Subscriber Package

Puck

There's been a bit of discussion on this lately and I was just wondering, could you admins tell us some more about it please?

Will we have boards.ie email addresses?
Will we have more server space? (Not a big concern for me)
Will we be allowed custom avatars?(Not a big concern either)
Will we be allowed custom tags?
Will the tags be safe from other users?
How much will this cost?
Is this a pimple or a boil?

Sorry if there's another thread about this but I'm feckin' wrecked at the moment and didn't see one.

Thank you byebye! Puck collapse now...sleep...sleeeeeep...

Gordon

Puck - you are opening a can of worms mate - a CAN OF WORMS!

/me runs away on his "56k" line

ozt9vdujny3srf

I say, eat your cake and be glad of it, for it will bring you far more than any "supporter pack" will

Lenny

/me wonders who leaked this one out

Gordon

Well it has been known now for a while that in 15 days boards wil be allowing uploadable post count changes. And Puck adds that uploadable avatars will be available. No brainer surley?

Victor

Originally posted by Gordon
Well it has been known now for a while that in 15 days boards wil be allowing uploadable post count changes.

But I've been doing that for the last 5000-odd posts.

kaimera

short answer puck...

it's all a dream.
when you wake up...your shorts will be stained n you'll be happi.

and you'll forget you ever posted this

DeVore

Originally posted by Puck
There's been a bit of discussion on this lately and I was just wondering, could you admins tell us some more about it please?

Will we have boards.ie email addresses?

Yes.

Will we have more server space? (Not a big concern for me)

Yes.

Will we be allowed custom avatars?(Not a big concern either)

Yes.

Will we be allowed custom tags?

Yes.

Will the tags be safe from other users?

Yes.

heheh you managed to ask about all the bits we threw in for fun and missed some of the bigger things
Blogs (actually called vbJournals... an icky example here)
Photomangement software (for creating galleries etc).
Supporters private forum. Your own forum on request (not accessible through boards Nav though).

All tied into your Boards username.


How much will this cost?

€5 a month. €50 a year.


Is this a pimple or a boil?

Its a boil.

We're going to test this with the Mods first (a manageable number of people) and then as soon as the beta test is over we'll be releasing it to everyone. We'll be taking CC (if Ulster bank give us an account. You should see their faces as we tried to explain what Boards is... bit of a clash of cultures there!) and cheques , postal orders, pidgeons with money tied to their legs etc.
ETA: unknown but quite soon I'd have thought.


DeV.

po0k

One thing I've been wodering about,
re: taglines

Will we be able to change our own?

Carbiens

excellent, whats the damage on your pockets though, im sure you'll make it back anyway with the amount of interest there will be for this but i was just curious on how much you guys invest in boards

regi

Will we be able to change our own?

Yup

DeVore

Originally posted by Carbine
excellent, whats the damage on your pockets though, im sure you'll make it back anyway with the amount of interest there will be for this but i was just curious on how much you guys invest in boards

Right now the site is basically self-sufficent as far as overt costs go. (ie money we have to pay to thirdparties).
Hosting365 and ourselves have reached a kind in-perpetuity agreement regarding the advertising you see above and us getting hosting space for our box and a fair chunk of bandwidth.

The costs now are really in our time. I spend about 4 hours a day dealing with the community and all that goes with it. Regi and Ecksor probably put in that much time too (certainly in the last few weeks Boards has been Regi's primary concern).

That cant really continue either as we all have day jobs!
So the growth of the community (and theres a lot of talk about what we want to grow to *become*) is reaching another turning point. We need a full time caretaker in the next 12 months or the site will just implode under its own weight.

We could just stop taking signups but that just seems to be turning away from the potential that Boards has to show corporates that freedom of expression doesnt have to be feared.
(thats my political view). I also think that theres something about Boards as a social experiment kinda thing...

As far as historically, I suppose the admins have put about 10K into the project in hard dosh of one form or another over the 5 years. That really pales compared to the work we've put into it!

DeV.

bubbles

Just a couple of points

€5 a month doesn't sound too bad, but the €50 a year (altho a saving of €10!) seems a little steep for alot of people.

