Perhaps if all those Master Skins were included in the subscription price, it might be worth it for the average Stardock program user. For the skin creator, I CAN see a value for the site for all the help, Q&A, and support without any additions. Especially since the program to make the skins is free, right? But support for Object Desktop programs themselves should be included in the price we pay for the program. Especially for Forum base solutions.
We'd have to raise the price of subscriptions SUBSTANTIALLY to be able to properly pay Master Skin authors what they'd be owed for all the users downloading their work. You forget that the artists make money off of each unit out the door, and they get to set their own price. Every skin we include, we would have to increase the price of a subscription by the amount of money an artist could expect to earn off an individual sale. You wouldn't be saving anything as an end-user in that scenario.
Instead, we offer a 20% discount to existing WC subscribers. That's how we can best reward subscribers while remaining fair to Master Skinner artists.
Morpheus -
I think you're reading too far into last week's poll. WinCustomize is not aiming to be your source for all news worth knowing. Heck, we're not even trying to be remotely comprehensive in what we cover. Most of the news stories posted here are written by me, and I only do a small handful per day anyway. News on the front-page of WC is just one of the many pieces of the site, and I was just wondering what sorts of coverage would be most appreciated in that space. WC is a sum of many parts, and I'm working to make each part as entertaining, informative and useful as I can. If someone looks at the site and sees a part that isn't very good, I want to work on making it better.
News is never going to be a feature of the site that drives subscriptions. Like you said, there's way too much high-quality news out there that's 100% free.
I'm looking now into new and different ways to enhance the value of the subscription. There is probably a lot we can be doing to make the subscriber experience better. This poll is to help us get moving in the right direction.
I appreciate your opinion and view on the necessity of ads on a site. And believe me when I say I am very careful in considering where an ad is placed, how big it is, and what it does. I hate sites that flood you with ads and have been working hard to strike the proper balance between providing a good user experience, and bringing in needed income
Make the money worth spending.... saying you need it cause you've devoted time to using Photoshop to dress up the glass effects on page borders and CSS frames?!? Ain't gonna cut it.
That's not really fair. Beyond the visual bits to WC2k7, the core of the site was rewritten. A site of this size and this complexity requires a lot of time and a good number of very talented coders to develop. And WinCustomize 2008 has a lot going into it that aren't simply photoshop or CSS tweaks. It's a pretty complex project already and we've only begun the design meetings (the project plan is a scary-large thing) Subscriptions fund the continued development and maintenance of the site. Without them, we could have just declared WC2k7 as final victory, and only put minimal effort into keeping it from crashing. It's stable enough now and everything works like we expect it to. Everyone wants the site to get better, to expand, to offer more... and that requires funds.
If you don't feel there's suffecient value to a subscription, that's fine. Beyond providing Master Skins for free (which we can't do, since they're not ours to give away) what would make it a better value to you?
As a general note to everyone... this poll and this discussion is in no way an indication that we're going to lock the galleries to subscribers only. There is far more value in keeping this site open to everyone who wanders by, than we could get out of subscriptions if we locked the content away. What is free today will likely be free tomorrow. We are looking for NEW stuff to put on the site, items that aren't part of the package today.
Also, I'm not trying to imply that people should feel they HAVE to subscribe. I would very much like each and every one of our millions of annual visitors to subscribe... that would make me very happy and make a huge difference for the site, but I'm not trying to say it is expected or required... just hoped for. I am trying to find out what would make you WANT to subscribe.
