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Just a little thought on donations & working for free for people who want monetization.
Posted by jaBote,
25 January 2014
·
1111 views
What is the reason behind this rant? I could've ranted about some other things, for example why I don't like temporarily upset blog entries even if I find they're right (as I've told Ind more than once) or about the fully original, uninspired by Hercules rAthena updates as always (even if I must admit that, without seeing the source code and despite a couple of glaringly obvious inconsistencies, I like this version just a bit more than ours). I'm ranting about money instead.
First of all, I must state that I hate money (not in an anarchist, communist or whateverist way, I simply dislike it mysel without any need of putting there some man with a beard who, when alive, once said money is bad). I've been offered money or donations more than once here at Hercules -some because of a "pay me" joke that turned on a real offer- and I politely said no (some users can witness that). I can't live getting money on the work I intentionally do for free with a clear conscience. I don't know yet, but (I hope) this doesn't apply to paid work I'd do IRL when I get to that time.
When I had my first and only private server (that I remember most of my users still want to remark it was one of their best servers ever, even if I did modify a couple minor things in source and almost every novelty was because of my scripts, not state of the art but they simply did their job well) I made all the donations go towards my co-admin friend even being me the owner, since I always said I was paying for the host myself and would do provided there's still a community wanting to play the server, because I wanted to open it because I love RO and didn't want any monetization out of it. In fact, I wouldn't have put any donation feature. "Pay me with a beer if we ever meet", is what I said most times. But the rule was there and I had to respect it even if I was against it. Moreover, I'm still paying for the host without any donations even if the server has become abandoned, and I don't mind it.
The "farm XYZ x 1000 things and I'll give you the donation ticket" way wasn't invented yet. And yes, I think it's another way of making people go frustrated even more than without that feature and overexploiting the spawns for these monsters. Overexploiters are often comprised by bots and some well-built macros you couldn't catch most of the times, with people who try to resell the items behind them, sometimes for real money or accounts in other servers (I've seen that myself). That creates a side effect that deprive the legitimate player his respawns and forces him/her to try to get the experience or loot wherever else.
Monetization is always there on 99% of the private servers. This is (yet another one) of the reasons I don't like main Spanish-speaking private servers, these that have become famous for one reason or another, or these that their admin closes when he considers he hasn't enough "clientele", rebuilds some of its features and then reopens when he builds up some more "clientele" (and, speaking of a server I know that is in Spain and located by native Spanish people, they also send out an e-mail to all registered users of its previous versions, in a blatant violation of Spanish privacy laws). Donations is the only important thing measured there. I mean, they are important since you can fund your server based on these and not everyone can afford paying them out of their pockets, but from that to only keep a server online while it's profitable... Well, I won't make an exact opinion of them or name specific servers that do or did that, just take it as a huge disservice to everyone else that is or has been out there.
And here we reach to the motivation of this entry. I love scripting but don't usually find time for that (I have a pending WoE setter ready to kick other's asses
). I like lending a hand when needed, especially in any Spanish-speaking support section IN official forums (I don't have a good opinion on dedicated sites for that, at least the main Spanish ones once again) because I like to feel compromised with RO in Spanish. Sure I don't know many things (especially source and/or client side) and that my knowledge is getting old due to Hercules updates and that I can't set up a proper test environment to see myself, but I'll try my best whenever possible, even asking devs if needed.
That's true, but I've become bored of these script support or request topics from users asking you to make a basic donation NPC (never telling you directly because 1 Proof of Donation or 1 TCG card isn't evident enough, just in case), but for free. As if we were some kind of free-paid customer service, wanting us to earn their money, some times by bumping or trying to redirect the attention from other topics to the request if needed.
Don't get me wrong. I still like scripting and will answer any questions I have an answer (and time) to, and I will keep developing systems when I still have time (and, ideally, open another private server of mine). I don't mind people using my systems for whatever they want as long as they are not a direct part of a donation process. Aw, c'mon. I part of the base everybody is a (respectable) newbie who lacks the creativity or scripting skills for thinking new, adapting and/or improving some existing systems, but there are already lots of answered basic donation NPC systems on the forum! Or you need the basics of the basics of scripting to make your own.
