Kier designing his own forum software?

I think that Kier is working on an VB4 -> VB3 converter

 

I doubt very much that you would get equivalent functionality from any new forum script at the beginning. The beauty of getting in on he ground floor of a new forum script, whose developers are dedicated to both the script and the customers, is that your input means something, and you know that the developer(s) are as excited as you are, and you get to watch it grow in functionality, and know that you had something to do with it. That means alot to me, and I'm willing to sacrifice some functionality as long as I have a base script that actually works.

 

As long as theres a nice plugin system, I wouldn't worry to much about functionality.

 

Even if there's not a plugin feature at first, I'd still go with it, knowing that features will be added, and that I have input on which features are added, and when.

It's an exciting thing!

 

;p I ment to say that I'd have my own features made by friends or staff.

 

Even better!

 

My ideal forum would probably be light weight, with just a very advance plugin and template system (Mostly CSS based, but using a logical framework so that beginners could easily pick it up), so that I wouldn't have all the features I don't use with vBulletin, but could extend it as much as I really wanted to.

 

Well my most important forum is still chugging along using a VB3.6 - very basic.
Have been too terrified to disrupt it to update!
But it does mean that it's just the forum needed although I do love Logician's Webtemplates. Still I'm sure Logician is clever enough to adapt them to a new system.

 

After being a truly devoted/involved vBulletin fan since 2001, I find myself now in the situation (like so many other paying customers) that my 4.0 package is still living on my local harddisk. Zipped that is.

I bought the package unfortunately in the presale. IB staff members like Wayne Luke stated this for example: 'We are asking you to take a risk though...'. Although I felt really bad about going for a product I did not get the chance to see functional beforehand, I based my decision both on the history of Jelsoft delivering outstanding quality products and staff members like Wayne Luke being confident to state to their paying customers that 'this is the best deal we can offer'.

Well... we all know by now how that deal turned out. IB deliberately sold a product that was unfinished, even dysfunctional. Showing this level of disrespect to your paying customers won't go unrecognized obviously... and it resulted in many, many, many outbursts on the internet regarding this new 'management' of this once outstanding (thanks to mr. Kier Darby, mr. Scott Macvicar and mr. Mike Sullivan: all three of them have left) piece of software. Looking back at everything that happened since Internet Brands took over, I have nothing but deep respect for the decision of the 3 of them to leave.

Unfortunately for us customers, it still seems that with the departure of the above key figures, the quality really has gone out of the window big time over there at IB's vBulletin. Don't have to go in detail, because just do Google search and you will find dozens and dozens of forums, blogs and articles about how people felt treated and what this has done to the reputation of vBulletin.

At least it helped Invision Power Services (or should we call them 'Wordpress') to become a stronger competitor and they deserve it. In my eyes however, both Wordpress or Invision are not vBulletin's biggest competitor. The biggest competitor of Internet Brand's vBulletin nowadays, is... vBulletin.

I respect myself and my (clients) projects too much to contribute any further to a company (IB) that clearly has no clue whatsoever how to relate to their paying customers in an open, honest way (although the addition of 'IB Adrian' to the team finally was a move in the right direction, so it seems <--- mind you, a lot of people totally lost their trust already and a fair amount have moved wisely to Invision Power Board) and deliver the quality products we are used to get from the former Jelsoft team. I am not a beta tester for example! I paid for a product that should be functional and still to this date customers feel they are constantly being used as beta testers, because IB seems to be incapable of releasing a stable product. It still does not deserve the label 'Gold'... only 4 months to go and then 1 (!) year has passed when IB released their alpha product called 'vBulletin 4' as a presale to their paying customers.

It is truly embarrassing. I have now come to the point to stop contributing anymore to vBulletin and by the quality of the suggestions forum nowadays you can see that I am not the only one who left. A lot of former 'influential' loyal/dedicated customers have left the vBulletin community by now. Thank you, Internet Brands.

For one of my projects it is difficult (due to several reasons) to switch to Invision, so this project will run on the excellent vBulletin 3.8 (produced by former Jelsoft developers) for a while. However, in 2011 I need to evolve this site and for this I need a better Blog layout (one of the very few negative points about vB 3.8) and a CMS (which we begged Jelsoft to produce for more then 7 years... imagine what would have happened to Jelsoft if they actually followed up on the CMS 5 years ago?). Anyway, I need a truly integrated package. Obviously the hugely disappointedly (on so many areas) vB 4 is no alternative, Invision in this case is no option... so I am very interested to find out if these rumors about new software from Kier Darby are true and (if true) I am curious to find out what it will contain.

Can anybody shed a light on this?

 

Hello Grover : )

I cannot tell from what you typed if you are actually using IPB at this time and are familer with it. If you are not I highley recommend renting a IPS "Hosted Community" and try it out. It comes with most addons for $10/m except for IP>Content which the 'sort of' a CMS, that is an additional $5/m. They give you the software installed on their server. Pretty good deal.

I really think you should check it out for yourself to see if you like it during actual use, the way your users actually use your forum.

If you are familer with IPB and it's products, and like them, there is no reason at all not to use them.

 

Well...

http://twitter.com/ForumScriptz/status/19376231390:

http://twitter.com/KierDarby/status/19406922860

I assume these kinds of replies from Kier Darby still mean that there is something in the works by him?

I am tired of waiting for Internet Brands to get their act together... I am afraid after yet another recent fiasco of this company that we will never ever get a trusted product and supporting company back. I mean, it's obvious by now why all respected and talented developers left... they saw this trainwreck that vBulletin has become under Internet Brands 'leadership' coming and left on time.

My company/foundation produces one of the most successful vBulletin powered websites in The Netherlands (5 million hits p/month which is huge for such a small country) and we have lost all our trust after Internet Brands took over Jelsoft.

We need a professional platform for our professional organization. Internet Brands clearly is uncapable of delivering on so many levels.

 

On his twitter today Kier says:

In response to AzhriaLilu who asks if we should all be excited too, he puts a smile.

Sounds to me like this is the day and along with others, I'm in the queue!!

 

I predict that this is the beginning of the end of vBulletin, as the leader in forum software - that's assuming it still even is.

There is no doubt in my mind, that it will take Kier and his team some time to be fully competitive with IPB and vB in terms of features, but I fully believe he will catch up quickly and then vB is toast.

You've just gotta think, that momentum wise, Kier is going to have a massive push behind him from disgruntled vBulletin users.

Bring on XenForo I say!

 

So that people don't think we're still going back and forth about this "rumor", I've created a separate continuation of this thread: http://www.adminaddict.net/forum/co...rs-new-forum-software-xenforo-6640/#post73111

Just for the sake of organization, I'm closing this thread. Please continue the discussion in the new thread.