The last
mod payment resulted in the mods getting a total of 0.1844
BTC, and was sent in the middle of March. I looked at the previous ad auctions going back a month (based on the end date) prior to the mod payment being sent, and the forum received a total of 0.325
BTC from selling ads. So it looks like last month, the forum spent about 56% of their revenue on mods. At current prices, that leaves about $8100 to pay for hosting, and any other expenses the forum may incur.
There's also a considerable cost for
forum treasurers: (at least) 4*0.75
BTC per year, or 0.25
BTC per month. That's 77% of the ads revenue you mentioned.
The fact that forum treasurers are getting paid ~45 grand/year to safeguard private keys makes me regret my escrow shenanigans from years ago even more.
I think theymos is probably overpaying for what amounts to escrow services, considering that each treasurer may not need to
ever do any work, or sign any transaction.
When considering ad revenue, mod payments, and treasurer payment accruals, the forum is certainly operating in the red. The forum has the ability to operate this way for many years/decades, so theymos may not be concerned.I do think that the forum should at least allow targeted ads, which I would anticipate increase total ad revenue.