Remember that at the end of the day, the part of the site that people actually want and use (the forums) will still be free, and lets face it, you're not excatly offering anything breathtaking in the package -

boards.ie e-mail - have plently of email address at the moment, anyone who would have a boards.ie account can be easily contacted via PM - and most people have addresses they want(nickname wise or whatever)
server space - not that hard to find
avatars + tags - big deal - prob 30% of people will notice they are custom
blogs + album, no shortage of free services for those around
private forum - don't see the attraction in that.

Don't get me wrong, it would be nice to have them, on boards.ie, being local, fast and within a fairly big and somewhat sound community But lets face it, will it attract anything but the die hard users with it being that expensive? I think you are going to have to look hard at the people who actually are going to sign up. All the regulars sure will etc, but thats a somewhat closed market, the people who really would donate something in the running of boards.ie

Also looking at who your main userbase is - I notice alot of students - they tend to be smashed, you know spending all their money on drink, drugs, and lube. I think a lower price would really help get more poeple on board(bad pun)

100 people @ €50 a year - €5000
200 people @ €35 a year - €7000

€3 a month is good - but you could charge for 2 month periods, so you get 2 months for €6. Adds a better sence of value, and community spirt, with a low low price!

Also, when if I come accross a message board or something, and I see mentions and ads asking you to subscribe for only €4.95 a month!!! - I pretty much assume they have a fair amount of their services closed off except to paid members. Kind of disencourages you, know that if you probably have to pay to do anything, not really prepaired to do so, why bother signing up. Too many cheesy, cheap sites that try to get money for everything, would be a shame for boards.ie to get that image to brand new people to the site....

Just an opinion.

leeroybrown

We need a full time caretaker in the next 12 months or the site will just implode under its own weight.

A full time mantainer ain't exactly cheap. You'd take quite a while if you tried to put a value on what You, Regi and Ecksor put into the site ... even 50% of it would be difficult to replace on a budget.

Also looking at who your main userbase is - I notice alot of students

I'd also agree to a degree with ******* comment. While there is a very large userbase who would contribute ... there is also a large proportion who woldn't. That said the difference between €10 and €50 wouldn't affect their decision anyway.

and lube

What kinky college did you attend

On the issue of monthly v. bi-monthly v. yearly subscription raised by *******, it probably would have to be for the yearly period otherwise the cost and effort involved in managing it would become very high.

I'm just wondering if the contribution (which would inevitably come from the cre boards membership) be able to support a caretaker ... after all boards has to continue to exist without killing 3/4/5 people with workload.

Again, I like the idea of a subscriber service ... just wondering will it be able to support Boards longterm.

DeVore

Fair points *******... I agree with some and not with others.

We arent looking to rip people off (and I accept that you arent suggesting we are). We thought (and think) a fiver a month is not a lot to ask.

This is a supporters pack, you are right everything in it can be gotten somewhere else for free. Is this group of services worth a fiver a month? Probably not though as you point out its pretty convenient...

What we're hoping is that people see the value of boards and the enjoyment they get out of it and factor that into the equation. We are NEVER going to charge for access to the main boards. We've already said that. This is a simple statement of support from the users. A "great job, thanks guys, heres a pint" sort of thing. After all , 5 euro a month is slightly more then the cost of a single pint...

In the end of the day, some people will do the math and factor in the various pluses and minuses and decide that econmically it isnt worth it.... I dont think we'll ever really attract the sponsorship of that group. Even if we drop the price... as you said it can be found for free so even a quid is too much. (Stuff that is free comes at SOME cost... there are few people who do stuff on the internet for no profit )

Others will see what I see... the bigger picture of supporting what is happening here and want to help it build and grow into its full potential.

Boards will forever be free. If you want to help us grow, buy one of these. Its not called "Supporters Pack" for nothing.

DeV.

DeVore

Leeroy,
The admins arent about to feck off anywhere. We'll still be putting in the effort, its just that any further growth would be limited by our ability to deal with it.

