Angry .Orgers

[vBintense]

Originally Posted by The Geek

Im a vb customer and my customers are all vb customers. Instead of gripping on to the past with white knuckles for fear of change, maybe it would be worth a go? It could be just what .org needs.

Your right you are, then perhaps they should allow it with out anything offered to the community free. But if they do choose ?your? route then we need to be fair, let hosting companies promote to if they have a valid vb license (fair is fair and it is a resource of vbulletin users) and lets not forget about web design companies. And while we are at it freelance coders, o0 yes and SEO companies, as long as they have a license they have as much right to promote as you would.

[GamerzWorld]

When i first saw the development of so many payed hacks with 3.5 i like many others felt a tiny bit let down(maybe not right word). Part of my choice to go with vbulletin was its vast community whom offered great support and additions to the software. An arcade system, a article system, a RPG/Pet system the list goes on. However now as time has gone on and ive purchased the RPG, Arcade, 3 geek products and countless more items i have changed my outlook on the situation. Im no scripter, me and PHP (bar basic copying) just dont go and therefore i need additional support. With payed subscriptions i get that, i get quality addons at a reasonable price and at the end of the day if im paying for vbulletin why shouldnt i expect to pay for a huge addon to my forum? Thereofre my view is also simillar for what vbulletin.org should now offer. To me its always been the ideal resource zone, the place to enchance my forum and like it or not the age of big addons for free appears to have mainly gone. Its time to adapt and in my view its the sites responsibility as the major resource area to offer its users the infromation on what hacks are out there - Free or for a fee. I dont see the issue of these authors advertising and giving the needed information here, if you dont want to pay dont look at that section of the forum, if you think its too much like i felt for VBSeo dont buy it.. but at least offer the service for those who do.

Thats just my view

[davidw]

I guess no use bumping this thread - I get a new email once a minute lol

[eXtremeTim]

Originally Posted by MR-2ZZ

I think that free is good... but I am always willing to donate.

At the same time Ive downloaded hacks and used them for a week, then got rid of them. Now it may become more of a money pit.

The problem with donating is that hardly anybody ever does. They take or work give nothing back. As alot of time consuming questions expect paid quality support, and half the time remove our copyright notices.

[Christine]

Forgetting the paid/free thing for a second, I have to say that Geek hit on something that has bugged me for a while. Reading an author's hack -- and rather than "thank you" you see a whole lot of "this sucks because it doesn't do bla bla bla". Bugs the daylights out of me, and I have installed hacks I don't need/care about where I have seen that just to be a voice of thanks.

On the paid/free thing -- is/was this an issue with skins? I don't recall anyone being upset about commercial skins when there are free skin sites (like Floris') as well as skins released both here and .com yet (correct me if I am wrong) people with commercial skin sites/custom development of skins are allowed to plug them, no?

I wouldn't mind seeing a forum for paid hacks with a description and link. While I haven't any projects large enough to warrant that, others do. A small fee for the thread (like on WHT) and there ya go. I would go as far as to model it like WHT: No discussion outside of that thread about the hack -- only questions like pre-sale and feedback from those who use it.

Only thing is -- would there be a problem if someone released something similar (but different -- not a rip) for free? That could be a real headache for the staff...

[eXtremeTim]

Originally Posted by Christine

Forgetting the paid/free thing for a second, I have to say that Geek hit on something that has bugged me for a while. Reading an author's hack -- and rather than "thank you" you see a whole lot of "this sucks because it doesn't do bla bla bla". Bugs the daylights out of me, and I have installed hacks I don't need/care about where I have seen that just to be a voice of thanks.

On the paid/free thing -- is/was this an issue with skins? I don't recall anyone being upset about commercial skins when there are free skin sites (like Floris') as well as skins released both here and .com yet (correct me if I am wrong) people with commercial skin sites/custom development of skins are allowed to plug them, no?

I wouldn't mind seeing a forum for paid hacks with a description and link. While I haven't any projects large enough to warrant that, others do. A small fee for the thread (like on WHT) and there ya go. I would go as far as to model it like WHT: No discussion outside of that thread about the hack -- only questions like pre-sale and feedback from those who use it.

Only thing is -- would there be a problem if someone released something similar (but different -- not a rip) for free? That could be a real headache for the staff...

The similiar thing doesnt really bother me. I mean if its similiar to one of my hacks and I look the code over and I dont see it being or consisting of chunks of my code I wouldnt have a problem.

Also with paid hacks you also get better support at least from me you get priority support on my site.