Athena/Hercules scripting is one of these languages easy enough you can actually teach to children at school, despite it being a dissimulated C and even though the fact that it's useless out of a server. What does stop you from that then?
P.S.: Why do I write all this wall of text when I just wanted to write a little piece of text as the entry title says? Why?
P.S.#2: I have nothing against people that contribute here on the forums and also requested a donation NPC. At least they have contributed to the community and it's perfectly reasonable for them to request a way for monetizing their efforts in exchange, despite the fact that they're asking the same thing. At least they get it much like a sort of reward for contributing, which is always good.
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SPANISH:
Si no me olvido ya haré una traducción rápida . Solo quería decir que aunque tenga semi abandonado mi WoE setter, es por motivos de estudio y cuando lo tenga listo no faltaré a la cita con una traducción al español del que espero sea el mejor, más poderoso (y casi que ligero en cuanto a proceso) y mejor comentado (¡servirá para aprender!) WoE setter del momento.
Si queréis haceros una idea de a qué iba esta entrada, era una queja sobre los sistemas de donaciones actuales, decir lo poco que me gustan los tres o cuatro grandes servidores hispanos que hay porque están orientados a donaciones más que a trato con el público y que por mucho que me guste ayudar (especialmente con el scripting), no aguanto cuando se me pide que haga de balde un script o algo que tenga que ver directamente con las donaciones de un servidor, en que el tipo que me lo pide se embolsa todo el dinero y la mitad de las veces no recibo ni las gracias, más aún habiendo ya cientos de scripts para ello. Y lo digo desde el punto de vista de alguien a quien no le gusta el dinero de por sí y que lo ve por desgracia como un mal necesario. Ya si tengo tiempo la traduzco completa porque contiene algunas perlas que quizá os gusten o, al menos os haga pensar. Pensar os hará libres
.
First of all, I must state that I hate money (not in an anarchist, communist or whateverist way, I simply dislike it mysel without any need of putting there some man with a beard who, when alive, once said money is bad). I've been offered money or donations more than once here at Hercules -some because of a "pay me" joke that turned on a real offer- and I politely said no (some users can witness that). I can't live getting money on the work I intentionally do for free with a clear conscience. I don't know yet, but (I hope) this doesn't apply to paid work I'd do IRL when I get to that time.
When I had my first and only private server (that I remember most of my users still want to remark it was one of their best servers ever, even if I did modify a couple minor things in source and almost every novelty was because of my scripts, not state of the art but they simply did their job well) I made all the donations go towards my co-admin friend even being me the owner, since I always said I was paying for the host myself and would do provided there's still a community wanting to play the server, because I wanted to open it because I love RO and didn't want any monetization out of it. In fact, I wouldn't have put any donation feature. "Pay me with a beer if we ever meet", is what I said most times. But the rule was there and I had to respect it even if I was against it. Moreover, I'm still paying for the host without any donations even if the server has become abandoned, and I don't mind it.
The "farm XYZ x 1000 things and I'll give you the donation ticket" way wasn't invented yet. And yes, I think it's another way of making people go frustrated even more than without that feature and overexploiting the spawns for these monsters. Overexploiters are often comprised by bots and some well-built macros you couldn't catch most of the times, with people who try to resell the items behind them, sometimes for real money or accounts in other servers (I've seen that myself). That creates a side effect that deprive the legitimate player his respawns and forces him/her to try to get the experience or loot wherever else.
Monetization is always there on 99% of the private servers. This is (yet another one) of the reasons I don't like main Spanish-speaking private servers, these that have become famous for one reason or another, or these that their admin closes when he considers he hasn't enough "clientele", rebuilds some of its features and then reopens when he builds up some more "clientele" (and, speaking of a server I know that is in Spain and located by native Spanish people, they also send out an e-mail to all registered users of its previous versions, in a blatant violation of Spanish privacy laws). Donations is the only important thing measured there. I mean, they are important since you can fund your server based on these and not everyone can afford paying them out of their pockets, but from that to only keep a server online while it's profitable... Well, I won't make an exact opinion of them or name specific servers that do or did that, just take it as a huge disservice to everyone else that is or has been out there.
