I've got to agree to a point. RCU certainly has the right to make some money from all the work that they do to support the site for the majority of users (who for the most part are freeloaders, myself included). They used to solicit donations through paypal, but I've found that quite a few people, for some unknown reason, think paypal is going to steal all their money, so they don't have accounts and that idea didn't work too well. So that leaves them with advertisers, of which it appears they have many, and users, of which they also have many...

Problem is, most users used RCU mainly because it was free and they weren't selling stuff for profit. Most of us RC people buy stuff and either don't use it or quit using it, so it has to go to someone else at a bargain price to fund the next project. Well, if that is your interest in RCU (as it was for me), then you would have no choices except to spend your "hobby money" for the right to place ads (spending the same as somebody selling stuff for profit), or be forced to go to some other site to sell...

My thought is, that another option would be, to allow one, or at most two free ads to be placed each month per user. This way, the occasional seller will hang around, seeing the commerical ads and reading classifieds and the guy selling the estate sales and hobby shop overstock items, that are posting many items a month, will carry the majority of the cost. This would be enough to keep all but the most whiney user (again, myself included) happy and visiting often and RCU still gets paid...