ibod said:
I think the way doitfast4u is good.
Anyone who has donated is always a step ahead release-wise with what's available for free.
That way, supporters still get something tangible for their donation.
Hi
yeah DIF4U is very good but if you look at the website then you can see what's going on regarding donations
Unfortunately, this program is struggling to exist with the current amount of donations. I'm in a financial hardship right now, and I can not be allocating time to any project which doesn't yield some kind of gain that I can incorporate into my mortgage, student loans, etc. I also build websites, other applications, and do network consulting. These have been my priority lately, because they keep me able to stay afloat in the world of today's economy. When I work on DoItFast4U!, I work hard on it, I support it well, and I keep abreast of latest developments/trends to make it even better than it is. I'd love to give my priority back to DoItFast4U! development, if others also want to make this happen.
Here's how you can prove that you do: A donation of $15 USD or more gets you into the DoItFast4U! VIP list, and entitles you to free beta access! As an added incentive, here's some features from the Latest DoItFast4U! beta:
As you can see, donations ain't going that well even for a great program like DIF4U so what chance would DS have had in donation world?
. Now you need to pay $15 to get latest Beta's which I couldn't agree more with as donators should get better priviliges. This is all to familiar with donationware as very few get paid back enough for their efforts
but can I ask this? is this any different than asking for $9 and getting the same advanced version with guaranteed support but without the 'free' inferior version? I'm not saying DIFU isn't giving support, far from it
but by charging we were obliged to give support and advice and as a user I would like that guarantee and fallback. Another thing you can't do with 'freeware' is complain or ask for your money back as you don't really have any rights even if you have donated, but as a paying customer you have your satisfaction rights etc. I have always said, charging for DS was a 'forced' donation but I accepted that I would have responsibilities to our users also. Of the 2 people I refunded only one person really ever felt conned but I feel it was only because he couldn't get it to work so I don't think we did anything wrong in charging for it as people got more for their 'donations'. The other refundee actually bought DS again after we released another version
it would be interesting as which would users would prefer?
if a program was half decent in it's workings, development and support and showed potential, would you rather donate $10 or buy the program for $10 if it was going to be from the same guy? (use DS for example). Personally I would buy it as like I say you 'should' get better security and satisfaction etc. Imagine all the issues we had with DS in the beginning. If DS was donationware, we could have easily took our time resolving issues as we had no obligation. Nobody could have said bo diddley if we did nothing, yet with the route we took, we faced all our issues and dealt with them and hopefully satisfied most by doing so. Even now we are offering support to non contributors when again we could make this a forum a little like DVD2One where you have to prove to be an owner to get our support
basically all I'm saying is that there was no difference whether people bought DS or donated when it was released as those who contributed got something in return. All those people who bought it, did actually donate in my eyes and helped develop it better and faster and those who didn't 'donate' didn't get a copy
It's as simple as that! and as I've said before, without those ''donators' then I doubt it would have got to version 030 and MenuModder wouldn't exist
being 'commercial' isn't as bad or evil as what some people seem to make out. It's better if it's handled in the right manner don't you think?
. You can only imagine how great some of the donationware tools would be if they were 'commercial'. They would develop better and faster and in the end the good ones eventually become commercial anyway one way or another as iBod mentions such as the code being bought or the programmer working for the software company for example. Nero's Recode being the latest example as without Shrink where would it be now?
p.s. another thing I always found strange was that before rejig, DIF4U used CCE and Scenarist to compress and rebuild the DVD. Now seeing as these 2 other programs cost well over $30,000 at the time if not more, isn't it strange that the rich users of DIF4U couldn't donate just a few bucks?
