Paid Mods
 

I know there is a rule against posting about mods which are "sold" - just curious why this exclusion? Is there an alternative where paid modifications are listed?

Likely not.

This topic has been discussed many a times in past threads, I suggest using the search function.

A better place to have post this thread is:
https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/forumdisplay.php?f=7

Maybe, maybe not. I was looking for a discussion about the subject, not just asking the site administrators. Searches are fine for researching historial information, but if you are looking to effect some kind of change, then the subject needs to be brought up again.

Please let us know what you think about us in here! - Well, I'm not really trying to let you know what I think about you. So...

Sit back in your lazy-boy recliner and chat away. Discuss anything related to vBulletin or life in general! - seems to indicate that anything related to vBulletin can be discussed in here.

So, the "better place" would be subjective, wouldn't it? If I was looking for group participation, this would seem most likely to be the "proper place".

Back to the subject at hand, I don't mind paying for mods when they are backed by support - in fact, there is one import mod I was interested in, but the topic was removed before I had a chance to review it and now I've sent off some PMs to try and find it.

if i recall, it was to do with jelsoft not wanting to be a fertiliser to other businesses in their opening stages as once they got the custom they could just drag the people off to their sites :(

also once you encourage paid mods, free ones would become sparse, the only way i could see it working was on a privilidge system, but then that would encourage poor support and spamming.

catch-22 :(

Not everyone can afford to shell out bucks for every mod that is paid that they like. The object of the site here is to share coding and learn from one another, not just make bucks of off unsupecting newbies.

Except that many can - obviously they paid for vB in the first place. Just because some cannot afford to pay for a mod with support shouldn't preclude them from being offered - it's still offers people a choice and they can look for similiar mods which do not have a fee. Gearing the site to those who cannot afford anything beyond their vB license seems very limiting, IMO.

Since the mods require vB to begin with, I'm not sure I see how selling add-ons would canabilize Jelsoft's business. Would it not potentially lead to better mods as people could charge for their efforts and customers could get better support?

There are a lot of free hacks here that don't get the support they should get. It seems to me when you already have someone's money the support isn't quite so important. Telling someone "well, it works for me" after you have their money really sucks.

Just a comment - this is irrelevant Bob. Not everyone can afford Vbulletin either. That doesn't mean they deserve to have it given to them for free ;)

I have never understood this community that thinks code should be free but styles and graphics deserve to be paid for.

That said, back on topic, I can understand perfectly why Jelsoft wouldn't people posting willy-nilly about paid hacks. It reeks of spam when a forum becomes overloaded with "buy this" posts and signature lines.

In addition, Jelsoft deserves a cut if we are going to use their site to promote our paid products. I would love to see Jelsoft do something along the lines of WebHosting Talk and allow developers to pay to advertise their addons.

Amy

No, it's not irrelevant, Amy. This site was set up to learn and share coding. It has no place for paid hacks or advertising of any kind. And it should be that way. Some of the hacks that have turned into paid hacks, the authors learned how to do a lot of the coding for those hacks here. They should be more interested in giving back to the community that taught them than trying to make a fast buck out of it.

And I don't think it's ok for graphics and styles to be paid for. I have 4 styles on my board and I didn't have to pay for any of them. There are styles out there that are free and some of them are just as good if not better than the ones people pay for.

na u don't get it
a lot of people just about scrape the money to get vbulletin in the first place
the last thing they would want it to pay for more stuff
i mean if money didn't matter
the debate about 'why should i pay for vbulletin when x forum is free'
wouldn't exist
i mean if i had to pay for every mod for my site
i would have stuck to a basic forum and only template mods
i mean the discussion of paid mods only seems to be an issue on
vbulletin
you never see anyone saying am gonna make x mod a paid service on other forums that run free
so i dont get why is it here

the way i look at it if you don't want to share then don't
but leave the free communities to it
and make ur own site for paid software
reason why i say that is because others have done just that

also the fact that you can't advertise Paid scripts here doesn't neccessarily
take away their popularity
especially in the case of Photopost , while not fully a mod for this forum
it does intergrate with it

i feel that a lot of people want to make a buck on Vbulletins success
and its probably one of the reasons why people tend to make mods and later decide to make em paid.
Fair dues to that but why complain about it
if its paid its paid and if its not its not

i would say vbulletin.org would not exist with the amount of mods as it does not
and the community would not be as big if paid hacks were allowed
coz then every single mod wether big or small would probably cost 5 bucks
for example even simple template mods
Filbert has turned into 5 dollars / 10 dollar installations
which is not a complaint but to be honest how is it justifiable

i can understand for large large modifications but small ones .

