Is it legal to give users priorities in my webpage if they are donated

[auriaks]

hi,
I have paypal donation working button in my webpage. Is it legal to give users prioritaires in my webpage if they are donated? [my webpage is non-comercial]

[djr33]

The legal issues about "donations" can be complex-- for example, you can "allow" users to "donate" on a site that has "free" content, in some cases even "free" copyrighted content. So if starts to border on "buying" rather than "donating", that is not necessarily legal like donations would be.

HOWEVER, assuming you are not worried about that kind of legal issue, then donations OR payments are just fine, if you want to offer some sort of "paid area", etc.

You can normally make users buy an account, or upgrade their account by paying. You can call it "donations" if you want, but that is basically the same.

If you explain a little bit more, maybe there are some unusual reasons it would not be legal, but in general it should be.

[auriaks]

normal users havent got permission to look at other users information. AND i offer them: "if you want to see this information you must be honoured member"
And there is only one way to be a honoured member - by donating to us.

[Schmoopy]

I think it's fair enough.
As long as being an honoured member doesn't give you exclusive access to copyrighted material then I don't see why it should be a problem.

[auriaks]

and what if i have store of self-created word files? can i use honouring to give access to that?

[Schmoopy]

Sure, if they're files that you created and not just copying someone elses work then I can't see a problem with it.
It gives people an incentive to donate.

[auriaks]

Thanks

[traq]

Are you talking about allowing users to view files, content, etc. that belongs to other users? If so, I assume that all users know that whatever they post is going to be shared...?

[djr33]

Again, you are just making them pay. It's not a "donation" if they have to do it (for a certain reward... that's called buying).

You can call it whatever you want, but there is no reason to hide this: you are selling a membership to your site. Basically you have premium accounts. That is totally legal, regardless of what you do.

Anything that might be illegal would be illegal for both normal and honoured members, but that is not an issue related to money or no money. (But don't think that honoured members are special, that they can do illegal things.... they've just paid and you can give them more legal stuff.)

[auriaks]

i think it is illegal to collect money without paying bills.... Or there isn't any laws for that?