And here we reach to the motivation of this entry. I love scripting but don't usually find time for that (I have a pending WoE setter ready to kick other's asses
). I like lending a hand when needed, especially in any Spanish-speaking support section IN official forums (I don't have a good opinion on dedicated sites for that, at least the main Spanish ones once again) because I like to feel compromised with RO in Spanish. Sure I don't know many things (especially source and/or client side) and that my knowledge is getting old due to Hercules updates and that I can't set up a proper test environment to see myself, but I'll try my best whenever possible, even asking devs if needed.That's true, but I've become bored of these script support or request topics from users asking you to make a basic donation NPC (never telling you directly because 1 Proof of Donation or 1 TCG card isn't evident enough, just in case), but for free. As if we were some kind of free-paid customer service, wanting us to earn their money, some times by bumping or trying to redirect the attention from other topics to the request if needed.
Don't get me wrong. I still like scripting and will answer any questions I have an answer (and time) to, and I will keep developing systems when I still have time (and, ideally, open another private server of mine). I don't mind people using my systems for whatever they want as long as they are not a direct part of a donation process. Aw, c'mon. I part of the base everybody is a (respectable) newbie who lacks the creativity or scripting skills for thinking new, adapting and/or improving some existing systems, but there are already lots of answered basic donation NPC systems on the forum! Or you need the basics of the basics of scripting to make your own.
Athena/Hercules scripting is one of these languages easy enough you can actually teach to children at school, despite it being a dissimulated C and even though the fact that it's useless out of a server. What does stop you from that then?
P.S.: Why do I write all this wall of text when I just wanted to write a little piece of text as the entry title says? Why?
P.S.#2: I have nothing against people that contribute here on the forums and also requested a donation NPC. At least they have contributed to the community and it's perfectly reasonable for them to request a way for monetizing their efforts in exchange, despite the fact that they're asking the same thing. At least they get it much like a sort of reward for contributing, which is always good.
--------
SPANISH:
Si no me olvido ya haré una traducción rápida
. Solo quería decir que aunque tenga semi abandonado mi WoE setter, es por motivos de estudio y cuando lo tenga listo no faltaré a la cita con una traducción al español del que espero sea el mejor, más poderoso (y casi que ligero en cuanto a proceso) y mejor comentado (¡servirá para aprender!) WoE setter del momento.Si queréis haceros una idea de a qué iba esta entrada, era una queja sobre los sistemas de donaciones actuales, decir lo poco que me gustan los tres o cuatro grandes servidores hispanos que hay porque están orientados a donaciones más que a trato con el público y que por mucho que me guste ayudar (especialmente con el scripting), no aguanto cuando se me pide que haga de balde un script o algo que tenga que ver directamente con las donaciones de un servidor, en que el tipo que me lo pide se embolsa todo el dinero y la mitad de las veces no recibo ni las gracias, más aún habiendo ya cientos de scripts para ello. Y lo digo desde el punto de vista de alguien a quien no le gusta el dinero de por sí y que lo ve por desgracia como un mal necesario. Ya si tengo tiempo la traduzco completa porque contiene algunas perlas que quizá os gusten o, al menos os haga pensar. Pensar os hará libres
.
Very well said. Although I'm more than able, I haven't quite gotten around to making a Paid Services topic or even really responded to solicitations for paid work. A lot of it has to do with the fact that I don't really have (or want) the time to script for everyone, even if it's for a couple bucks. I enjoy scripting fun and useful features; I have a vast collection of scripts I've written over the last year or two, and I only see myself improving. I'm gradually releasing select features and utilities into the community (as you and some might have noticed lately) after they've been deemed useful and rewritten - but hey, they're free, so who's complaining?
I guess my point is just that you're not alone when it comes to enjoying free work for non-commercial purposes. I ran a server for a while that basically died out after an inadvertent wipe (our douchebag of a host suspended our VPS and deleted our backups; though, it was our bad for leaving backups on the server...d'oh), but I kept it up and running for another four months before closing it. The private server scene was always supposed to be non-profit and free-to-play, as it was a great alternative to buying playtime for official servers or playing their shitty free-to-play one; and over the years, it's become an outlet for creativity, for developers, artists, and gamers alike. It's just too bad that most servers these days are more concerned with money than they are with producing a fun rendition of RO. I wonder what a server would be like if it was as dedicated to generating new content as one that was committed to profiting.