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Bloggers Assail Movable Type's New Pricing Scheme
cioxx writes "An immensely popular weblog publishing tool, Movable Type, has announced a new pricing model based on "support level, number of authors permitted, and the number of weblogs permitted per license". MT3D (Developer Edition) for non-commercial users has drifted away from its full-featured, free predecessor and managed to upset many blog authors whose entry summaries can be seen via the trackback feature originating from the initial MT3D announcement. Is this a case of bait-n-switch, or simply a company trying to capitalize on its dominant market share? WordPress (GPL), which is an equally powerful CMS, seems like a perfect candidate for those who are considering a switch to a non-crippled, free alternative."
I've been hit by this kind of thing before. Now I really look hard at the license. If you use proprietary stuff, you are at the mercy of the owner. It's not just a Microsoft thing, folks.
....but what everybody is really interested in is free beer!
And if you thought that was boring you obviously havn't read my Journal ;-)
WordPress (GPL), which is an equally powerful CMS, seems like a perfect candidate for those who are considering a switch to a non-crippled, free alternative.
Presumably you believe it's crippled because you have to pay for it, which I have to say I find a poor argument. Pay for the stuff if you think it's worth the money, use something else if you don't. It's not a hard choice.
I just switched from Movable Type to Text Pattern and I couldn't be happier. It's more CMS like AND easier to use (granted MT was easy to use but Txp feels much smoother). It makes a good separation of content and display and has a few goodies that make this feel natural. It's got a few minor bugs that'll be fixed before release; but it's worked great for my blog.
Oh, and it imports movable type files. Seriously, with the wide variety of free, quality, blogging software out there, Six Apart has their work cut out for them.
Photos.
I bought a Honda Accord in 1994, and when I bought a new one in 2004, they raised the price by almost eight thousand dollars!
It seems like with anything you buy today, you're at the mercy of the people working to make the product and sell it.
But how will I be able to get through the day without Jerry B. Smith's Blog entries? Today he got up and found his cat had vomitted on the floor in the middle of the night. HILARIOUS! You can't pay for writing that good. A few days ago he described how he had to take his car in for an oil change and it took 15 minutes instead of the more industry standard 10 minute quick change because they were jerking him around. Damn quick change places.
I especially don't ever want to continue to give away a free version, but charge people who are using it in a business environment. That would suck even more if people who are using my software to make money themselves.
PEOPLE! You can still use MT for free with one or two authors, personal blog, etc. If you're using it for more industrial stuff, then don't expect it to be free forever, especially since you GET SUPPORT FROM THE DEVELOPER.
I'm not talking about the typical "RTFM, l0s3r" support you get from certain GPL apps, I'm talking about actually ask-a-question-get-a-polite-and-helpful-answer kind of support.
Just because they need to make money (who doesn't?), doesn't mean you should dump them completely.
That said, it's obvious to anyone with a pair of brain celss that this pricing structure is to make their Typepad service more attractive for casual bloggers and non-techies. If you you're willing to get your elbows dirty you can run a blog on your own machine from home with the free version.
-EB
Do you ever walk alone like a drifter in the dark?
AFAI understand, the main reason why there's a lot of bitching going on against the MT authors is that they were using their loyal users to beta-test their new MT release (3.0) while keeping them under the mistaken impression it was going to remain free. I quote from one blog:
No business ethics problems? How about this.
You ready a beta release of a piece of software, and ask people to beta test it. Mention nothing about paying, or even that you are considering changing the license. Being the loyal folks they are, lots say "OK" and you give them the software. They upgrade to it, and there's no way to downgrade.
Then, about 5 weeks later, you say, "Oh, by the way, most of you will have to pay to upgrade out of beta". Keeping in mind that most of the people who are the most loyal to MT, and therefore the most likely to have signed up for the beta program, are the ones who take MT to its' limits by using multiple blogs for things like link sidebars, book reviews, photoblogs, etc., and a lot of them no longer qualify for the free version because of the three blog limit.
You've just stranded a whole bunch of people on a beta version of your software, and you're basically extorting them to allow them to upgrade to a non-beta release.
It does look like SixApart have shot themselves in the foot and alienated themselves from their fanbase. They have violated the golden role of starting to charge for something that was previously free. In the world of tech where everyone wants the latest and greatest (and MT users are particularly tech-savvy given the requirements to install and maintain the software), this was always going to be an unpopular decision. How could they not have foreseen this?
The launch of their TypePad service last year (which is basically a fully commercial, hosted MT package with bells and whistles like photo gallery management) was a smart business move; make a service out of your product, and keep the original product free. This latest move, though, is beyond comprehension and will only hurt them. It will sure be interesting to see how they backpedal from this.
---- scrm
Ummm ... while MT has been 'open code' ... MovableType has NEVER been Open Source ... says so right in their documentation.
--- have you healed your church website?
If you wanna come to wordpress, you might find this moving guide handy with all the details about what needs to be done before, during and after the move.
Couldn't agree more that if this leads to fewer blogs, it's a Good Thing. They should raise the price even more.
You know that Slashdot is a blog, right?