Six Apart has finallly released Movable Type 3.0. It's new licensing/pricing is apparently causing an uproar in the blogosphere, but it's one that I feel is inconsiderate and unjustified. I mean, be for real ...
The Trotts created what probably is the creme de la creme of CMSs for weblogs, but methinks that donations and $20 installations weren't what allowed them to either continue development or to create Six Apart. They, as cute, benevolent, witty and brilliant as they are, created a business to offer a product that they are proud of. They need to be compensated fairly for that product not only because it's fair and so they can eat, but also to be able to pay the good employees who help them with marketing and to continue the development of innovative (and lovingly populist) world-class software like MT and TypePad as the installed user base grows. It really is sad and pathetic that this isn't more important to SO many Movable Type users. Y'all are really buggin' out, for real.
And they ARE still committed to a free version - a version that is NOT 'hobbled' and that allows most of us to keep the MT fires burnin' on our blogs. I would gather that most of us only create one author and one weblog anyway. Movable Type has ALWAYS only been free to a point and many people (myself included) have taken this for granted for far too long. Well, the buck stops here. Welcome to Movable Type 3.0. And to all y'all who want to enjoy the freedom of choice, please, go right on ahead and knock yourself out. Don't let the door hit you in the ass on the way out.
The problem isn’t that they decided to charge for it. The problem is that, despite what you think, a good big chunk of MT users, like me, have a lot more than 3 blogs and 1 author. The problem is also that they blindsided us (Alpha and Beta testers included) by not giving us even the slightest hint about this new licensing policy. I myself have 5 blogs and 7 authors but the amount they’re charging is so high that I can’t possibly afford the license. In essence, I feel like I’m being forced.. FORCED to leave Movable Type or lose my blogs. It ain’t right.
Exactly - it’s not the fact that they’re charging money for it. In fact, I have a professional interest in making sure programmers get paid for their work!
It’s the fact that they kept it quiet for so long, and kept saying “MT3 will be out soon, you’re all gonna love it”, and then suddenly “Well here’s a release of MT3 with hardly any new features, now pay us vast piles of money please, sorry we forgot to mention that before…”
I not against the fact that 6A is charging for MT3. In fact I’ve donated $60 them in the past because I like the product, and I think the Trott’s need to eat, but I need to eat to. and if I’m going to spend 699 I’m goingto buy Photoshop or Final Cut 4 those programs are worth the money not MT3.
My problem is the extremely high price of a service release. MT3.0 is not MT pro in fact Mena stated just that back in April. I was lucky and I Alpha and Beta tested MT3.0 and it’s not worth 699. It’s not worth 150 with the limitations that it has. I would be willing as a personal user to pay 99 for unlimited authors and blogs. As of right now I would have to pay close to $1000 to support my blogs and authors.
If I felt that the the product was developed enough to charge more I wouldn’t be against it, but it’s really not that different from 2.661 other then typepad and comment management there was no real break through, I would compare it to Windows 98 going to Windows 98 SE. It’s a little more stable but no real new features.
More power to Six Apart for turning this into a viable business; that is not my gripe.
My gripe is that they are abandoning most of the people who got them where they are today. Even a trivial thing like non-paying users not getting on the recently updated list is bad business - no one really cares about being pinged on that list, I’m sure. It’s the principle. That seems like a mighty petty thing to do on their part and I think that, and the one author concept are the things that are leaving old time MT users scratching their heads. It’s not about Six Apart making money, not at all.
The problem isn’t with charging, it’s the price/benefit ratio and the application of commercial level fees for a personal level usage.
The prices are way out of reach to most honest people who run multi-weblogs, host, or have community posts (multi-authors). For those people the current schemes are cost prohibitive, regardless of whether or not SA “looks the other way” in terms of enforcing the license.
I still say a flat fee personal license for Unlimited users/blogs would have been the way to go, commercial licenses excepted. I would have gladly paid a $100 or so for a new personal version just like I gladly donated $40 to the original free development. I also have a commercial license for 2.6x and would have probably shelled out the $300 or $600 (depending on my needs) for the new license understaning the need for profit. In fact, I like the new commercial schemes better because they don’t limit you to one blog per license.
So for me its not the “charging,” for it that bothers me. Its the cost prohibitive nature of the charges and the fact that we actually lose usability in the end by cutting the number or authors/blogs we can have.
A lot of you are saying that it’s not about them charging, but it is. You want to continue to have the ability to have as many authors and weblogs as you want for free and that’s precisely what fuels the unfair lack of compensation.
The Trotts created what probably is the creme de la creme of CMSs for weblogs
Yes, they did. Several years later, they haven’t kept up and MT has been surpassed by other applications. You see, while Ben and Mena were off galavanting about the globe being web celebs and speaking at conferences and giving interviews, other people were busy developing quality products.
Now they want to charge people for their latest feature-poor effort. I’ve got no problem paying for quality software- I abandoned MT for ExpressionEngine, which costs a good bit more than MT3. What I’ve got a problem with is
a) charging for crap. For as long as they took on MT3, it’s a MAJOR letdown.
b) the ambush style way in which this was announced to their user community. Why couldn’t they have started hinting at this months ago when the MT3 talk started up (again), so people wouldn’t be caught off guard?
c) the slap in the face to their long time loyal users.
And nobody talks about the paradoxal struggle between TypePad and MT… Don’t you think it was the real cause for going paid ?
