27 Crags introduced .premium topos approximately three years ago. Some climbers have asked us for more information about the model and how it works, and also about the future plans for the website and app.

We want to be open on how 27 Crags works, what are our ethics when it comes to topo making and what are the future goals. Here’s an article that opens up some of the questions related to .premium.

1. Why .premium was introduced?

27 Crags team has been working many years for the website and invested a lot of free time and private money to have it running. What has been free for users, has become very expensive for the team running it.

This led to the point where a decision needed to be made. Either the service is put down and the website and app wouldn’t exists anymore, or something is changed. 27 Crags team believed that there has to be a good way to continue the story, and that’s when .premium was introduced.

Some of the new features include GPS trails which help climbers not to get lost while navigating to the crags.

The main point with .premium is not only to secure resources for maintaining the app and website, but also to create even better topos and support the local climbing development. 50% of the income from .premium subscriptions goes to the topo makers consisting of local topo authors, bolters, climbing area developers and enthusiasts. This money supports them in developing and maintaining climbing areas and the information about them for all of us to enjoy.

If you wish to read a more comprehensive analysis of this, feel free to check out another blog post about the topic here.

2. What’s the difference between the community/free topos and .premium topos?

3. How it’s decided which areas have .premium topos?

Whether an area has community or .premium topos depends especially from the people who make the topos. 27 Crags doesn’t solely decide whether an area is .premium or not, and we don’t force anyone to turn their community topo into .premium. Neither no-one's community topos material is used to make .premium unless they explicitly allow so.

Georgios Chaziris is a local climber and topo author who has made the .premium topos from Athens and the Athens Climbing Guidebook.

When it comes to big and popular areas that require a lot of work to have them up-to-date, it is better to have them under .premium. This way it’s possible to make sure that the quality is high and that the topo makers have enough resources to maintain them.

4. Will all the topos turn into .premium?

Even though .premium offers high quality topos for climbers, supports the development of the climbing areas and helps 27 Crags to maintain the service, the goal is not to make everything under it. 27 Crags will always have free community content also and we want to support the development of the climbing scene also through this.

Our plan is also to ease the topo-making so that sharing information becomes even easier!

5. Who makes the .premium topos and what’s the benefit for them?

Maya Ayupova and Vicent Palau have made the .premium topos from Margalef and are the authors of Climbing Margalef guidebook and long term bolters of the area.

Out of each .premium subscription, 50% goes to the topo makers based on the size and the amount of use their topos have had. Besides the economical part, .premium topo makers get all the tools and support from 27 Crags to make excellent online topos.

It’s important to know that not just anyone can make .premium topos. In each area, we are looking to work with the people who have opened new routes, bolted, dealt with the access issues and are supporting the development of the climbing in that region.

The goal is to make sure that .premium topos support the local climbing area development. We believe that doing as much as we can to guarantee this is the right way.

Our current topo makers include for example Petter and Hanna Restorp (Bohuslän), Laurent Girousse (Céüse), Michael Schreiber (Leonidio), Georgios Chaziris (Athens), Maya Ayupova and Vicent Palau (Margalef) and many more. In the upcoming articles you'll get to know the .premium topo makers more!

Have still some questions you're wondering? Check out the FAQ here, or feel free to email us to support@27crags.com!

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With love to climbing,
27 Crags Team

27 Crags topos are made by local climbing area developers and enthusiasts. From the .premium subscriptions 50% of the income will go straight to the topo authors who are doing extremely important job in developing the climbing areas.

Not registered yet? Sign up for free here and get a trial access to 200+ .premium topos!

Interested in making topos? Don't hesitate to send us an email: tim(at)27crags(dot)com