If people could post comments and/or ratings on the directory link then it would provide people with honest feedback.

I'd like to see some sort of directory of paids hacks, simply because I think signatures are a terrible place to advertise hacks and such and I automatically skip over them after a while.

What if:

1) Commercial Add-ons should not modify code any more than necessary. They should be concentrated on Products and Plugins.
2) There was a certification program that verified that the work was created to vBulletin standards as laid out to the programmer/designer. In order to be listed you would need to be a part of this program.
3) Instead of listing and making commercial hacks available, the listings would be links to the provider themselves.
4) The provider list included Designers, Style sites, Add-on/Extension developers, Hosting Companies and for-hire programmers.

Frankly, I have witnessed too many personality clashes and vendettas on these forums to "trust" that any rating system/feedback would necessarily reflect the quality of any commercial script.
And how in the heck would Jelsoft know if the person commenting actually purchased the software from the 3rd party vendor? And would the vendor be allowed to respond to negative feedback? And does Jelsoft want to play hall monitor?
Control ... control ... control!

So you mean a 'certified vB partner' program?

Its an improvement, but may cause as many problems as anything.

Who is going to validate the code?
What about future products?
Future upgrades?
What if a serious security flaw appears AFTER you have given it the gold chaquita bannana sticker?

Im just chuffed theres a constructive discussion about it now :)

(crikey im on a posting roll)

I agree spence... ratings are useless when they can be taken advantage of. Thats why I was trying to brainstorm on a way that only those that purchased could give feedback. Maybe only once.

It was just a thought - I can see the difficulty in it though.

and what about a Products Reviews system, where a moderator only can post new products listings, and users/clients posts comment over them ?!... if it's the moderator that post new products, nobody would see a favorable advertising...

btw, nobody can evaluate the impact of a solution or another... because nobody have done it here... i know how this was done in other projects, they are dealing with other situations... here we talk about vBulletin... and even different, most of the other projects have a single administration process that manage usually all details... here, we have Jelsoft at vB.COM, and the team here at vB.org that have to deal with different situations...

having a directory or anything else is a Company decision, with some suggestions of the participants... not the opposite.

Jelsoft won't be recommending products. If we were to follow up on this, we would list Providers the fit a particular list of restrictions, some of which could include public releases on this website.. Anyone would be able to become a provider. Think along the lines of the MSP program, thought simpler. You would apply to become a service provider and get the same "thumbs-up" as your soon-to-be competitor if you qualified.

For years, Jelsoft has reaped the benefits of an enhanced feature list based on the "free" donations of it's customers. It's a two-way street here, but the money has always flowed one way. I can hardly think of a more seemingly implausible yet brilliant and successful business plan than that of Jelsoft.

So, now you are asking about requiring a "free" product as a requisite for your "Certification" ... which, you know increase the sales of the annointed.

Why not just let the market place determine the fate of commercial products --- without Jelsoft involving itself in that process? Why does Jelsoft feel it should always flex it's muscle?

Me ofcourse :D :D :D

And the stickers will have the face of Bobfool (a trustworthy looking old man :D )

Sorry just couldn't resist.

I better get some pics taken then, huh? ;)