Vanilla Reactions and Badges - Would you buy it?

jason2007

If the vanilla people offered Reactions and Badges as a purchasable download plugin, would you buy it?

If you are in the dark about Reactions and Badges read about it here: http://vanillaforums.com/blog/news/introducing-vanilla-reactions-and-badges/

as you can see, currently the vanilla people are only offering this plugin/addon with their hosted solutions.

hbf

@422 when did Tim say that badges would not be released? I missed that post and cant find it on the blog.

Anyway.... there is no reason badges could not be released under a different license or even as compiled or obfuscated code.

I dont care one way or the other really... but i would like an answer. If badges and reactions will not be made available publicly outside the hosted solution, thats ok. It gives a clear runway to a developer (or a couple of developers) to put together an alternative solution.

I can clearly see co-sponsored development being able to fund an open source solution.

It seems like a clearly wanted thing, i offered to pay licensing on it a while back.

If the .com solution will not be made available and this is confirmed i will setup a fund raiser for developing an alternative solution.

x00

jason2007 said: so any developer want to copy vanilla reaction and badges?

I also want users to earn points for doing things on the site and a point shop to spend the points in. The shop will include account customizations (like adding prefix/suffix/icons to username, changing profile background or layout) and gifts to self and friends. So you earn points for contributing to community and can spend them on pimping your profile and buy items for you and friends. Also spend points on sending "pokes" to friends and users. Pokes can be friendly or not and can use 32x32 images or whatever size image. To send a poke you must pay X amount of points.

This is basically what Karma bank is for, and the Market Place is currently begin developed for the second part. Market place would be able to spend karma, but it is also for premium services with other payment options such as Paypal or Stripe, if you are interested in sponsoring this then contact me. ATM I'm only taking as far as necessary for current client, so manually added products are not a priority right now, only API, so this would be your prerogative to fund that.

However I have to prioritise.

As I mentioned before. Karma Bank already works in a way conducive with Badges, only it rewards Karma.

I have proposed Karma Bank Accolades as a solution. it work with Karma like rule only you are reward Accolades based on meta rules rather then Karma. So you can set up the rule exactly what you want, and use the graphic and description of your choosing for the Accolade.

It would be good to get around five or so sponsors who are interested to get started Accolades.

---

As @hbf contacted me and wanted to be involved I suggested he have a stab at his version the reactions side of things, as he has created I Like Plugin. I have give him some pointers suggestions, however we may work something out if he requires some input. However this can be ostensibly his concern for now.

It make more sense for me to just get on with Accolades, as I know how it would work, and really don't need any input.

Regarding graphics. Accolades would not be bundled with any default graphics, as you could upload anything you like.

Designers like @422 could come up up with their own graphic packs and distribute/sell how they wish.

However I should point out, that accolades are custom rules and targets, so you have to think that way when designing graphics, either the pack has to be versatile, or simple to modify, or we can talk about using programmatic overlay of sprites and/or text to enhance the graphic to be applicable to what you want.

I also suggest that accolade to have small and or larger size. Smaller suits some styling allowing you fit more in the panel, without begin an eyesore.

422

Personally i wouldnt, not because its not worth it. It certainly is.

But this is the open src area.

fh111

i can live without it. i am not saying no to paid development either

brainolution

I would if I can afford it.

happydude

I will buy it if I can afford it too

qwenty

I'm willing, but It depends on its price! How much will it cost?

peregrine

It doesn't cost anything, because its not available. It's just conjecture. and it's the weekly, now daily post of a hypothetical instance.

Which leads to the question? How much would a developer charge to develop this, then all the people who say if I could afford it, could sponsor it.

Then this can be put to rest and everyone will atain nirvana.

aery

I would.

But this is not a proper business model for any company. The leaks will be too high and it will be costly to support such system.

The current vanilla ecosystem is perfectly tuned except pricing constraints.

peregrine

aery said:

The current vanilla ecosystem is perfectly tuned except pricing constraints.

It would depend on the organisms's umwelt , wouldn't it.

SevMC

I would (If it's affordable)

But I think that if the badges could be open source, the vanilla software will become very popular (I think that could help more than just some bucks).

aery

@peregrine Definitely. They have good business model in their own but it needs to be very popular for brilliant revenue. I liked @SevMC suggestion.

422

Tim within the blog has made it very clear. Badges will not be released open src.

I thnk hs reasoning makes perfect sense.

jason2007

It doesn't have to be "open Source" charge a fee for the damn thing and get rich just like Bill Gates, maybe.

fh111

and who stops you from sharing the plugin after you bought it? just curious how you will prevent that from happening....

didn't somebody say he would write a free badges plugin if somebody provided the graphics? i thought i read something like that, but can't find it anymore...maybe i dreamed it :p

422

Thats not the issue tho, releasing a version paid or otherwise to a free open src pkatform, will bring with it a gazillion requests, bug reports, i wanna do this issues. Best bet is to wait and see if a third party plugin gets made.

