I'm not opposed to pledge drives. The good ones, done well (NPR is a great example) manage to somehow leave you in a "feel-good" state of mind as you are handing over your money or even as they are in the process of annoying the hell out of you by interrupting the service you're there for. Even if you're not giving money it's hard to have anything but a minimum of benevolence if the product is truly loved. Everyone understands you have to pay the bills. It would be wildly interesting to have the accounting books of a site hosted and read-only anytime by anyone in conjunction with a donation or some other model. Like 'keys to the kingdom' everything. As long as we're tossing out wierd and possibly terrible ideas...during drives, anyone could actively see how much more is needed and see where the 'ask' from previous years went. Could really drive donations of users liked what they saw.