Really don't know what to do about vB 4

I think that MyBB is just as good as vB for those who don't want all the bloat and extras.
Any new projects I start will be on MyBB.

 

I totally see your view and respect it completely. But what really got me is the enormous amount of style and plugins available for vBulletin. It definitely wins in that area. I love plugins/modifications, and have had 100+ installed at one time on a single forum before (call me crazy, but let's not go there :lol: ).

 

Just one-hundred? Silly amateur.

 

I use as few mods as I can possibly get by with.

 

Honestly, just about every plugin you'd ever actually NEED can be found for MyBB. Maybe it won't match all of your 100+ plugins, but that's just unnecessary.

 

Plugins aren't about needs. They are more about extras, fun stuff and wants. MyBB doesn't have all of the plugins I want; I'm sure the vast majority of vB users who know anything about MyBB would agree.

It doesn't matter anyways. There is no "right" or "wrong" about which forum software anybody prefers to use.

 

No problem. Personally, I have yet to not find a plugin that I want with MyBB (Except iTrader, I really want that :p - and it's on somebody's development list right now anyways.)

 

Nick, first off thank you bringing this subject. As you said, vb4 is not that great and to be honest i cant see any improvement. What i see as a new feature is search page is prettier, thats all. Anyone can tell me whats new in vb4 for our forums' users?

There are 2 real problems that should force us to decide;

1. IB betrayed us, especially the owned license owners. This is an unforgettable mistake. And you have to take an action.

2. The new pricing system will work for IB and it will work against you. Whenever they want to earn more money they will release a new version of VB. Their new priority is not the quality then but just serve new series. What about security? What will happen to your mods/skins when they release a new version? How many months you can go with vb4? Thanks to their new pricing system, there are a lot of questions that nobody can answer!

"Vbulletin's first priority is quality, not to earn money"

This was a truth before IB but now it is an irony...

I was a huge fan of VB too but after their ugly behaviors i've decided to switch to IPB.

Hey, i found a nice skin for ipb3 several weeks ago (i have no any relation with this website):
TechForum -> Comunicazioni con lo Staff

 

Ditto......
I did "re-purchase" the 4.0 vb license with the first sale because I felt pressured and was afraid of the higher price. I like vb, but I just can't quite stomach using vb when it's ready. Also, who is to say what the price is going to be whenever 5.0 rolls out.
I've renewed my IPB license and am in the process of playing/re-learning with the forum. I think I'm ready to move on.

 

I actually downloaded and installed it over the weekend, haven't had much time to play with it but I must agree that MyBB might be the best free alternative out there and pretty sure I'll be using it to launch all new communities.

 

I'd stay with vB3, or move to another forum later...

I'm not really intending to move to vB4, until I'm sure it will at least be worth it, which so far I'm pretty sure it won't be.

If it comes down to it, I've already talked to some programmers and security people to creating our own patches to secure the forum (One of the security people works for Symantec, and is a programmer for the site I run).

 

For now I'd stay with vB3 series. I renewed my IPB licences and installed IPB3, but in the end I went back to vB3 series. I thought it was a better all round board generally than IPB3 in the end, but that's just me. others have never looked back as you've read by some who took the plunge and converted their vB boards to IPB boards.

The worrying thing about vBulletin 4 is how things will span-out in the future cost wise I'd say. Are we going to see IB try and get more money sooner rather than later with vB5? This is something which should be taken into consideration with your decision.

 

After literally tossing and turning along with scouring the internet for information and opinions, I converted away from vBulletin. I realize that this is a beta version, but I'm not impressed with it at all. Given their recent customer service track record, the risk is just not worth it for me. I don't see a promising product evolving although I still think vBulletin is a quality choice. I know many administrators who will stick with it and I don't blame them.

I took this as an opportunity to go open source. I feel like it's a safer choice.

 

My trust in vBulletin has gone, I see Internet Brands as being a company who just want to use vBulletin as a cash cow when they can. But of course that's just my view! They've already pulled a fast one with owned license owners as far as I'm concerned (making them pay full price) more or less on expired owned licenses, rather than charging them a much, much cheaper renewal fee like IPB do.

I'm not happy about a lot of others things as well, way too many broken promises of what was to come that's never materialised like the promised Full Rewrite. Also, the first pre-sale stunt to try and make as many people rush into renewing, which has now turned into a never ending pre-sale as off right now. An obvious sign in my book that sales are not going as well as they'd like you to believe they are. They seem to me, to enjoy playing (mind games) with customers to get them to BUY now. Another trait I really don't like about IB. They are not up-front and honest!!!

IB remind me very much of "SALES REPS" in that respect, that's the image they project for me. I'm also not convinced we will see a very stable final vBulletin 4 gold release either. Already we're at Beta 4 (and there are still a lot of issues being pointed out) by people. I would have expected a much more stable product at this stage in the Beta releases. They seem to be jumping a little too fast from one Beta version to another for my liking - as though they want to make it Gold very soon. And I can't see it going beyond Beta 6 personally before they'll release it as Final. But the way things are looking now it would have to go way beyond that!

I think as time goes on they will alienate more and more customers into leaving vBulletin, as it becomes more apparent further down the line that they are just in it for the bucks they can get from you.

 

Yeah mrgtb, one thing you touched on would of been better if the pre-sale was valid all the way till gold release or something but oh well.

 

Well, some actually benefited from the sale - I was one of the lucky few. Basically, I had a Leased license up for renewal this month; the sale enabled me to purchase the vB 4.0 upgrade for $130, basically saving me $50 for what I would have paid to upgrade to the Owned license this year. Unfortunately, that didn't happen to very many people. It's obvious from leaks and responses that IB anticipated a fairly nasty situation. However, I think the situation went south more harshly than they anticipated and so they scrambled to fix it. Hence the inconsistent response of trying to moderate and then full-on ban people and extending sales deadlines.

Unfortunately for the people who feel a bit trapped, the usual fanboys and crybabies took this situation and ran with it as well. I think that really hurt the legitimate momentum that many had. I did not like ho IB tried to turn this into something it was not. For instance, "record sales" came about because of a knee-jerk reaction you created with the "pay $130 now or very possibly $250 soon so you can still run your forum and upgrade to our software."

As for me personally, I don't mind paying a little more money for a good product. However, IB thought they could take our money and then output a subpar product at an unspecified date without a real chance to check it out. It clearly didn't work, they got burned, and now we have the rushed product we all see and don't really like. Trying my best to look through neutral glasses here, this "new" vB is nothing more than a skin redesign with a CMS that looks like it was first put together a week before the beta release. Any software product will always promise this or that, but vB has really gone to that mantra. The slogan really should be "Wait til the next version!"

Their putting out an extremely buggy version of the software their other major paid competitors have had out for months. They were doing this under designed pretenses to generate a false landslide because of their position. Unfortunately, this is what you generally get with a public company, because the motive is entirely profit. I'm not downing Mr. Brisco who I think is a respectable man, I've just discovered that the cost of vB is simply not worth it.

 

+1 mrtgb and CrazyTech.

On that note, anyone catch the latest comment on the LawProfessor site...?

vBulletin 4 Forum - The Upgrade Dispute | The Law Professor

...interesting?

(move this post if it needs to be better placed)

 

tl;dr much. ~_~ I'm still a teenager, not many things catch my attention. I just read the last part.