Radiomuseum.org? No thank you.
This page describes my personal experience with a Swiss foundation, who call themselves a radiomuseum.
They can be found on www.radiomuseum.org
The foundation is officially called: Stiftung Radiomuseum Luzern, with another website.
What is a foundation? This a non profit organisation, which has a status by itself. A foundation has tax freedom in most countries, as long as they operate within the legal limits for this. A foundation must have targets, documented in their foundation act, which can not be changed any more. Like the Alfred Nobel foundation awards the Nobel prize every year. They can not decide spend the money for something else. Any activities, not in correspondence with the official targets of the foundation, makes them loose tax freedom status.
When I registered as a member at Radiomuseum.org, now several years ago, it wrote on their website, they are a foundation, and their target is to collect Swiss Radios from the 1920's, and to operate a related website. So a kind of a "Good" target, and Swiss laws apparently allow to run a foundation for that.
But what did I see? This website they had at that time, offered limited access to the public, with pictures in reduced resolution, partial visibility, and dead ends everywhere. Then, in order to get access to this website, I had to pay. And not only that. Members are obliged to upload pictures, or provide them regularly with other information. If you fail to do so your access gets limited. This reminds me of a normal radio club, where all members have to pay something, and have to do something. BUT BUT BUT..... a club has to pay taxes on profits.
Let me say I have no good knowledge about this, and I express only my personal opinion here.
The member activity thing, looks like club to me. I use the word club, because they are "members only". However a dating website can be " members only", and yet be a tax paying company. Please understand me well, I do not say they violate the foundation rules by Swiss law. I think they make no mistakes. It is just I am interested in what I see here, and I have no good knowledge of legal aspects.
This here is my personal experience after becoming a member, and after Ernst Eib kicked me out soon after.
Here is my bad experience:
After registration, I could not find the paypal address to pay to. In the end I needed help by regular email, and it was done, though not in a very pleasant way, I remember that very well. So already the beginning was not good.
After paying the fee, I got a password, and 1000 free "Points" which I could use, to view pictures on the site. So if someone shows five 5 pictures of a Swiss radio, and you click on that you have five "views". But my points disappeared like snow in the sun. Already after 35 "views" my account got very low and I was warned to upload information, like radio pictures or schematics, or loose my access.
Now, since I have probably more schematics than they do, I though that was no problem. However I couldn't get anything uploaded. The help key was of no help, and I gave up on it initially.
Then some months later, I tried again, and had to give up again. Than a few times more and let the project rest. I run an SLQ databased forum and five websites. So a little something I know, but sometimes one gets stuck by the same mistake all of the time.
After two years, I decided to give it a last try, via the help forum. Well the forum appeared "read only" though I am a member. So trying to register for the forum, was the next problem. It just didn't work. Then I found a way to extract the email address ernst@radiomuseum.org out of the contributions. He talks and acts like the owner, so I suppose he is. Some sort of a reply function made his email pop up.
So I asked him how to register for the forum. I send him a screen shot of the registration page, and the missing "button" I had to click. It just wasn't there.
His answer was (translated from German) : "Dear Jac, I have no idea who you are, we have 10.000 members. The way you deal with pictures is not so good" .
That was all he said about it it, and for the rest I must use the "HELP" button, not ask for help by email. But how to do so when his website is not working, and the "HELP" button is missing?
Then I kindly replied with a screen shot of my PC, where he can by himself there is no "HELP" button where he said it was supposed to be.
His answer was (translated from German) : "... you have to press the "HELP" button, that's what is for, and if you don't understand it, you must use the FAQ".
That is nice... So if there is no "help button" you need to press the help button???
I found this answer not help at all, and frankly I told him so, using only a four words. Now it gets interesting. I give you the original text in German + translation.
"Sie suchen sich den Weg jetzt besser alleine - oder "vergessen" das Ganze. Warum bin ich wohl noch am arbeiten?" TRANSLATED: "Find it out on yourself, or forget about everything. Why I am working still here?"
So I payed a life time fee by Paypal, and after 35 "views" I lost my access.
I answer him that I want my money back. His answer was: NO. You have looked at 35 pictures of radios. So no money back. I send him my uncensored opinion about this. Then he cancelled the membership, and not answer my email any more. Money was gone.