DChapman is wearing out the "Zoints" name
 

I don't know why it bugs me but for every hack DChapman makes he puts "Zoints" in front of it. Does anyone feel the same?

Well so would i if i had put as much time and effort into something, most of the zoints hacks are really good.If it means you have to have links to zoints in your forum then so be it.The hacks are free, would be different if you had to pay.

Doesn't bother me... His products are useful, they are free, he's very helpful and one can choose to use them or not. :)

nothing wrong with it .. in fact I support such naming convention; it's the best form of promoting your product/business/service

I agree, he works for/at/owns the Zoints network. They take their time to release the quality hacks they make here for everyone.

No such thing as "wearing out" your brand.

i was in shock when i read the title haaaa

glad to see i am not the only one that doesn't have a problem with it.

Must admit I feel the same way. But then I suppose you can't blame him.

It's called marketing. Annoying as heck but it's part of the world we live in.

Personally yes, I find it irritating that "zoints" seems to crop up all over the place - but that's marketing for you. They produce some good stuff, it's only natural they would want to brand it.

you could always edit out any instance that you don't want anymore... if it bothers you that much.

I agree

So the guy hires a bunch of really good programmers to make some hacks and create a pretty cool profile system for forums, what would you rather have him do? If he released them without "Zoints" then they'd be his, and he'd be getting all the credit for it.

Kudos to him for not wanting all the glory for himself! :)

Bear in mind if they hadn't released so much stuff and it wasn't so popular then you wouldn't be seeing so much of the name. Lots of good stuff there so you can't really argue with it. :) I do prefer the "vB Something Something" convention though.

But I don't find a website name as remotely as annoying as putting your username in a mod's title. I dunno if it's self-promotion or ego or what, but just...no.

I wish there were couple more guys like David so we can have more quality hacks.

Could not agree more.

To add, I had a very bad first impression of Zoints at first. I followed the original thread here at vB.org for many months. Could have been almost a whole year. Now I am about to implement the tags hack, the zoints local hack and possibly the seo hack. We need more people like DChapman, IMO.

I totally agree.

I think it's in his right to insert the "zoints" tag on his hacks. He coded it, spent the time and effort to release hacks, no cause for any complaining whatsoever.

My question, is it becoming a trend to hate on zoints? it appears so.

If anyone is offended by this. good.

I just know how it feels to contribute and the complaints still come rolling in.

there's zoints hate? i didn't know. tbh i appreciate the work that mr chapman is putting into the community. there was a huge low point in terms of variation of things being offered and zoints has done wonders to turn that around, we honestly need more innovation and add-on's.

I do not see a problem.
It's the best way to organize.

< Subject > first and then < Function > second

Subject is what the hack is for.
Function is how the hack relates to the subject.

How do you organize your hacks on the many projects you work on ?


If your a person that wants to search for all items of a subject
IE: "Zoints" it will be hard to find threads if there is no menchen of "Zoints" in the title.

:D


I place:

Module CMPS: infront of all the vBAdvanced CMPS blocks.
PhotoPost vBGallery in front of all the gallery hacks.
Shoutcast infront of shoutcast hacks.

[high]* Zachariah shrugs[/high]

Well its not a big deal for me. I understand that he has put alot of effort and hardwork into his modifications and he has the right to name it after anything he wants. If that means after the network of people that made them so be it.

he is a great person to do this FOR FREE and for people to complain about it is just selfish. If you made something that everyone used wouldnt you want your logo on the product? i know i would.

so hopefully this thread turns into a testimonial for DC and not a bashing over a name. you have the right to not use it if it bothers you that much. so let it be and do your best to contribute to the community instead of just bickering over silly things like this. Weve lost quite a few coders and staff members over things like this.

Yep, it's smart marketing and hard work on his part. He doesn't have to give anything away. I've noticed that wherever controversy arises with his work, he always maintains a professional and friendly tone...says alot about the guy IMHO.

Heheh, it's amazing what you come across when searching :D

I HATE putting "Zoints" in front of everything. Hate it hate it hate it. I HATE living in a world where everyone suffers from "information overload". Zoints' has 10 core principles we abide by, the first of which is Avoid Information Overload. This is why you don't see a Zoints logo and why you don't see a Zoints slogan. We don't have either. Naming everything "Zoints [blank]" is necessary at present time because we operate in an environment where not using some sort of standardized naming convention can lead to a lot of problems. I look forward to the say I can drop "Zoints" from our products name.

Just how much do I hate branding and marketing and information overload? Much of Zoints development takes place via a community as we have people all around the world working for us. The following are two excepts from a thread where a few of our advisors were trying to get me to use a logo and slogan:

Later in the discussion:

As I said, I hate branding. As time moves forward, you'll see very little, if any from Zoints. Wouldn't it be nice to be able to drive down the road and be able to enjoy the beauty of the world rather than companies shoving their crap down your throat at every turn?

Thanks Sabe, right back at you. Your modifications are fantastic!

Thank you to those of you who shared your kind words of support in this thread. It means a lot :)

It's just marketing. It's unfortunate that you can't make it in this world without it. Wouldn't it be nice if you could just get ahead by word of mouth?

