: I love running this website and what we’re building, and I’m committed to making the best website I possibly can for as long as I can. I’d love your help and support on this journey.

As always, thanks for reading and thanks for your support. If you have any questions at all please reach out to me via email.

F.A.Q

How do I manage my membership?

Sign in to manage your supporter membership. You can update your payment information, change plans, and make all changes to your plan. You can manage all your supporter options on this page (or from your forum control panel).

When does my membership renew?

Your membership will renew one year from the date you purchased (unless you’ve signed up for the monthly option, then it’ll be one month from your purchase date). An email will be sent a few days before renewal to remind you about the upcoming yearly charge, and you can turn off auto renew under your subscription tab.

Is payment secure?

Yes. All payments on this page are processed via Stripe, an industry leading payment processor. Your email address and personal information will never be given to anyone for any purpose and we do not store your payment information anywhere on our servers. In fact, we never even see it.

What payment options do I have?

Stripe can take any major credit card (Visa, Mastercard, American Express, Discover, JCB) as well as Apple Pay and Google Pay. PayPal is also available.

Can I gift a supporter package to someone?

Yes, send any amount over $25 for each package you want to gift, then email jason@chorus.fm the username(s) you are gifting.

Can I just send you some beer money?

Of course! I’ll never say no to beer money. You can easily send any amount here, or use Venmo, Square Cash, or PayPal.

What are the different tiers?

All of our membership packages have the same perks. You pick the package that works best for you. The tiers are simply to offer different price points you can choose to support the website with.