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May 13, 2004
As of 4am PDT this morning, Movable Type sucks (As of Noon, they suck less)
| Updates: - 6A released new license protocols today, AND clarified a lot of questions, like "what constitutes a weblog," which is of some concern for those of us who use multiple "weblogs" to run 1 personal website.
The "blogosphere" is speaking, and | |
This turning out to be a stellar example of how blogs can connect you with your customers - and it's happening right now in front of us!
I was trolling around the MT Beta Blog this morning and found this message:
This morning at 4am PDT, Six Apart is releasing Movable Type 3.0D, the developer edition of 3.0. This marks the first fully-public release of Movable Type 3.0 and along with it, a pricing scheme that makes it easy for people to do business with us, and a new set of licenses that are more permissive than our legacy license.
I personally want you to know that we all really appreciate your help in working the kinks out of this release, and we're also grateful for you patience-myself in particular. In spite of its significant bumps, this was a very valuable beta test, and we went through several hundred bug reports in the past month and a half....
My first reaction was, WTF, you must be kidding, I've just done a bunch of Alpha/Beta crap for fun...and now, WTF? After thinking about it some more, I've progressed in my thinking to WTFF... Les Jenkins was one of the first to start ranting in the MT forums, but is you really want a glimpse at rage, check out the trackbacks to Mena's post on SixApart's site!
On the MT Forums, someone tries to clarify the situation; things are not looking any better:
I think that Six Appart is abusing us by providing MovableType 3.0D with such licenses.
The previous licenses where not at all limiting the number of weblogs nor of authors.
http://www.movabletype.org/download.shtml
http://www.movabletype.org/commercial_download.shtml
With the Movable Type Free you can not have more than 1 author and three weblogs !
If you already passed trough this limit with MT 2.6x you just can't update for free !
More over, if you already have over 20 authors and 15 weblogs you won't be able to update at all, even by paying !
Because of the Commercial License which is limiting to 20 authors and 15 weblogs.
MovableType is now TypePad proof.
I'm requesting suppression of the limitations to the numbers of authors and weblogs for all the licenses and for the Free version.
Why such griping? Have a look @ the new pricing structure.
So, almost needless to say, I'm pretty pissed off (me writing in on forums):
Wow, what an announcement to be hit with. I've been doing Alpha & Beta testing for quite a while & feel a bit used to get this message today.
I already have 11 weblogs, albeit with one author, I use different "weblogs" as content areas of my personal site. Basically, I'm pretty much screwed and will be stuck on a Beta version forever, because I can't update with these new license requirements.
Needless to say, if this stuff sticks, and it is what it appears, it could go down as a case history on how to lose loyal fans for life in record time!
More on this crap:
- Mena's rant on why this is a good idea...
- Derek on "Why it Looks Like He'll Be Dumping MovableType Soon"
- Movable Type RIP?
- MovableType 3.0 released,And well... what the hell? No really, what the hell?
- Movable Shite - drunkenmonkeys.org
Alternatives to MT:
As of Noon CDT, the trackbacks on Mena's post are no longer visible and return only the message [an error occurred while processing this directive]. No shit I say, there certainly was an error in this directive!
I've noticed for some time that the 6A gang are quite good at coding, but they aren't too bright in other areas. How do you have a pricing structure that HAS AN UPPER LIMIT to the amount of authors/weblogs??
And you forgot to mention that the fine print says that the licenses are for SINGLE CPU machines. Most hosting facilities are big UNIX boxen, usually with 2 or more CPUs. Double the CPU, double the license fee?? Who knows? I feel sorry for people who are hosted on Sun E series hardware, as they usually have *at least* 4 CPUs
Asshats.
I've heard good things about Wordpress - seems to be the most "MT like" of the open source alternatives.
Personally, I like Blosxom and have successfully installed on a test blog in the past. However, it does require a high geek factor and is not a viable solution for most.
The CPU limit is ridiculous. I'll bet 90% of their user base doesn't even know (nor should they care) how many CPU's are on the host machine.
Seems the Trackbacks on Mena's comments are off the air and also the support site is off the air.
There's no upper limit. Check out the sidebar under "Need something else?"...
Dana, that "new tier" of licenses isn't actually new. If you clicked on the "help me pick a license" link earlier this morning, that's the same info you got, just not in the same fashion. As of right now (2:20PM EDT) they haven't changed the prices at all, they've only changed the front page to show all the options.
Duly noted...you are correct on that. We all should have been so diligent to check that out. Such an ignorant bastard I was...
(I apologize if this comment comes through twice but the first time it didn't seem to take.)
Dana, the pricing tier you note isn't new. That's the same info they've had on the site all day, just now they've put it up front (presumably to get people to stop quoting the $700 commercial license price as being needed for more authors than the basic personal license allowed). Before, you could only see it if you used the "help me pick a license" link.
Going through the license selector tool though steers you to the $69 personal license, with no mention of a free alternative. That price point is way too high for the general hobbyist blogger.
Personally, I won't pay $69 - and I've got over 1000 entries on my blog. If the free version will meet my needs, great. Otherwise I'll be migrating to an open source solution.
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