Recent posts in this topic
Staff
Ilija Studen
on Sep 26. 2007. 10:11 pm
qwik3r:Can you pay monthly for this?
No, you can't.
activeCollab Team Member
disappointed
on Oct 1. 2007. 7:02 pm
I'm paying $49/mo with Basecamp. I'll have to wait and see what the same amount will buy me here. Maybe I'll stick with the OSS version and modify it as I go, who knows.
I would also think that this is an opportunity to differentiate yourself from the competition, not be like them. If you offered two versions of ActiveCollab, perhaps one for personal use and one for business use, and had flat monthly pricing, I think you'd get a lot more interested people and sell more than you would with a multi-tiered structure (like Basecamp does). Haven't seen the final word on pricing but just a suggestion before the fact.
I would also think that this is an opportunity to differentiate yourself from the competition, not be like them. If you offered two versions of ActiveCollab, perhaps one for personal use and one for business use, and had flat monthly pricing, I think you'd get a lot more interested people and sell more than you would with a multi-tiered structure (like Basecamp does). Haven't seen the final word on pricing but just a suggestion before the fact.
I don't understand why someone would prefer to pay monthly for something, indefinitely, rather than pay once and own it. If you're paying $49/mo. for Basecamp, you could have paid for — and permanently owned a license for — ActiveCollab in only 8 months for the Corporate version, or 4 months for the Small Business version. This fact alone differentiates AC from the competition substantially in my opinion.
I'm planning to get the Small Business version (pending seeing a demo of course), and assuming I use it for 2 years AND get the 2nd year of support, it figures in at only $12.42 per month. A no-brainer as compared to Basecamp, to me anyway.
BTW, as far as I know, the final word on pricing can be found here:
http://www.activecollab.com/blog/50/pricing-details-updated/
I'm planning to get the Small Business version (pending seeing a demo of course), and assuming I use it for 2 years AND get the 2nd year of support, it figures in at only $12.42 per month. A no-brainer as compared to Basecamp, to me anyway.
BTW, as far as I know, the final word on pricing can be found here:
http://www.activecollab.com/blog/50/pricing-details-updated/
flashlackey
on Oct 2. 2007. 12:08 am
I'm not sure why anyone would want to pay monthly either. Actually, that is the only objection to the current model that I have, that there is a yearly fee for upgrades and support.
I hate to beat a dead horse and I suspect that it will actually change over the course of the first free year, but, charging yearly for upgrades sounds like there will be some bug fixes that you have to pay for later. I know for me, I will be keeping track of feature changes, etc. during the second year and waiting for something to be added to justify the yearly fee to pay it. In essence, it will be the same thing as waiting for a 2.0 version to pay for but without a clear definition of what that is. And all in the meantime potentially using a product with some bugs just because the bugs are not worth fixing for $200. It seems like, when you buy the license, you should have the right to expect all of the features to work properly as advertised, even if that means a free fix later. Charging for such fixes would be like Ford charging people for a recall on one of their cars.
I would feel more comfortable about the purchase knowing that bug fix upgrades would be available for no additional cost for those who bought a license and the yearly $200 would be for feature additions.
Maybe you guys can clarify that we won't have to live with bugs because there aren't any other reasons to pay the upgrade/support fee?
I hate to beat a dead horse and I suspect that it will actually change over the course of the first free year, but, charging yearly for upgrades sounds like there will be some bug fixes that you have to pay for later. I know for me, I will be keeping track of feature changes, etc. during the second year and waiting for something to be added to justify the yearly fee to pay it. In essence, it will be the same thing as waiting for a 2.0 version to pay for but without a clear definition of what that is. And all in the meantime potentially using a product with some bugs just because the bugs are not worth fixing for $200. It seems like, when you buy the license, you should have the right to expect all of the features to work properly as advertised, even if that means a free fix later. Charging for such fixes would be like Ford charging people for a recall on one of their cars.
I would feel more comfortable about the purchase knowing that bug fix upgrades would be available for no additional cost for those who bought a license and the yearly $200 would be for feature additions.
Maybe you guys can clarify that we won't have to live with bugs because there aren't any other reasons to pay the upgrade/support fee?
flashlackey
on Oct 2. 2007. 12:12 am
Speaking of 2.0.
Do you intend on releasing a future 2.0 version with a new license fee? Or, continuing to add features to 1.0 only?
I think this is a pretty significant thing to know since one would involve paying $200 a year as the product grows and the other involves paying a new license fee. Nobody will want to pay the yearly fee if they can just get a fresh version with all the fixes in a new license some time down the road.
Do you intend on releasing a future 2.0 version with a new license fee? Or, continuing to add features to 1.0 only?
I think this is a pretty significant thing to know since one would involve paying $200 a year as the product grows and the other involves paying a new license fee. Nobody will want to pay the yearly fee if they can just get a fresh version with all the fixes in a new license some time down the road.
I'm not crazy about the yearly fee for upgrades, but as flashlackey says, it fer-sure better include any and all future versions, be it 1.1 or 2.0 and beyond.
Staff
Ilija Studen
on Oct 2. 2007. 5:18 am
Upgrades include all versions - major, minor, bug fixes...
Priority bug and security fixes are provided for two previous versions, free of charge. If current version if activeCollab is 3.x fixes are provided for 1.x and 2.x, but if current version is 4.x 1.x is considered outdated and you are recommended to upgrade.
Priority bug and security fixes are provided for two previous versions, free of charge. If current version if activeCollab is 3.x fixes are provided for 1.x and 2.x, but if current version is 4.x 1.x is considered outdated and you are recommended to upgrade.
activeCollab Team Member
Pro
I'm not sure if anyone has made this point, so I will...
We like aC a LOT and intend to at least attempt to sell it as a tool to many of our clients, after demonstrating how good it is by using it with them! Many of our clients suffer from the exact problems that aC solves.
In that veing, however, we'd certainly like to see some volume pricing discounts, for hosted instances on the same server/farm, that scale as we scale clients (that is, we don't have to follow a M$-like plan of purchasing 10, 100, etc in advance).
As long as I have you: have you thought about forked instances on replicating/load balancing servers? Heck if we'll get that far, but I'd prefer not to be paying twice for load balancing ...
Thanks again! Great product, &I hope we can provide you some revenue to support your work!
We like aC a LOT and intend to at least attempt to sell it as a tool to many of our clients, after demonstrating how good it is by using it with them! Many of our clients suffer from the exact problems that aC solves.
In that veing, however, we'd certainly like to see some volume pricing discounts, for hosted instances on the same server/farm, that scale as we scale clients (that is, we don't have to follow a M$-like plan of purchasing 10, 100, etc in advance).
As long as I have you: have you thought about forked instances on replicating/load balancing servers? Heck if we'll get that far, but I'd prefer not to be paying twice for load balancing ...
Thanks again! Great product, &I hope we can provide you some revenue to support your work!
