I don't know the details of the Rotax-Owner.com business model, how many paying members they have, or what their costs are. But I can say that I have tried to run a message board together with a friend of mine and the workload was much higher than I anticipated. It has to be a full-time job or a personal passion to make any sense. While we had the message board, we would sometimes get 100 inquiries a week for new members. That sounds good I know, except that 99 of them would often be fictious with malicious intent. The only way to vet them was individually, and that took a lot of time. That's just one small thing I learned. Then there are software and security updates, that seem endless, and don't always go smoothly. All that and we had not even gotten to moderation and content. That message board was small in comparison to this one, so I know this is no small task.
I don't think much about the "doubling in price" because it has been more than 10 years since there has been a price increase. What I do ask myself is one simple question: Do I get $60 a year in value and enjoyment from this site? I can answer that easily. I took a friend to pizza yesterday and we each got a personal size pizza and a large drink, and the bill was $54.00. Not sure about the rest of you, but I think I will avoid one pizza outing next year and keep my paid subscription. Rotax-Owner.com, thank you for providing us with this great forum.