The internet is changing that. Getting by via word of mouth is becoming a reality for some companies. From what I understand, Google never spent a dime on advertising. Of course, they're the biggest, "Google [product name]" company out there.

A lot of ppl would be out of a job if no one used marketing.. including my wife :(

There is if it happens to be jeans.

You'ld be amazed at how many brands of jeans I have outworn.
________
________

But on a more serious note, I find the "Zoints" prefix perfectly OK, and in fact I find it very helpful, because it gives me the immediate information that it has to do with Zoints.

I have not yet installed the Zoints system on my site & board, but I am planning to do so very soon.

I Think You Guys Are All Idiots For Helping Him Make Money Off Of You From Your Forums, Zoints Is Designed To Make Him Money, Get A Clue Little Kiddies, Why Would You Promote Someones Chit For Free While He's The Only One Who Bennifits From It?

(I'd just like to add that I despise Quiznos and would take subway over them any day of the week. :D)

Why have you started all your words with a capital letter for? :confused:

Ah, there's always gotta' be a troll.

Zoints is awesome, stop hating on someone who helps the community so much. Alot of people got pissed off because he released 349734763 hacks at once and said there would be no support. In reality though hes given more support than most of those who offer it.

Actually, only the Zoints SEO has no support, it was released into the public domain under the LGPL. :)

And that is the stupidest theory i have ever heard in my life.

1. Of course he is out to gain something from it. It, maybe fame, fortune, a good time, whatever his goal is he's doing what it takes to get there and he isnt doing anything less then morale, or lying to get to the top. Its a little something called initiative, its what separates his work/forums from others.

Let me ask you, Whats the point of your forum? Is it just to say, "oh hey i have a internet forum. Look how cool i am!" I doubt it.

2. He isnt the only one that benefits from it. I used Zoints for a matter of 3 weeks, and gained a couple of active members from their network before i disabled it while i rework the site. Thats a couple of active members I never would have got without Zoints.

Well, I've always viewed Zoints as being like a clone of Pyramid investment schemes in it's design and how it works. And we all know only the pyramid starters made the money from them in the long-run.

God knows why I view Zoints that way, but the way it works just reminds me of the old pyramid investment scams. Sounds crazy I know, but thats what Zoints reminds me off! :confused:

I admit it. Zoints is using you and your forums for ulterior motives. However, the system is designed so that while we use you and your forum in an attempt to realize our 10th Guiding Principle, you benefit. I'm all about mutually beneficial relationships.

Does Zoints have the potential to become a reasonably big company? Yes. Will I personally make a lot of money from it? Not really, as I have chosen the path of karma yoga. I'm one of those annoying dirty (at least at heart ;) ) hippies trying to spread peace and joy. I realize 87.59% of the people reading this just rolled their eyes, laughed, or threw up a little in their mouth (I know I would have a few years ago) but I have a little vision.

Why do I care so much about communities, and more importantly, interconnecting them? Does interconnecting increase traffic for forums? Yes. Does it increase the chance for success? Yes. Does it make forums more "sticky"? Yes. Does it increase revenue? Yes. Does it improve SEO? Yes. But it goes even deeper than that. Forum-based communities are global, borderless extensions of our society. On my personal big-board, more than 140 countries (last I checked) are represented. I have formed so many friendships with people from all over the world that I could go to just about any country and have a place to stay a night and probably a tour guide. Many of these countries are so called "enemies" of the USA.

If we interconnect online commmunities, then the interaction of members from other countries will only grow in scope. And as technologies such as real time language translation come about, then we'll all be able to interact, understand and befriend people of different cultures and belief systems more efficiently. Let's be honest, our governments are never going to bring about peace. It's the common man like you and me forming so many friendships around the world that will help bring it about. Because in the end, when you understand someone and come to befriend them, then only good things can happen.

No, I could care less about the money. I'm perfectly happy driving around my 91 Toyota pickup held together with duct tape and prayers. The day you see me in a fancy car I purchased, by all means, take a picture, stop the presses, and link to this post so the world can call me a fraud.

Will Zoints succeed on the level I hope? I don't know. But I have the resources to try, and in the end, it feels like the right thing to do. I must admit, I never thought trying to do good would be so hard. But if I take a step back and look at it from the perspective of others, I understand why. But in the end, someone has to try.

/damn hippy

P.S. As for the guy above who prefers Subway, I have filed an order of protection against you with the state of Arizona. You must stay at least 100 yards away from me at all times. :mad:

LOL.

Zoints, not sure about that. :classic: zzzzzz....

Don't use any of these addons, modifications, hacks, whatever, so it means diddly-squat to me.

Name branding and advertising can be good (and often needed) for a company. Leaving enough traces of the name in various places is one way of doing so.

The only risk is that you overdo it and it gets seen as a negative thing (advertisements versus spamming). The only judge in this is the general opinion.

I think thats a fair comment and well put across.

I agree; a very well-put point. Jamster anyone? In this case, it also depends on what you happen to be selling, as well.

Though it's very difficult to find a happy medium in between healthy advertising and plain spamming. It's always nice to throw your name out everywhere, but those places may not want to have to see it. It's all in the eye of the reader, not the advertisers themselves.

I've been looking for articles on this actually, and another site (linked with this one, but link omitted) is very useful.