[akz645]

Originally Posted by TheLastSuperman

If the system has worked fine for years with only a handful of threads similar to this one asking why or why not something is done then its fine and does not need updating.

If it ain't broke, why fix it. I can definitely understand why you and others would think that way and that might be the most beneficial mindset to have for this business.

If this isn't too much trouble, can you/another mod make a poll, asking only unlicenced members to vote?
The question being something like:
- If trail was extended to 1 week & you could download mods during that time, would that temp you into buying our product more than our current system?
You could expand on that question in the first post and/or change that question to something similar. As you'd need to explain what your current system/stance is.
You don't have to make that poll and vbulletin staff certainly do not have to use it's result to determine what they'd do. I just think it would be better to make a poll asking users without vbulletin licence than not asking at all.
It can potentially make vbulletin more money, but if they're content as is, then that's their choice Maybe new staff in the future may agree with me, if nobody does now.
If they think it will be bad for business, then that's fine too. If that is the case, I would like to know why they think it would be bad for business though.

Originally Posted by TheLastSuperman

You're not wasting time giving out solutions, you truly didn't give any... not saying that smart but the system/setup is fine as-is, these ideas of yours are just that, ideas and while you deem them worthy enough to warrant change, that is your justification as to why its required not the companies.

Now that I think about it, using the word solution does sound quite pompous :erm:. So yeah, Solution probably wasn't the best word to use. I apologise.
Yes you're right, they're just ideas. In fact, my ideas may be the opposite of a solution.

Originally Posted by TheLastSuperman

Genuine customers are the type of people who would never download and install illegal/nulled software to begin with - they would genuinely pay for it, genuinely test out mods, and genuinely enjoy the support provided on vbulletin.com and here on .org that they genuinely paid to access. Did I say Genuinely? Genuinely pay for something and you can genuinely enjoy it without shame!

I think you're using the word genuine and loyal customers synonymously.
I'm referring to potential customers. So users who would like to/want to test first before they become full customers (genuine) by purchasing a vbulletin licence.
Existing customers don't really need to download free pirated mods, as they can just get them for free here.

How is a 'potential' customer supposed to know whether or not the product is to their liking? How exactly will they know if a mod works or not?
As I stated before, you can't truly know if the mod will work on not, without testing out yourself. What if they buy a licence and then install the mods but it doesn't work out? Additionally, lets say they don't get any support to have it fixed. Should they still be happy? If that was their only reason for buying this board over another, wouldn't they have wasted money?

What if they do not know anybody who owns a vbulletin licence to allow them to test, on a test forum?
The only way for them to test out your product & mods before actually purchasing the full product is through piracy- I don't think that's very good. Potential customers are not loyal to you, they simply want to test before purchase, which I don't believe makes them bad people. The shame will be very minimal, if they're only doing so for testing reasons and do not intend to use any nulled product for too long.
If they like the product and mods, they'll buy it. If not, they won't. I guess another counter argument you could say to my idea is that allowing users to thoroughly test vbulletin and mods wouldn't be good for business. Although I have no idea whether or not that would be true.

Originally Posted by BirdOPrey5

Whoever owns a vBulletin license can also install a second "test" copy for which they can use to test mods or other things. This copy just needs to be blocked from the public- most often accomplished with an .htaccess password.

So any license holder can create their test copy and give access to a developer or someone they know interested in creating or testing mods on it. There is no need to pay for a 2nd account.

Yes I am aware of that, as that's precisely what I did (which I stated earlier)
However, I don't think the vast majority of unlicensed users would be able to access such a thing, as they'd need to know somebody with a vbulletin licence (as I've mentioned before).
This method isn't very ideal though because it requires constantly nagging the licence owner to download X mod. Also I don't think the licence owner would allow one of their limited email slots to be given to somebody they don't know too much and/or access to their FTP for the user to upload mods themselves.