If i had to pay for hundreds of mods which is eventually what this community could become if paid hacks were allowed
i think a lot of customers would either have a lot of standard vbulletin forums out there

and personally i don't think i'd stay a customer with vbulletin too long
coz the biggest attraction to me is its hacks

i have already 100+ mods on my forum
if i had to pay for each one i'd be very poor right now
or they would simply not be there

or maybe i'd be learning web design a whole lot faster :p

Very well said, sir! ;)

And just how should professionals expect to make a living? I assume that not everyone here has a trust fund.

I assume you expect mods posted here only to be done by people in the "learning" process. As such, the expectation for support could be summed up with "you get what you pay for".

That said, the emphasis of these forums is for learning and serious developers should consider alternative resources. (That gives me an idea....)

I think you fail to take into account that market demand will drive prices and "small mods" would unlikely generate any revenue as there would bound to be free alternatives. The current policy prohibits even "large ones" from being promoted on the site (such as the mod I was looking for). I can see a trend here where people with no financial incentive often fail to followup on their work - after all, the "fun" of documenting and posting mods is often lost after a couple pages of rants from other people on the learning curve.

Advertising seems like a viable alternative.

Professionals need to make a living somewhere other than here.

And poeple who fail to follow up on their work, are going to do the same thing after the rants come in when money is involved. You seem to think that money is some sort of magic that will make someone care about support. It doesn't happen that way. You of all people should know that.

If you have something to sell, peddle it elsewhere. This is a learning and sharing site. It's not a money pit.

My point was that by denying the opportunity for people to see all their options, you are simply providing a service which caters to the lowest common demoniator.

As "The Ultimate vBulletin Resource" you might consider some guidelines for allowing more professional involvement here.

Ok, let me ask you this. How do you get people to register PP? You still get them even though you aren't allowed to adverise it here, right? Then why do you need to advertise here, too?

well i think this actually is the best vbulletin resource

and to the other extent the proffesional involvement is here
because developers like yourself have to come here to make sure their hacks are better than their free equivelenta

and i agree to the point where this is a sharing community we get our support from each other

i myself am only learning but i still help when i can
because simply i remember when i was a newbie

and i will always give back to the community that gave so much to me
and changing that from what it is today
and allowing paid hacks
changes the fundamental principles on why this place is here today

if paid hacks were allowed simple fact would be that
we wouldn't be sharing we would be expecting people to pay

example

hello i got x addon to x mod , i want 5 dollars for it
i just don't want that to happen

and to be honest its only developers like yourself that are moaning
which is a minority
i don't see what the complaint is either
since you make a living off a a gallery script whose main selling point is not that its a gallery but its a gallery that can intergrate with forum scripts

If you read my first post, I wasn't talking about PhotoPost. I was talking about a mod someone had posted here which had been removed - specifically a paid mod to convert a Threads db to a vB3 db. While I am sure that JelSoft will get around to it, I had heard about someone offering this script as a service, but could not find the post a was referred to.

Given the choice to wait or pay a few bucks to get it done now, I would probably pay the few bucks. In this case, JelSoft loses out on the vB3 license purchase because I couldn't find the resource I was looking for.

I was using PP as an example. If people can find that mod then they can find the other paid mods. They don't need the ORG to advertise on, is what I'm trying to say.

<i>Post made before response above.</i>

For a commercial script, I would agree. However, a "mod" which isn't your typical application doesn't really fall into the same catgegory.

If it is a paid for mod, it does. When you start charging for code or mods, then they all fall into the same category. When you involve money, you take all of the integrity out of a place like vb.org.

Integrity? I'm not sure thats the word you were looking for.

Once again, as a resouce the lack of a professional aspect to the selection is limiting. You could have special forums devoted to the topic of paid mods and maintain the "integrity" of the site while providing a valuable service to the entire community.

If I wanted a paid hack and I didn't want to pay for it or couldn't pay for it, I'd code it myself if I could or do without. I wouldn't pitch a fit that the author of the code is charging for his work. Just a thought.

And Bob, this community has evolved so far past a coding community that it's not funny. A year ago, I would have agreed that paid hacks have NO place here. But, Jelsoft wants this site to be a site for customers to download additions to vbulletin. Once it ceased being a coding community and people were chastised for telling members that they really should be able to code a bit before trying to install some hacks, then it became a viable place to advertise paid hacks within an organized structure. But, that structure needs to be defined by Jelsoft, and Jelsoft most definitely should charge something for advertising rights.

MPDev, you are actually in a better position to allow advertising of paid modifications on your site. Your members have already shown they are willing to pay for custom work.

Amy

Once you allow one paid mod here, then everyone will think they can make a buck or two off of anything they write. This site is no less professional as a learning and sharing center than it would be as a paid mod site. The paid mod service is nowhere near as valuable as learning and sharing is. Only to people like yourself who have something to sell.

And, yes, integrity was the exact word I was looking for. ;)

Yes, true - we actually have a thriving business of people who pay for custom modifications. I believe that alone is a decent indication that there are plenty of people willing to pay for quality work and support.

