Just like Open Source software is the beginning of the end for Commercial Software right?

Most of us make these modifications in their spare time. If you would launch it commercially a whole other type of support commitments are required.

Now support is a question of goodwill.

however vb.org could benefit from revenue by hosting and validating modifications that are commercial.

vb.org could become a trademark for good commercial and free mods. With a testing procedure in place, just sign of on the mods that have "approved by" which of course adds to the value of both the mod and the site.

vb.org is owned by vb.com meaning any trademark they have would reflect back to vb.com and not just good commercial and free mods as vb.com doesn't want that, instead they want vbulletin to be the trademark. That is what I get from alot of things anyways.

Free hacks will never die. Many of us that are working on commercial scripts still release free hacks. I am planning my new talkerbot v3 to be free of charge but have a subscription you can buy to gain access to the aiml sharing directory (mainly becuase of the sheer amt of bandwith it will consume).

The aiml share database will be a collection of custom made aiml files and ones submitted to us from the internet. So it will be like a single distrobution place for aiml files. The hack will have a nice integration into the database on my site if you purchase the small subscription and then you can install stuff in real time and even keep track of which bots know which files. ;)

I agree entirely with this ... VB.org has built up it`s excellent reputation and member base for VB.org, not for another site. If people want to promote premium hacks, why not promote it on there own forum rather than using the power of VB.org to do so.

Reason is simple, because VB.org is the best place to advertise. And why?? because it has been for so long the best resource for free addons/hacks etc for vbulletin. This site aint built it`s reputation around advertisement of premium hacks, in fact it`s built it`s reputation more through dissallowing them.

Just my opinion.

The problem is, if it's allowed to plug commercial scripts here, more and more people will be inclined to release free hacks merely to plug their paid hacks and not for the reason of actually releasing something to help the community.

More and more hacks are turning into LITE versions with stripped down features to get people to purchase PRO versions.

Then there's vBSEO who used this forum and used the members of this forum to polish their commercial script. Where's the lite version? lol, it'll never happen. The only 'free' hacks they've released is to gain exposure for their commercial script.

Yes, there def. should be a paid addons section.

i voted NO... would vote yes, ONLY if said area came with immediate (within 24hr) dedicated tech support.

90% of the people who voted No ignores/is ignorant to the fact that it was not the purpose of this poll to decide whether or not vBorg should install a Shopping Cart addon and start going all Amazon.com on you all. This, I find slightly annoying.

I voted Yes, because I would very much like to see such a section. Not only will it help users looking for paid hacks, but it will help boost vBorg's status as the ultimate vB resource.
As for the argument that more and more will be releasing paid hacks, then think of it this way: Shi'ite hack = Shi'ite support = no purchases.
Personally Id not want to go paid with my RPG due to the fact that this automatically means pressure. If you pay, you expect frequent updates and less bugs from the start.
With going paid, I don't have to /wrist just because the upgrade has a bug that scorned 2 beta testers, I just have to fix it before it goes final.
Then again, money is a good motivation for getting stuff done. So yeah, its just choosing the greater evil.

Ok Im sure I didnt get my point across at all and I probs made no sense, but Im so fkn tired my eyebrows start tickling in my nostrils, so Ill see if I can dechipher this babble tomorrow.

I don't feel that VB.org should be for paid hacks, but I also agree that a new site would be ok and should handle this. Such as VBPaid.com or such domain, this would be a sister site to vbulletin.org.