Most likely the caretaker would be Regi as he's the one we need to work on boring icky stuff that isn't fun.

We might pay him for 2 days a week which allows us to do ACTUAL coding and stuff during work hours without having to monopolise his weekends/freetime.

The payment schedule can be 1 month, 3months, 6months, 1 year. At the start during initial rollout (to the mods) it will be for a year to make things simple (as most indicated that they would want a years worth).

The students will graduate (or not!) and hopefully they will support us then. Is there anything you can think of we could offer that would be worth 10euro a year to them? Would they buy it?

DeV.

leeroybrown

I'd forgotten that ******* had been added to the censord words list along with fúck, arsé, etc. Some words are just too bad to see ... even with fada's to make them pass the censor

Is there anything you can think of we could offer that would be worth 10euro a year to them? Would they buy it?

Probably not in most cases. The rest whop would support would be doing it for that reason exactly to support Boards. The point to which you refer does bite it's own tail.

I suppose at the end of the day a €50 'supporters pack' is exactly that ... a way for people to 'support' boards.

I don't really see a problem with €50 year for a 'supporter' pack. I might even pay it. The custom avatar [funny that] would be a good and I might even use the mail address occasionally (especially if theres POP(S)/IMAP(S) support) but the main reason I'd pay for would be to support Boards.

As for Regi acting as more of a full time caretaker ... yeah, that does actually sound like a very fiesable idea. I got the impression that the admins wanted to lighten the workload a bit (legitimately so) but paying Regi to keep up the good work (pending his patience to put up with us ) would work.

And funnily I think dictionary.com's word of the day for today (arrived while posting) describes the admins well:

http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=assiduous

CuLT

Búbbles, I would point you to www.SomeThingAwful.com for an example of a successful pay-board.

Now, on SA they restrict you from going into the forums until you have subscribed, I'm not suggesting that, however there are things like SA direct connect hubs. Boards could have its own fileshare hub, with the huge amount of users I'd say it would be more than useful.

Also, if the revenue from this happens to get substantial enough, One of you lads (Dev, Regi, ecksor) might even give up the day job for a while , see how being around all the time works out.

There's a load of small inexpensive (with the fees) amenities that could be added, just gotta figure out the right ones for the "unique" group of boardsies (patent?) .

I will certainly be going for one of these packs if only to show my support for boards.

:ninja: heh, luv that ninja thing...

davej

I think an emphasis on the fact that it is a supporters pack is paramount for this to work.

Once people start paying for something they begin to expect a certain level of service. If a person is paying for a boards.ie email a/c and comes to rely on it, they might not be happy with downtime or bugs. If it was free they can't really complain, but if their hard earned cash is involved they may see things differently.

DeVore said:

So the growth of the community (and theres a lot of talk about what we want to grow to *become*) is reaching another turning point.

I agree with you and share your optimism about what boards can become. But there is also a risk involved in bringing money into the equation. Money can destroy relationships between even the closest of friends and family. You may risk alienating some of the oldest regulars and discouraging many enthusiastic newbies.

I don't want this post to seem like it's being completely negative: I'm just urging caution, I think it's a good idea. The wording that explains what the supporters pack is about must be very explicit; clearly stating what this service is and what it isn't.

I also think there is a danger of creating a two tier system whereby those who can afford it get certain privileges and those who can't may be seen as being less of a "supporter" of boards. Things like running regular competitions where the prize is a supporters pack may alleviate some of this....

davej

Puck

Originally posted by DeVore
Blogs (actually called vbJournals... an icky example here)
Photomangement software (for creating galleries etc).
Supporters private forum. Your own forum on request (not accessible through boards Nav though).

Mmmmmm nice.

Originally posted by DeVore
Its a boil.

It was a gummy bear.

Looking forward to when it will be released. It's a very nice package but to be honest I didn't really need much persuasion to support Boards.

I'd probably go for the anual package myself. One question I have though is what happens if somebody keeps missing payments on the monthly package? I mean if they pay only every other month will the services be on one month and switched off the next? If so, what would happen to their blogs, webspace and emails they might have still on the server, would they all be erased every time the service is taken away and started on a clean slate everytime the services are switched on again? Just curious.

seamus

....and will we get personalised urls, like http://devore.boards.ie ?

po0k

Give me a bank account number, account number and branch code and I'll deposit the €50.