Limiting your selection to free mods supported by the community holds you back from being the "ultimate resource".

Except in this case, I'm here as someone looking to buy something - not sell.

Unless, of course, your goal is to enhance your site without having to "learn" how to code or use vB templates. Or, in my case, just wanting to convert from one format to another because JelSoft doesn't support it.

That sounds more like a personal attack than an example. Is there a reason you are going on the offensive?

Nothing personal whatsoever. I'm sorry if you took it that way. I just don't have any time for anyone who deals in paid hacks. Never have and never will. ;)

yep sharing and learning i agree to the above


To the others
i don't know why we are reiterating the same point

we don't want people making a fast buck on this place
if paid mods were allowed u would rarely see a free mod

for example if u had the opportunity in a place to release a free or paid mod
what would u post
especially since this place could become the center of trade for paid modifications

fair enough we are here to see the beginning but it isn't easy to shake off an image of center of trade once its labelled on
the very fact that they can't release paid mods here is what makes it desirable in the first place

as a customer of vbulletin and as a learner of php / databases
i would say if i had to pay for something and i knew i could get it elsewhere free and to a similar standard i'll just go elsewhere

i think the very fact that this conversation topic is up means that you don't want to give your hacks for free
thats fine but take it elsewhere

in terms of communication there are other mediums of releasing paid modifications so go do it ;)

By "deals in" do you mean a customer who is looking to make a purchase?

This is the issue which I am talking about - you want no part of it, but as a the purchaser of another vB license, I am looking for a mod which will enable me to convert a site from one forum to another. I know there is one alternative, but because its a "paid mod", its not allowed here and therefore I cannot find it.

By limiting my selection to only "free" mods you are not providing me with all options that would otherwise be avaialble to me.

Again, you are discounting the power of a free market. Just because a mod is for sale doesn't mean you have to buy it.

Again, you aren't reading what I am writing. I am looking to buy a mod, not sell one. I give away my mods because they help our customers, which indirectly benefits me. I have no such mod for vB that I would ever consider charging for - does that clarify my reasons for this thread at all?

You give away your mods? What is PP then? Did that turn free? ;)

what makes you think somoene would want to pay for something that they can normally get free ?
the only reason why anyone says they will pay for it is because they want it now, but even then it has to be within reason

also what u just mentioned in terms of converting over
is something u can go to specialists for
theres loads of them

That conversion script is usually something that vbulletin provide for free sooner or later

yeh we don't have to buy it
but you are negating what it implies when they allow mods here
why would anyone want to release a free mod if they can make a fast buck on it
this place soon become the biggest advertising source instead the resource it is today

Yes, I do. I provide many mods for vB that are free; including this popular one at the top of the BETA forum:

https://vborg.vbsupport.ru/showthread.php?t=60917

And a few others, without doing more searching:

http://www.photopostdev.com/showthread.php?t=158
http://www.photopostdev.com/showthread.php?t=153

I hope this information is helpful and you can get back to the subject at hand, your preoccupation at making the thread a personal one is starting to get annoying.

yeh u do but remember u do that out of service for your own script
its rather the same for vbulletin
we pay for access 30 pounds a year for this hacking resource

Because I cannot find it for free and I would prefer to do it sooner-than-later; particularily when the "later" isn't defined or even on the radar screen based on current projects discussed on DotCom.

Hmmm... Let's see, pay someone by the hour for something that could be purchased for $40 or $50? You do the math.

And so that would suggest that my hacks are not a contribution to this forum?

why do you make the assumption that the specialist is going to charge more than anyone else that deals in vbulletin modifications

theres a going rate for modifications , for example if i want a hack installed i generally pay something like 10 dollars but thats nothing to do with this forum
i have to go elsewhere

sorry your hacks are a contribution to this forum however they also promote
photopost indirectly

for example to have this loveley feature you also need photopost

What's the going rate to convert a database from one forum type to vB? Would it be more than $50? By pooling the purchase power of more than one client, you reduce the overall cost to everyone.

The purpose of my hacks make them no less a contribution than yours. Once again, this isn't about me, but it you want to make it so - start a new thread.

sorry if you took it personally but i'm just making points on why we shouldn't
i was only using you as a point for example

Sure, as long as they buy your program first. But what have you released that anyone can use that isn't for your paid program?

Is this how personal attacks work here - make an accusation and the follow up with "it wasn't personal, I was just using you as an example."? Because that's pretty much the definition of a "personal attack".

Sorry, Boofo, but you are off-topic (once again) and should start a new thread or contact me privately if you have some questions.

My involvement here isn't the issue being discussed - my use of the site as a vB customer looking for mods is.

Now, can you stay on topic or do you need to take a time out?

lol now ur seriously taking it personal , ok what about constructive critiscism
i was on topic because i was relating it to how it affects the site itself

but i'll apologise coz i didn't mean to offend you