I mean fgs they are only badges lol.

fh111

fh111 said:

didn't somebody say he would write a free badges plugin if somebody provided the graphics? i thought i read something like that, but can't find it anymore...maybe i dreamed it :p

oh that was @vbgamer in the other badges discussion http://vanillaforums.org/discussion/19036/badge

jason2007

fh111 said: and who stops you from sharing the plugin after you bought it? just curious how you will prevent that from happening....

worst excuse ever. I happen to buy lots of scripts and willingly spend on quality products. In fact in the last 4 months I've spent over $1500 on scripts and website templates alone. If you plan your business to stay small with a handfull of clients, thats one thing but if you want to grow then basing your model on a hosting business is not the way forward.

As an example look at the evolution of MMO games. In the early days most charged for access but nowdays most are free to access and rely on microtransactions.

Microtransactions is the way of the present and future. Get with the times.

If you offer a quality product and market it at a decent price, people like myself will purchase it and using piracy in any form to argue against selling to consumers is ridiculous; that's like arguing that having no customers is better than any customers at all because they might pirate the product; which I might add is exactly what you are saying.

422

Im sure i read in the master blog, that he woudnt be releasing it to ths portion of the community.

Obfustated code can be decrypted with one click

x00

Here is a proposal Karma Bank already rewards based on on meta. So KB could be extended to reward accolades, which could be any kind of graphic of your choosing. You can set the rules.

I doesn't currently do compound rule (and, exor, etc) but that is also possible.

jason2007

hbf said: @422 I can clearly see co-sponsored development being able to fund an open source solution.

It seems like a clearly wanted thing, i offered to pay licensing on it a while back.

If the .com solution will not be made available and this is confirmed i will setup a fund raiser for developing an alternative solution.

count me in, i'll buy a copy if someone makes it

aery

@hbf step up brother. We all are with you.

One thing vanilla developers should undertand is that gamification is the core for any prosperous community. With so many communities out there (leave apart facebook and reddit but other thousands) if you want members to constantly engage in discussions, then gamification is a must.

Why does all the forum softwares, CMS systems and QnA sites provide trophies, awards, medals, badges? Only vanilla is left out.

Though, badges makes exellent pitch for sales of their hosting plans, they should consider the other model where vanilla will be popular in short time frame as Xenforo and then they could milk the popularity.

@x00 Karma Bank is an exellent plugin and we all would love to see more inhancements.

jason2007

so any developer want to copy vanilla reaction and badges?

I also want users to earn points for doing things on the site and a point shop to spend the points in. The shop will include account customizations (like adding prefix/suffix/icons to username, changing profile background or layout) and gifts to self and friends. So you earn points for contributing to community and can spend them on pimping your profile and buy items for you and friends. Also spend points on sending "pokes" to friends and users. Pokes can be friendly or not and can use 32x32 images or whatever size image. To send a poke you must pay X amount of points.

candyman

I think we should wait for an official answer from the Vanilla developers.

If they say that reaction&badges are for the the hosted forums only, then we could look for the developer (x00, the author of Karma Bank, could be our man) or for a team of developers.

According to me the ransom could be the solution.

jason2007

@candyman they've based their business model on hosting so an answer may not be forthcoming for the forseeable future. I'll give it till monday and hire a developer and vanilla will have some competition for their features.

brainolution

The feeling that we are running an inferior software when a better version is available, isn't great, especially when you are willing to pay for the upgrade.

Though, badges makes exellent pitch for sales of their hosting plans, they should consider the other model where vanilla will be popular in short time frame as Xenforo and then they could milk the popularity.

That's a common sense that seems to be prevailing among most members in this thread, but unfortunately eluding the Vanilla team.

Just curious, is there any one in this forum who has switched to a hosted solution just for this plugin? (I seriously doubt there is.)

aery

jason2007 said: I'll give it till monday and hire a developer and vanilla will have some competition for their features.

Yupieeeeeee... :) :) :)

Tim

We have no immediate plans to release Reactions or Badges, either as one-time purchases or as open source downloads. The reason for this has been stated quite a few times, most recently by @422

422 said: Thats not the issue tho. Releasing a version, paid or otherwise, to [the self hosted community], will bring with it a gazillion support requests, bug reports, 'I wanna do this' issues.

The time we would spend dealing with that would make it unprofitable, despite what the business geniuses in this thread seem to think.

Nothing stopping you from making your own version though. Go nuts!

peregrine

Clarified!

Nothing stopping you from making your own version though. Go nuts!>

now this thread can rest :), while the development begins... maybe?

jason2007

Tim said:

422 said: Thats not the issue tho. Releasing a version, paid or otherwise, to [the self hosted community], will bring with it a gazillion support requests, bug reports, 'I wanna do this' issues.

The time we would spend dealing with that would make it unprofitable, despite what the business geniuses in this thread seem to think.

Poor excuse really, as paid support services is a huge business and ongoing growth industry but what do us business geniuses know about making money and business in general.

Did Mark O-Sullivan sign off on that comment, is it the official final word?