I explained myself on my blog in a open letter to 6A…
You’re missing the point big time. I donated $40 to MT in the past. The point is they led us to believe there was going to be a free MT (for personal, no-profit users) and a MT pro (for commercial uses). Now it turns out that no profit users should be charged, or overcharged IMHO - think about $600 for a collaborative weblog, for a software with no significant improvements over the free 2.661 (let alone the central registration for comments which is a nightmare) OR get the free one which is limited to one author and likely won’t run on any hosting because of the multi-processors limitation.
By the way, Typepad is charging $4.95/mo for the very basic level of service when I currently pay $5/mo for my hosting service with unlimited bandwidth, support, 500M hard disk space, 3 mySQL databases, unlimited mail accounts and all the bells and whistles. I think that on a commercial standpoint they are dead, no one running a weblog for fun is going to pay $600 for a license or switch to the overpriced Type Pad.
As I mentioned in the piece you linked to (thanks, btw) it isn’t about the Trotts turning MT into a money making concern - that’s their right, absolutely. Some of the points that you bring up, however, about having money to hire people to do x, y, and z - well, the way that they’re going about this, they’re going to need it. By overpricing the product, and severly crippling the freeware version, they’ve effectively pink slipped the thousands of free promotors and marketters they had in their corner. Probably have snubbed a significant number of the highly talented people that were making contributions by coding plug-ins and hacks, as well - sort of like dumping a significant portion of the development staff.
I actually feel bad for both of them, and am not too optimistic about the future of their company. They may get some buyers - but they’ve effectively jettisoned the potential customer base that developed over the last 3 years. Particularly the some of the ‘large’ bloggers - any idea what the liscensing fee for something like the Command Post - a multi-blog/multi-author extravaganza would work out to with their formula? It would be a special arrangement deal, cause it’s off the scale they’ve published.
Further, have you reviewed the new liscensing verbiage? It’s so restrictive that they’re probably now ineligible for use on the majority of hosts that run of the mill bloggers use - the announcement from Hosting Matters (a very popular blog hosting outfit) in their support Forums indicates that due to the restrictions in the liscense, running MT3.0 on their machines would probably be illegal for most bloggers due to the age and processor constraints.
Ben and Mena have definately shot themselves in the foot over this. I’ve spoken with Anil Dash in the past about using MT in a commercial environment -possibly they have some indications that sort of business to business arrangement will carry the day for them.
If that isn’t in the cards, they’re probably screwed….
My gripe is that they are abandoning most of the people who got them where they are today.
With all due respect, that’s rot. What got them there today is the fact that they worked hard enough on MT to make it really, really good. People use it, and not one of the other free CMS’s, because it’s better. They’ve spent years of their lives giving away something, and now the people who’ve benefitted from their work are turning round and biting them on the ass.
I’m not complaining that they’re charging for the product - I’m just saying that their licensing model is, to say it in a Pythonesque manner, silly.
Why the hell are people complaining for a product they’re NOT going to buy? It’s like walking into a car dealership, carping about the new model car when the current model they have is running fine.
Personally, I would NOT have a problem with paying for MT if (and only if) it did everything I needed it to do. You know how many plugins and MT hacks I’m utilizing just to get the CMS to do what I want it to? MT 3.0 may be for the developers, but the users really made it happen. I just don’t understand the bitching. Stick with the version of MT you have now and keep on blogging. Don’t like it? Get another CMS or build your own.
BTW, I beta tested for MT 3.0, and it really ain’t the cat’s pajamas.
This is how I’m looking at it: sure, my version of Movable Type is working for me, so I don’t need to upgrade. But after a few more releases, I’m going to feel more and more like I’m stuck in Windows 95 and everyone around me is going on about the new XP features. That, or I have to somehow scrape together the money to get a license, not easy for a college student who works fulltime just to keep a roof over his head.
People use it, and not one of the other free CMS’s, because it’s better.
That’s simply a false statement. People use MT and not one of the other free CMS’s because
a) they’re new to blogging and they have a friend using MT, or they see a few of the more popular blogs are on MT so they assume it’s the best without checking out other options;
or
b) They’ve been using MT since two years ago, when it really WAS the best, and they don’t realize there are better alternatives or they just don’t want to go through all the trouble of migrating their site to something else.
But to say MT is better than all the other free blog tools out there is simply wrong. Unless, you know, you ENJOY endless rebuilding, non-responsive and secretive developers who want you to pay for collossally disappointing software releases. Blah.
It’s not the charging. Seriously. I get it. They need money, and I can understand that. But they could have said it from the beginning. That is why I feel let down, not because they want to charge me for using their application.
Right now it feels like they have been setting up a hype and then, when everyone was jumping up and down in their seats when the alpha-testing started, they dropped the bomb and hoped that more people would buy into it.
Ah, why bother. I will use MT until I find something I feel can replace it. I actually like it - perhaps because I’m used to it. I don’t know. But I’ll just stick with 2.661 for a while.
Just a piece of news: Mark Pilgrim has moved to WordPress. The GPL seems to have been the strongest factor in his decision.
The pricing model is punishing for group blogs. I run two group blogs, strictly for my friends, and I’d be asked to pay $408.25 to upgrade to allow the current users on my blog and another $99.50, to add the 10 more users we might add.
And this is under the “tweaked” license terms they’ve published.
Having previously voluntarily donated $100 because I liked the software and felt it should be paid for, I’m perfectly willing to say “yeah, it’s too expensive”. It is about money, but anyone who says that the complaints are strictly whining because it’s not free is being inobservant at least.