AlanBarber.Org
Thursday, May 13, 2004
The end of MovableType?
Well the fine folks over at SixApart just completely pulled the rug out from under MovableType users everywhere!First the good news:
The new version of MovableType has been released. Dubbed MovableType 3.0 Developers Edition. Simply put, it's an extended beta edition of MovableType 3.0. Now that they've cleared out the worst of the bugs they're dumping it out to the public. The idea being that developers of plugins and such can now start working on updating their stuff to work with the new version. That way when they release a "real" version there won't be the lag time between their software being out and the plugins and extensions getting updated.
Now the bad news:
SixApart also released their "new" licensing and pricing structure. What's so bad you might ask? MovableType has just made the switch from being so called "donation-ware" to being a commercial product. Their license and price structures basically screw the pooch for anyone but the bare minimalist MT user.
There are now basically 7 levels of licensing available.
1) Free - Limits you to 1 author and 3 blogs
2) Personal Edition ($99.95) - 3 authors and 5 blogs
3) Personal Edition volume license 1 ($149.95) - 6 authors and 8 blogs
4) Personal Edition volume license 2 ($189.95) - 9 authors and 10 blogs
5) Commercial Edition 1 ($299.95) - 5 authors and 5 blogs
6) Commercial Edition 2 ($699.95) - 20 authors and 15 blogs
7) Custom license (must contact company for prices)
Those prices are outright ludicrous and I know I sure won't be upgrading. Oh sure currently I only have 1 author and 2 blogs so I could get away with the free version. However, I refuse to upgrade on the principal of the situation! Previous versions were free and they asked for donations. I know you can't run a business on donation but at the same time to do a complete 180 turn without warning is horrible. They never even gave warning this would happen.
In the many months they never once mentioned that they planned to start charging for MT. You would think in all the time they had they could at least be nice enough to give everyone a heads up. I suspect they didn't because they knew it would bite them in the backside. Lets be honest here folks. It was the MT user community that helped develop this new version. It was our cries for fixes to problems, out hard work doing alpha and beta testing, our hard work developing plugins to extend the software, and our work in doing the leg work in advertising and converting people to MT. Why did we do all this? Because we loved this wonderful free piece of software. And what is out thanks from SixApart? Getting reamed in the behind!
I guess no one saw it coming. I just always assumed MovableType would remain free since SixApart had their TypePad service. TypePad is a paid hosted blogging service. I just figured that's where they would make their money so they could offer the free version of MT. There had been some talk of a MT Pro version that would cost. The idea being the Pro version would contain many of the features found in TypePad.
So what's the future of this blog? I really don't know yet. For now I'll be sticking with MT 2.661. It works fine for what I need right now. As I've stated in past posts I've done lots of work to automate the backend maintenance of the blog. I really don't want to have to convert to something new and start all over right now. I'll be keeping an eye out for open source and freeware blog software though. If something fancies me I might make the switch over. If not perhaps I'll just create my own system.
So thanks for nothing SixApart! I used to think you were a decent company that actually cared about the blogging community. Boy were we wrong!
I agree with the first comment by John, SixApart has every right to move to whatever revenue model they like.
I also completely agree with Alan and his pulling of the rug comment. They have obviously known they were moving in this direction for a while. It would have been good to have some warning. SixApart has to live with their decisions so I’m not sweating it. I hope they know what they’re doing but only time will tell.
I’ll be looking for some new blogging software along with Alan.
Let me get this straight. SixApart has upgraded their software and offered a free version that you are eligible for. But you’re not going to accept their kind offer ‘on principal’ because the company has spent years and thousands of man hours building software and they want to get paid for the use of it by others who plan to use the software for commericial purposes or use it in large multi-author, multi-blog implementations.
When you go to a restaurant that offers children free lollipops at the cash register, do you refuse to pay for dinner too?
If you were princliple, you’d stop using their service. You aren’t. You won’t. You’re a poser.
This is the silliest rant I’ve read in weeks. You use free software that makes your life better… the authors upgrade it, and continue to offer it to you for free, and you complain? Just because they say that people who make serious use of it must pay?
Let me know when you return to sanity, I might check out your blog again.
I can’t believe you’re complaining about something you’ll get for free! SixApart is a company, and their purpose is to make money (not just give you software). Did you happen to donate any money when you installed their product? Well, I did.