Prehaps a direct Debit system would be possible for people (ie the gainfully employed, unlike myself)

CuLT

I'm sure PayPal could work too .

Hobart

Just being Devil's Advocate here Dev but I just feel the need to clarify your motives/terminology here. Am I right in stating the following:

1) You/Boards are calling this User Enhancement Pack a Supporters Pack. Ok. So by calling it a supporters pack you offer a little more to those Users/Members who buy/subscribe to this pack with the understanding that it will show some (albeit small) allegience on their part to the boards.ie site/community.

2) You plan to use any funds raised form this to get a round of drinks for the admins and to help boards 'grow'. Ok. So a percentage will go towards a bit of a shin-dig once a year (for example) and the rest into a bank account to pay Regi/Alt-Regi for 2 days a week (or whatever is needed) most weeks of the year.

3) You will never charge for acces to the boards.ie message boards.

Can I also ask the question (and you can tell me to fcuk off if you want to) but I am surprised that boards.ie is not a succesfull commercial adventure at this stage. Why not?

PiE

I'd consider Boards a very succesful commercial adventure. It's supporting itself with minimal advertising and I'm sure the running costs of the site aren't exactly cheap.

Anywho, €50 each year seems a bit steep to me, being the poor student that I am and all. How bout a once-off lifetime membership for hmm... €100-€200?

seamus

Not being an admin, and fully prepared to be completely rubbished.......

Just on point 2, helping boards 'grow', I assume you mean, the money will be used to pay for bandwidth/hosting costs, as they inevitably increase, and prevent boards.ie from ever having to become reliant on advertising to the point where it'll be actively sought.

Originally posted by Hobart
Can I also ask the question (and you can tell me to fcuk off if you want to) but I am surprised that boards.ie is not a succesfull commercial adventure at this stage. Why not?

It's never been, and never will be a commercial adventure per se. They way I see it, the supporter's pack is like taxes. You pay taxes to benefit and improve (!) the country that you live in, and it's not really a commercial adventure. There are certain basic things you get for free, and other things you can only get if you pay your taxes. If you're interested in the smooth running and growth of your country, then you're happy to pay your taxes (!)

Such as it is with boards.ie, except it's simpler and not corrupt (!). Those who love using the boards are mostly interested in paying for it's smooth running and growth. Those who don't still get the basic goodness, but those who do get the fringe benefits.

But at the end of the day, the admins/owners are not interested in boards.ie generating money for profit, and judging by their posts, that's the golden rule of their plan here.

Victor

Originally posted by seamus
and other things you can only get if you pay your taxes.

Oddly known as user charges (tolls, bus fares, PRSI/state pension)

Hobart

Originally posted by seamus
It's never been, and never will be a commercial adventure per se. They way I see it, the supporter's pack is like taxes. You pay taxes to benefit and improve (!) the country that you live in, and it's not really a commercial adventure. There are certain basic things you get for free, and other things you can only get if you pay your taxes. If you're interested in the smooth running and growth of your country, then you're happy to pay your taxes (!)

But at the end of the day, the admins/owners are not interested in boards.ie generating money for profit, and judging by their posts, that's the golden rule of their plan here.

Bad analagy IMO. Most ppl have no choice but to pay taxes and have no choice as to where their taxes go. The main reason for me asking the question is that boards ain't broke!! So why does it need improving/fixing??? Are the admins/owners just creating a headache for themselves? Or is this a type of pseudo-commercialisation to raise some funds? AFAICS Boards is built by the community for the community. As Dev has already said it pays for itself in terms of bandwidth and hosting. Why not give the enhancement pack/supporters pack away for free??

ecksor

It isn't broke, but it can be improved/added to. I have some ideas in terms of online communities that I'd like to develop at some point in the future, and some of the other admins have ideas of their own, and there are always little things that we're trying to improve or play with.

