Paid membership only forums?

What can I say?
I run a pay to join forum. You get what you pay for.
We have members that have earned over $1,500 dollars, others $700, and no member have earned less than what they paid for.
So, you don't see that on free forums....

Anyways, hosting, domain, server, time spent creating a community cost money, I don't understand why people
expect to always be free. When you go to do groceries, is the food free too? Do you expect it to be free? Do you also don't eat if the food is not free?( is that elitism? does it has other terms?) lol... what a joke!

Free it's ok, Paid are ok too.

Look at it this way....
When it's free, you work for the forum
When it's paid, the forum works for you

People will pay to go to your forum if you're some SEO whiz with a proven record, something similar to that. They need to see real proof you can make them rich or increase their income somehow.

I've seen this before, something similar. Well, the forum wasn't free, but there was this guy promising domains from Peru because they were good for SEO. People were flocking into his forum posting with the promise of getting one.