This pricing scheme affects the “big boys” planning on hosting out blogs - not you. Those companies are hosting MT sites and giving out the free product. SixApart realizes that they need to capitalize on that market. We should be thankful that we still have a domain-ware product for us.
You’re moving in to another dimension. A dimension not only of sight and sound, but of ridiculously self-important whining, where people think software should be free because they’re too cheap to pay for goods and services.
To Craig’s lollipop example, of course I would pay for my dinner since I expected to pay for my dinner.
If, however, the next time I went there for dinner, they handed my kid a lollipop and it showed up on the bill, I would say they’ve made a change that I didn’t expect. I would reevaluate my decision to eat at that restaurant, or buy their previously free lollipops, in light of that change.
Oh, and as long as I’m at it:
Say, how much did _you_ donate to SixApart?
If the answer is “I didn’t donate anything,” as I bet it is—since you didn’t mention it in your post—then I think the people that should be saying “Thanks for nothing” are them. To -you-.
Holy cow! Where’d all you people come from?
Anyhoo…
I have no problem with SixApart wanting to make money. Lord knows I’d do the same thing! The whining is about the way in which they did it.
As a member of the Beta group I have access to their beta website. I had just checked it yesterday morning to see what the latest news was and saw the announcement of the release. Hey I was excited to read it. I then visited the MT website to my surprise seeing they had moved to the new pricing and licensing model. It’s the fact that this all came as a rather shocking surprise.
Had they
A) Been honesty and told people they planned to start charging
B) Created a more reasonable license scheme
there wouldn’t be the uproar that there is now and I wouldn’t be bitching.
I wouldn’t have a problem with things had I expected them to charge for the new version. There’s no denying that MT is a good product and worth money. Why do you think I used MT in the first place? It was a top notch piece of software that was free! What more could you want?
The other part of the complaint is the limits on authors and blogs. Everyone is switching to per seat/user licensing models. You no longer “buy” software and have full use of it anymore. You have limits set and in order to add more users/features/etc you have to pay more.
In the business world this has been going on for years and is acceptable. However this is new for personal/home users and I don’t think it’s a good idea. Home users want to buy and “own” software like you buy a loaf of bread or gallon of milk. Once you buy it, it is yours to use as you like. Whether one person uses it or fifty people do.
Unfortunately this is just the reality of the software industry and what to expect even more in the future.
Ok that’s probably a pretty stupid example but whatever…
on 05/14/2004 at 11:51 AM
I don’t know what planet you’ve been living on, but software has been sold as licenses for years. Go pull out the EULA of almost any software product you’ve ever bought (I’m assuming, of course, that you’ve purchased software before) and you’ll see that most likely you are granted a license to use it, but the fine print quite explicity says that you most certainly do NOT “own” the software as in your gallon of milk example.
Let me make this clear, I agree with Alan.
He points out that MT was donate-ware with little restrictions, now slapped with a new license, which limits ample users without warning.
Mena, one of the co-founders, tells us ample jibber jabber. There’s nothing that tells us why there’s this heavy license. Mena says, “we have created licensing that allows and encourages the development of software and services paid or free.” Okay, so what does this mean for the users who can’t afford the license, that has more than one author? It ain’t free.
We know that MT will inevitablely charge for their software. It was disscussed in the past as Pro version. The regular version would be free.
In addition, the license agreement is just goddamn messed up. Why would someone limit the user to one author and three weblogs as ‘free version,’ than say commercial users will pay and the non-commercial won’t need to pay? It doesn’t make much sense.
The main purpose of the license is to bring large institutions and companies to pay. If a free user has more than three weblogs then that user is screwed. It simply doesn’t fit into the picture of a company if the user has more than three blogs.
Forget people with non-profit websites. MT simply wants money, not because they care about their users.
I’m not saying they don’t deserve it, I’m just saying they did it behind our backs.
Three questions:
How much notice do you need before 6A changes their policies? Do you have a contract with them that says you should get 1 week, 6 weeks or a years notice before thay change their prices?
A bunch of hosting companies are making money off 6A’s hard work by giving people MT blog services for x dollars per month.
Finnally, can you really feed 50 people with that loaf of bread you just bought? Who are you? JC?
Your attitude is ludicrous! They tried donationware and noone donated. They averaged about 25cents per download.
If you think the software is good, pony up for it… Simple as that. The whining about a company trying to actually **gasp** make some money is troubling.