Also, there's a bit more to boards than hosting and bandwidth, it takes a little bit of work every day to keep things running smoothly, and regi is the only person who can do this in a consistent manner. This isn't really reasonable considering that he has a full time job however, so it is intended for boards to employ him part-time.

Hobart

Originally posted by ecksor
It isn't broke, but it can be improved/added to. I have some ideas in terms of online communities that I'd like to develop at some point in the future, and some of the other admins have ideas of their own, and there are always little things that we're trying to improve or play with.Also, there's a bit more to boards than hosting and bandwidth, it takes a little bit of work every day to keep things running smoothly, and regi is the only person who can do this in a consistent manner. This isn't really reasonable considering that he has a full time job however, so it is intended for boards to employ him part-time.

Don't disagree with you in terms of improvement and BTW i don't think what you guys are doing and asking for is unreasonable. I just don't see the motivation behind it. For example I would imagine that it would be far easier to approach an advertising agency wioth you hit/user profile and generate revenues in that manner. A lot less complicated aswell.

Having said that I can fully understand the strain running/supporting something like boards would have on you guys so best of luck with the improvements (I 4 1 will give ye me hard earned 50 yoyo's just to see what I get).

Maybe it might be an idea to publish a who's who of admins in boards just to let ppl like me know who does what.

For example I am under the following impreesion:

Devore = Owner of boards (I mean owner is the loosest sense)
Vexorg = Co-owner of boards
Regi = Tech Support of Boards
ecksor = Has security after his name (And I once warned you that you may be banned for calling me a cheeky monkey. You weren't BTW)
Cloud = No Idea??

Who is who? (Again tell me to MMOB if you want to but just curious!)

CuLT

Right, if Dev was God, boards was the world and it took 7 days to create board in all its glory...
Cloud is the guy who would give God the bandwidth to do it.

Hobart

Originally posted by Cultellus
Right, if Dev was God, boards was the world and it took 7 days to create board in all its glory...
Cloud is the guy who would give God the bandwidth to do it.

?? Back to sleep for me.

Hobbes

Originally posted by Cultellus
Right, if Dev was God, boards was the world and it took 7 days to create board in all its glory...
Cloud is the guy who would give God the bandwidth to do it.

and regi would be the guy with the pitchfork handing out apples to all the posters.

I hear the subscription you get free cake.

DeVore

Originally posted by Hobart
Just being Devil's Advocate here Dev but I just feel the need to clarify your motives/terminology here. Am I right in stating the following:

1) You/Boards are calling this User Enhancement Pack a Supporters Pack. Ok. So by calling it a supporters pack you offer a little more to those Users/Members who buy/subscribe to this pack with the understanding that it will show some (albeit small) allegience on their part to the boards.ie site/community.


Correct.



2) You plan to use any funds raised form this to get a round of drinks for the admins and to help boards 'grow'. Ok. So a percentage will go towards a bit of a shin-dig once a year (for example) and the rest into a bank account to pay Regi/Alt-Regi for 2 days a week (or whatever is needed) most weeks of the year.


Also correct mostly. We may use the money to (for example) house another server to improve stability/reliance.
But noones running away to the Carribean on this




3) You will never charge for acces to the boards.ie message boards.


Correct.
Nor will we sell mailing lists, do popup-ads, sell sig-space for advertisment or any of the other stupid irritating ****ed up greed-driven things that are only done to maximise "shareholder value" and make people money by killing any goose in range, in case it *might* be golden.

Does my rant look big in this??



Can I also ask the question (and you can tell me to fcuk off if you want to) but I am surprised that boards.ie is not a succesfull commercial adventure at this stage. Why not?

How do you make money from it? (if you say ads I will laugh until I barf. Ads make pocket-money...)

It is successful, we're dead chuffed with it! We just dont feel the need to milk it because then it becomes nasty and loses what it has.

DeV.

DeVore

Actually most people seem to think that there is some hierarchy in the admins or that I'm the "owner" of Boards.

