We often hear that we shouldn’t expect rapid support from RW plug-in and Stacks developers because they are ‘one man outfits’ and have other commitments.
Leads me to wonder whether some RW products are underpriced? The “Pro” themes we buy for WordPress for example are often $60 with an annual charge of maybe $50 if you want continued updates and support. Same applies to Pro versions of many WordPress plugins. The deals are better for multiple purchases of course, but there is an important principal of ongoing support costs being met.
I don’t see why RW developers should offer support for stacks that cost $10 four years ago, or Themes that cost $25 in 2014. I feel guilty asking for it!
Whilst I wouldn’t expect RW products to be the same pricing as WordPress simply because WordPress has frequent updates and compatibility issues, I would however be very happy to enter into longer term support arrangements if it meant that our great RW developers could afford to become 2 or 3 man teams instead of solo players.
I would pay more and think for most developers and stacks higher prices are more than justified. But I do earn some money with the sites I make, so I think this is just fair.
First an ongoing discussion that is dragging NCDs good name though the mud, where following posts called him various unwarranted names and called on his products to be freely released or sold to other developers - a thread which I think should have been closed long ago due to it being nothing more than a sh*t-fest at expense of someone’s reputation.
Now a discussion with a question if developers make enough money, and that one feels bad about asking support questions?
I can’t fathom why would a person want to or had the right to give anyone business advice and how to run it, or why one would think it’s ok to trash someone because their milk turned out to be sour. Product in question worked when it was purchased, it stopped working when Safari got updated. So naturally instead of asking for help because the company is out of business, or paying someone to help, a rant thread was started how someone is bad, unprofessional, immoral and whatever else. Product in question is still working just fine with the release of Safari it was released for, and it will most likely not work with Safari 15, 16, 17. What will one do then? Create another rant thread?
If one thinks that developers don’t make enough, many of them have a donation button. Go wild! You can click it as often as you’d like with or without asking for help. Or one could do like many of us do, buy developers’ products even if we don’t end up ever using them.
Another developer stepped in and saved the day no questions asked, no money required, just that you own the product … I just hope that the superhero developer doesn’t end up where NCD is now should he change his business practices.
In the end I’m sure NCD along with the rest of us somehow missed Apple’s technical announcement where they shared with us how to prepare for future technologies they will be implementing and possibly breaking with a new release of their software, oh wait …
Firstly, I appreciate you’re new to this forum but can you keep your rant about Nick Cates on the appropriate thread - this is a different subject.
Secondly, the small contribution you made to this particular topic - namely regarding donation buttons - misses the point. Donation buttons are all well and good but are too random to help create a sustainable business. What I’m asking (if you cared to read it) is very simply whether some kind of ongoing support fee for products would help our developers to create more sustainable businesses. It is also, may I remind you, a question - not a rant or a demand.
The whole issue revolves around the life-span of a product. You use the sour milk analogy - again not helpful. A pint of milk is a short life product designed to be drunk and discarded (or preferably recycled) and the whole point is software is NOT such a product. Who wants to build a website knowing that the plugins used to build it could go down unsupported whenever a browser or OS update is released? They will go down from time to time - that’s expected - but surely we would all like to know that developers are in a position to fix issues promptly and if so, should we not be prepared to pay for that?
My own view is that the fee for a product should be good for a year but if you want ongoing support and updates beyond that, be prepared to pay an appropriate annual fee. It’s a good sustainable model that gives people confidence in the long term viability of our developer’s businesses.
What is support though? You call it out as separate to product updates, so what is it? Eg Brand new RW user buys the plugin, struggles to get it working in their project then emails the vendor for help… is that support? Not trying to be inflammatory… I’m genuinely interested in what “support” means to the RW community.
Totally agree that the donations button thing is just a race to the bottom. That’s a nice to do, not a sustainable model.
Yes, I’d say the email to the vendor for help is support and should be available for 12 months from purchase.
Most developers would probably encourage user enquiries via a community or documentation in the first instance and only email if they can’t find the answer, or suspect they have identified a bug. It can never be perfect, some people will always fire off an email rather than read a manual or google an answer!
What to charge must be a very tricky balance.
I’ve bought dozens of stacks, and many themes, over the years and never used them in a project.
I bought them simply because I thought the developer deserved some pennies and it was cheap enough not to think of as a waste.
“I might use that one day.” Crops up in my head a lot.
If they were more expensive I don’t think I’d have bought so many. I’d have more room in Stacks library though and maybe the developers would have earned roughly the same.
I do have the best of intentions in mind when I reply. I consider stack/theme/framework developers a goldmine and hope that they continue pumping out products that will help me and many others wow our customers - without them I wouldn’t be where I’m at right now. There is no perfect solution to this and I know developers and any business owners for that matter - participate in an endless war of trial and error with how to make their businesses survive and keep people from feeling they didn’t receive enough - I know I do.
What made me create this account and respond is simply the disappointment that the toxicity of where a customer is always right, where a parent tells the teacher how to teach, and a patient tells the doctor how to heal spills over here. Too many businesses were driven under because of those who could never be pleased started a campaign (in this case starting multiple threads) of bashing or “you’re doing it wrong” just because they didn’t get what they wanted when they wanted it. There seem to be no constructive criticism, it usually is “I’m your best customer, but I could be your worst enemy”, and that’s why people walk away. There is already a fine line and a widening fracture between customer-provider especially here in this small community, why perpetuate this? We’re only driving people away.
Wishing everyone a better day than yesterday, and hope that the best is yet to come.
What I said is that the orignial suggestion resembles a subscription model, I might have misunderstood and in error thought that when someone says “long term support arrangement” it means subscription or an ongoing payment of sorts?
You’re not getting rich with stack development. Just want to put things into perspective
I also don’t know what the original suggestion was about. My experience is that support cases appear at the beginning of a product usage. Not when the product is already in usage some months.
I’m with RW since RW4 if I recall correctly. To my opinion developers can charge up to 50% more.
Since RW has grown up to a more professinal tool any user can make money with it.
If you go to the showcases on WeaverSpace or Elixir Forum you see so much great sites.
Does anybody believe they are done for free? I don’t think so. At least 1.000 bucks
The investment for RW, Stacks, and one of those fantastic Freeform Frameworks incl. a CMS is less than 500$. Ok, you got to learn how to work with RW and it’s Stacks. But it’s so much esaier compared to Typo3, WordPress … name them.
I always donate for free Stacks a fair amount. In general are the developers kind enough to help users out of the mud (me included). I always think where they find the time to answer the questions. Mostly 7 days a week. Anyone who comes into the community with a problem, asks a question or has a problem will be helped. This is as well a service that costs nothing. Go to Mercedes and ask if they can check the oil…
I could write a lot more to praise the developers and explain why the stacks could be more expensive, nobody would want to read that. Too long.
Famous last words
Every cent the stacks cost is worth it.
I always feel for the developers. Especially if they serve an increasingly limited market. This is why I hate the inevitable doggy-piling that seems to happen.
Support probably also comes into play when things break, and they always do. i.e. Mapping or Instagram modules that rely on external feeds.
