Jelsoft a little stuck on themselves?

It is the same insult that Internet Brands has told vbulletin customers. We dare you to switch to another forum. We know you invested a great amount of time and money invested in your vbulletin sites. Scream all you want now, throw a tantrum, moan about customer service - you are still crawling back to us and with your credit card out.

FYI there is another solution - dont bother upgrading at all and change to another forum software if it works for you. vb4 suite does less than vb3 since i have tons of great modules that work perfectly. we have integrated another cms and community software. why do i need to blow tons of time and money to upgrade all the work i've done for my forums, which work perfectly as forums right now? For our new communities we are using another product which is far easier to integrate than vbulletin and done. Internet Brands has helped us make that decision simple.

 

I agree but there is a limit to everything.

I've seen people make the remark that vB is acting just like teenagers when a lot of the comments here made by the vB customers are JUST like little 2 yr old kids who do not get it their way.

 

Customers can act that way if they want to, they are the ones with the cash. The company can't though.

That aside, I don't think many people have acted in this way, people are just fed up at being ripped off and treated like numbers on a balance sheet. It's such a contrast from the way we used to be treated that people are understandably kicking off - me included.

 

I disagree, There's never a limit. If your customerbase is unhappy, And not being responded to with the appropriate information then they will take desperate measures to be heard.

You can't say there is a limit just as much as I can't if i get tired of hearing the concerns. Bare in mind, the customerbase is huge for vbulletin, so everyone will not show their concerns in a day or week but span months because they have no reason to vsit the official site. Alot of owners don't upgrade for months which by then they have lost out on their presale discount and the complaints are will still come in.

This will not be over in a day. Again, the customer base is huge and now even the loyal members are complaining who have untill now praised the management and software that they used for the past 9 5 whatever years.

 

I hate to sound so serious but if we all use a little common sense then i think we can understand both parties. both parties being the customers who remain puppet stringed tied and the people who will want those hard hitting questions answered and actions taken.

I don't care what happens at vbulletin solutions I gave up on it months ago but people have a right to speak and show concern which I have always stood by for the years I've been with vbulletin. Heck, at IPB the community was never like this, the good ole days.

 

You had a choice to upgrade now or upgrade later, still had the choice. As I said, there is a limit to everything, and stooping to a child level just because you have money is foolish and idiotic in my opinion.

Edit: Because of the difference in opinions, I really see this thread going nowhere, more people complaining, so here i /end my argument.

Quite a pitty that people here JUST joined to [strike]argue[/strike] discuss and not enjoy what AA has as content.

 

I understand opinions can be made, but if a company refuses to change, then maybe the customers will have to. Again, I've only owned a vB license for less than a week, and never gave a flip before. But if IB is truly as bad as you say they are, and they still aren't doing anything to change, then you really should rethink if you want to keep funding them.

I'm done. Pick this apart as much as you can.

 

I didn't have the choice at all, because upgrading the license later is too expensive for me. I only just managed the $130 price, mine is a hobby board not a business, but they want rid of us hobby boards anyway.

So what they have achieved is making that 4130 the last money I ever have to spend with the company, because I won't be upgrading to 4.0. I only spent that because I had a leased license and it would have expired in February otherwise. Now I need never pay them another penny, AND I will still get updates until they EOL 3.8.

It didn't have to be like that. They could have carried on getting regular money from me, even under the new scheme, but they had to go on treating my like an idiot before finally mocking me on their forum. Who's being childish here? Certainly not me!

 

That solution actually has a few flaws:
Firstly, 3.x will inevitably become outdated. Just look at all the problems with php 5.3 and 3.x, and picture what php6 is going to be like. I can only imagine the hell that's going to cause.

Secondly, that doesn't work for leased licenses. I, myself have my last leased license up in December, and I'm busting ass to get something converted just so I can move one of my owned licenses to use there, but still, that's more time and money out the window.

The problem is this, realistically:
The playing field is incredibly small. Right now there are only two professional (if you can still consider vB professional) solutions for forum hosting and communities. IB/vB and IPB. Both are rather flawed.

You can only throw money at a problem and hope it gets solved for so long. Eventually, you have to look at reality and realize it aint happening.

 

This comment is insulting to the intelligence. So I have a choice to (a) upgrade now to vBulletin 4 suite deluxe for only $2,000 and get a free 2001 Volskwagon Beetle (which makes the entire vBulletin suite free!!!) or I can upgrade later for a meager $15 discount off the full price of the software reflecting a single digit discount. So I have 2 unacceptable choices. Considering we run several forums, we will also have to layout huge sums of cash quickly in one week to take advantage of the lesser evil. We are talking thousands of dollars. As others have suggested, one questions whether the high flying internet millionaires were even thinking or caring about the people who they expected to yank out their credit cards... and during a recession. How can you insult your customers? Choose (e) for "all of the above".

 

Looks like they are getting ready to try yet again.

However, it has the same problem as yesterday and no CSS is loading with the site. I've noticed a few things though, like there is now a link in the copyright back to vBulletin.com, I wonder if this will be mandatory now...

 

You'll worry about it later or migrate to another solution now. I didn't consider solutions other than Invision Power Board before but now I'm seeing the merits even of decent open source. With enough people using open source and these other professional forums, the developers will provide solutions, either free or third party vendors. When there is a real problem, there is always a solution for Wordpress and Joomla. Look even at drupal. I've been using another forum. Not as good as vBulletin 3 but, quite honestly, it's not that bad and is coupled with the ability to use over and over without worrying about licensing and other issues.

WHY are you using this horrible solution? The problem is you're trying to pay low budget for top notch professional. That being the case, you DEFINITELY don't want to get near the Internet Brands product. It's not meant for customers like you.

The reality is that if you want "professional" than you have to pay for it, either to a vendor for a full software solution or get something a little raw customized perfectly for your needs. Given that vbulletin is a monster to integrate with anything and the people there won't give me a peek under the hood for months so i can integrate my sites properly, i have zero incentive to stay with vbulletin. It's a horrible, sad reality but nobody there seems to have a clue or at least no direction from the top.

[Note to guys at IB reading this thread: Please delete screen names and comments after you copy and paste recommendations from professionals on this forum.]

 

Looks like its back online, but running horribly bad.Could be due to various reasons though, and perhaps not just a reflection on vB4

 

I see the CSS loading fine, although I'm not sure whether said forum is being opened again soon, as in... a few hours or minutes, or temporarily open to be put back behind a maintenance image once a bug is sorted or something.

Edit: I posted this before the last two posts were visible for me

 

Well it's up.

I actually like the look of it more than I did before after those screenshots and the leaked demo.

 

haha I win at life: http://www.vbulletin.com/forum/showthread.php?321669-First

 

Honestly, I thought the skunk was a photoshopped joke and couldn't have seriously appeared on the vBulletin official site. I thought his tail in the air represented spraying the forum with the putrid scent skunks release and which stench doesn't go a way for a very long time... how appropriate.

Great forum here. I'm finished with my comments on this topic for now and leave to the rest to discuss and back later. You all know how I feel and it's a pleasure to see many others here with a high level of experience sharing their honest opnions.

 

I have been using leased licenses for years. Why? The return at the end of the year is better (tax write offs) for one, and the initial investment is lower. Not everyone can ( or will ) just drop $200 for software.

As far as software not being "meant" for customers like me, you don't know me a bit, so keep ridiculous opinions like that to yourself. I know what I'm doing, I know how to keep business going, I've been doing so for years now, without any problems.

 

The board looks okay, but jeez... it's slow as heck. I wonder whether the slowness is due to their server being badly optimised or the product itself...