Let me dissuade you from that impression:

I have the biggest mouth of the admins. I also have been fascinated by the internet and communities since I first used usenet back in '88.
I'm a militant cúnt who delights in causing pain to people who screw around with our community. I'm very good at finding stuff on people and hurting them in original and occasionally funny ways.

Combine that with the fact that I code badly and havent the patience for the commercial side of things, I got put in charge of managing the community and muppet-patrol.

Dont mistake the fact that I have a big gob and a fair sized ego with some form of superiority in the admin ranks. We're a team and we work real good together. Beyond that we dont have a structure as such.

For example if I want something installed and xor says "thats a piece of **** and it shouldnt go on the server"... we listen to him.
(I bitch and moan but we still listen )

DeV.

DeVore

Originally posted by seamus
....and will we get personalised urls, like http://devore.boards.ie ?

We'd like to do that.

We're looking into the scalability of this... there are some technical issues to do with having 1000 such dns entries.

DeV.

regi

Could do it with dns wildcards too, matching with your username.

Puck

puck.boards.ie would be :ninja:!

Pablo

it might be an idea to give people a 30 day free trial , to get them hooked. :ninja:

DeVore

I hate that sort of FREE TRIAL stuff. Its always dodgy.

Tech stuff is dans area, if we can do it we will. No promises.

DeV.

Gordon

I think the idea of a free trial is great but would be much harder to implement. 2 weeks would be better though.

Dazzer

I cant believe people think a little more than 1 euro a week is too expensive?

CuLT

Originally posted by Dazzer
I cant believe people think a little more than 1 euro a week is too expensive?

By your logic cars are inexpensive to buy, after all whats 14.99 a month when you have a job?

I don't think its expensive, just playing Devil's Advocate .

DeVore

Just because someone cant buy the supporters pack (cos they are broke or a student or what have you) doesnt mean anything.

Some of us have jobs and are willing to put up cash to stabilise something thats fun for us to be part of.
We have the cash to do it and wont miss it. If others cant afford it, I see no problem standing them a pint

I mean, thats kinda the admins' view from the start, we still never expect to see the cash we've put into it come back to us. This is our hobby I guess in a way. You dont look for a return on a hobby. [1]

DeV.

[1] though I sometimes think I would prefer if my hobby didnt run 24/7 , eat 2 gigs of bandwidth a day and involve 7000 other people. I mean, what was wrong with stamp collecting, Tom!

p

Had an idea for a good service for the sub package.
Blogs.

Basically just give a person their own forum,
which only they can start threads on. Other people can post replies which actually are comments.

It'd be a bit of messing with the templates to make it more bloggy, but seems liek a good subscriber package thing anyway.


- Kevin

seamus

Blogs are part of the package. Everyone gets their own personal rantspace.

It'll probably result in the death of boards.ie, because everyone will have vented on their blog instead of posting on a forum

KdjaCL

If this turns out to be successful is the bandwidth and resources there to cope with all the extra usage and resources?

Boards has issues like all Vbulletin sites they dont like being up all the time and need a rest if someone is paying for something on boards wont they be a bit pissed if its down?

/methinks of the constant daily abuse i give a certain webhost called Siteturn for downtime.

Also in reference to other websites like Something Awful they have more than a forum on offer.

Not nitpicking im sure i will get the pack either ways.

kdjac

p

Originally posted by seamus
Blogs are part of the package. Everyone gets their own personal rantspace.

It'll probably result in the death of boards.ie, because everyone will have vented on their blog instead of posting on a forum

Ah cool, that's what I get for not reading.

lol

- Kevin

Pablo

There will be a subscriber package in vb3, via paypal I think.

Cork

100,000 people chopped up their credit cards to avoid paying a €40 government levy.

Unless Boards.ie offer something completely differant for their subscriber pacage. But they are many message boards out there that don't charge. eg. peoples republic of cork, clarehurlers etc.

There is content supplied on the Irish Times & Hotpress websites - no that changing an annual fee works for them.

But I think charging for a service that is available for free on another site will not work.

This is why, what is going to be offered has to be needed as well as differant to the current offering.

If not members will defect to other message boards.

Mercury_Tilt

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