[Boofo]

Originally Posted by The Geek

insane - its becoming more common to find paid vb add ons not because anyone sees dollar signs in their eyes, but because its impossible for many to continue to provide high quality work and support for free. In some cases it actually stifles further development and cause excellent coders to simply say 'cant be asked'.

What gets my goat is the cynical attitude that some users have here when 'commercial' is mentioned (almost always seems to be from those that have 0 to maybe 2 tiny releases here). These guys seem to think there is a bunch of greedy business men salivating for the chance to advertise on .org so they can go buy a new yacht. I can tell you now: There is not a lot of money in selling commercial scripts for vBulletin (maybe unless you are charging over $100 for them and selling them out the wazoo).

As far as the 'to post a commercial hack, you must do a LITE one'. Thats going to be impossible to fulfill. Its not win/win for everyone. Its win/win for those that don't have to write 2 versions of a script for those that will pay and then those that wont. Supporting 2 versions of the same script is even MORE of a nightmare (as I am quickly finding out) and as was previously mentioned - some stuff just doesn't scale to a LITE version.

In my opinion it doesn't make much sense to have 1 site for commercial addons and one for the hobbyists. This is supposed to be the ultimate vb resource, setting up a separate sight for fear that no one will make free add ons anymore is paranoid and defeats the purpose of having a resource center for owners of vBulletin. Heck, there will always be free options. In fact I just stumbled across a couple sites giving away my stuff for free (woot! I'm in the big time now! I'm being pirated!).

I don't have anything against paid hacks, although I will never pay for one. I just don't think they ought to use the org to advertise their paid hacks and use the site to get customers. It will become an epidemic overnight.

The only way I could see it ever even half-way working is to do what Wayne suggested doing a while back. To charge a percentage or fee to advertise paid hacks here. You have to spoend money to make money so there shouldn't be any problem with doing it that way. As much as I hate commercial hacks for vb (hacks, NOT coders), I could live with something like Wayne's proposal. The org is a gold-mine for anyone selling commercial hacks and we all know it. That's why this debate has been carrying on as long as it has.

[eXtremeTim]

Originally Posted by Boofo

I don't have anything against paid hacks, although I will never pay for one. I just don't think they ought to use the org to advertise their paid hacks and use the site to get customers. It will become an epidemic overnight.

The only way I could see it ever even half-way working is to do what Wayne suggested doing a while back. To charge a percentage or fee to advertise paid hacks here. You have to spoend money to make money so there shouldn't be any problem with doing it that way. As much as I hate commercial hacks for vb (hacks, NOT coders), I could live with something like Wayne's proposal. The org is a gold-mine for anyone selling commercial hacks and we all know it. That's why this debate has been carrying on as long as it has.

Im going to have to argue this whole thing. This is supposed to be the ultimate vbulletin resource site. Not allowing paid mods is restricting the resource availability.

I mean im not in this game to rip people off. I am in this to pay for my time I spend on my stuff and to cover all the time I spend providing support.

I mean I am targeting comercial grade programs right now. Such as a full feature client management system, a fully featured auction system, and a fully featured shopping cart / store system.

Why should I not be able to tell the people here about these nice tools. I mean some people are always looking for these things. But may never find them. Which hurts them. I know I will be selling them either way and covering my time for them and support and other expenses related to the script. If I had to pay a price to vb.org I would proble not offer them here or else I would more then likely have charge more. Which isnt fair to them.

[Boofo]

So instead of paying a small price to advertise and bring in customers, you should get it for free, and still make money? What doesn't sound right about that?

Go to your local newspaper and tell them they should let you advertise for free and let me know what they tell you.

[eXtremeTim]

Originally Posted by Boofo

So instead of paying a small price to advertise and bring in customers, you should get it for free, and still make money? What doesn't sound right about that?

Go to your local newspaper and tell them they should let you advertise for free and let me know what they tell you.

lol

No what im saying is this is supposed to be the ultimate vbulletin resource. If I were to advertise here I would have to raise the price to offset the fee I have to pay. Which isnt fair to the user I said.

I mean most of my pay stuff is fairly cheap. Now the big commercial grade things usualy cost quite a bit more. But the smaller hacks and shit that I would be selling would be fairly cheap. Meaning im already hardly making anything on them just enough to hopefully cover my time and expense for the hack.

I have bills is all im saying and for me to spend as much time making free hacks as I used to it takes money and thats where my pay hacks help out. They help me to be able to keep making free products.