Sparkal

you are aware.. that the blog "cannot" function without IPB.board? its required to actually operate. the blog is an addon for the forum. not the other way around.. relax. and its totally worth the price....

I know that 9 pages in, nearly everyone else will have covered the points I'm about to make, but I do wish to explain how this has come across to me. I am a perpetual licence holder, which I bought in 2005.

What worries me is that I feel that there is an effort going on to force me out of my perpetual licence. The biggest issue in this is that we are not at all eligible to purchase the service - nor, it appears, any future service.

It concerns me that there will be many other things released in the future which will be classed as a service, as a way of excluding perpetual and lifetime licence holders from useful extras to the software (thereby convincing people to relinquish their licences).

I am also concerned that not being able to buy such services might somehow compromise my board. I know it's an extra to the software, but spam is a very serious issue and I find it worrying that I won't be able to have any sort of access at all to a module that could prevent a significant spam attack.

I will stress that I don't think that IPS are unscrupulous at all, but I imagine some people might also be worrying that if a spam module provides enough robust protection against spam but there is a problem in the standard software and people are getting heavily attacked (like what happened in the later 2.3 series), IPS won't be as swift to respond to patching the software.

I stress, I'm not saying that *will* happen, but you can understand how that might cross people's minds. After all, four years ago, it would've been unthinkable that IPS wouldd be launching extra services in the manner they are now.

Overall, I feel that I'm being forced out of my perpetual licence. If we'd been able to pay an extra cost to obtain the service, then I understand that there might have been complaints but I can understand the difference between lifetime, perpetual and standard and if you wanted to make an offer to standard holders, that's understandable (honestly, I've been waiting for this for months because I could see where you were going with some of your forum posts last year).

But the crux is that we can't get the spam service at all without relinquishing what we currently own and have paid for...and I find that slightly odd. It also concerns me that this won't be the first service released, nor the only effort to make us give up our licences.

I bought the licence that was available to me at the time. I didn't buy a perpetual licence to screw IPS out of money or to upset IPS or to make IPS hate me. I also didn't force IPS to sell perpetual licences - I bought what IPS offered.

I would be happy to pay additional costs for services - if I felt that they would be a benefit to my site - and it seems a shame that they're not available to purchase as add-on modules at all.

I love IPS's software and I always have done, and I don't ever want to have to change from using Invision...but I am being increasingly upset at the way I'm being treated by the company - a company who I've never hassled via the support, who I've only ever said good things about and have always strongly recommended to people.

Lifetime and perpetual owners are still your customers - we run your software (and probably have done for years, so our users are used to your product and we probably don't wish to switch), so we're the best people to try and sell things to because we're a captive market. Excluding us entirely just makes me feel unwanted and it feels like you're trying to trick us out of what we already own. I respect you guys more than that, and it's horrible that that's how it's coming across. You can't mean it to be like this, surely? :(

I am in total agreement with everyone else here whom has a perpetual license or lifetime license here. I have both the perpetual and the standard just for the record.

If I really wanted this on my board, I can't get because I not willing to transfer my perpetual to a standard for the mere fact that I would lose out in the benefits of the perpetual license has to offer. More specifically, I am not willing to give up on the free upgrades regardless of if I renew support or not with that license.

In order to get the extra features, we should pay an extra $20 a year without having to change the structure of our license.

I am in total agreement with everyone else here whom has a perpetual license or lifetime license here. I have both the perpetual and the standard just for the record.

If I really wanted this on my board, I can't get because I not willing to transfer my perpetual to a standard for the mere fact that I would lose out in the benefits of the perpetual license has to offer. More specifically, I am not willing to give up on the free upgrades regardless of if I renew support or not with that license.

In order to get the extra features, we should pay an extra $20 a year without having to change the structure of our license.

I am in total agreement with everyone else here whom has a perpetual license or lifetime license here. I have both the perpetual and the standard just for the record.

If I really wanted this on my board, I can't get because I not willing to transfer my perpetual to a standard for the mere fact that I would lose out in the benefits of the perpetual license has to offer. More specifically, I am not willing to give up on the free upgrades regardless of if I renew support or not with that license.

In order to get the extra features, we should pay an extra $20 a year without having to change the structure of our license.

I just believe that if someone have +Active Customer status because of an IP.Board license, then that should qualify them for this feature. After all, if a Perp license holder pays the $30 for a year of service, then they are a current customer. The Lifetime holders are always current.

Now, if you want to say that Standard license holders get it for free while their license is active and then charge (say $10/year) for Perp/Lifetime license holders to obtain the service, I could go with that. But to make an announcement that it's for those with active IP.Board licenses, then to turn around and say "active" doesn't include lifetime/perp license holders, that's just shameful. Should have just said that it's free to those with an active Standard IP.Board License.

I'm juggling my licenses around anyway and plan to make use of the added feature on the board that currently has the lifetime license (but will swap that with the other board license). Just would have been nice to have it for both boards.

Question though, once someone has the key to use the function, does it only work while their license is active, or is it only required to be active when they put the key in but remains in effect from then on?

So why not offer the 'service' to your legacy customers for a fee?...

... It's because you want me to give up my Perpetual license.

Make a new "service and support" plan available to lifetime and perpetual customers and charge $50/yr ($25 / 6 months) for it. Then those who want the additional services can simply renew the more expensive plan. Why force us to give up our licenses?

Yes, you are not 'stripping features' for legacy licensed customers. Instead, you are forcing the 'legacy' customers to give up their licenses in order to use a new service. Unacceptable.

Sorry for opening the other topic, didn't notice this one.

For me, it's not about the money. It's about principle and respecting the core of your customer base that made you what you are today. I've been keeping an active support license pretty much since I got the perpetual license and in all that time I'm not sure if I put in more than 1-2 tickets (we're talking years here). The only reason I've kept it going is to support IPS and their products. I don't really need the support part (both the perpetual and lifetime license have lifetime downloads anyway). I can understand your point of view on this, but for me it just seems you're money hungry. I can understand not offering it to people without active support but this is just not very well thought out.

The costs you mentioned are there and I understand that. However, I doubt the cost is so large that you have to force your old time customers who supported you in the beginning out of their licenses for an additional $20/yr. Without us old customers you would not be where you are today. Also, these old licenses haven't been available for purchase for a very long time now. You should be treating our support licenses the same as you treat regular support licenses. We're getting the shaft here because we support you earlier than other people did.

Alternatively (if it was really about the money), you could have simply given us an option to keep our licenses but pay $50/yr instead of $30/yr for these additional benefits. Call it an "extended support level" or something. You haven't done that either. The only conclusion one can be make is that you want to force people out of their old licenses and get even more money out of them. I find this incredibly disappointing.

You've seriously tarnished your reputation here in my eyes.

I will not be renewing my support this year.