[username0001]

Again, I apologize.

Posted from my CrackBerry at wapforums.crackberry.com

[LittleRedDot]

I personally stick with what I originally said. Free = free, premium = pay. No need to change. What about some sort of ranking system as to what users think about each theme. Then the quality can be assessed by simply looking at the rating the theme has gained

You see no need for change, but let me ask you this. If "premium" was changed to "pay", would that throw you off or affect you in any way? I'm goint to wager NO. But making that simple change would positively affect a bunch of people, so why not support the change. That's what I'm finding so hard to understand with some of the responses. Here we have a few people claiming a problem, but the solution/s are so simple and won't affect anyone who is happy with the current system.

A ranking system is a good idea, but it doesn"t address the issue of pople associating "premium" with higher value. You don't have to agree to respect the fact that someone else is having a problem with it.

[LittleRedDot]

If you perceive a problem, come back to us with a description and a few examples if it helps. Ideally propose a few practical solutions - not including banning Premium Themes or going on strike, we've heard those already.

Isn't exactly what we just did?

[LittleRedDot]

Does CB get any cut of the software sold on this site? Do they have a stake in the "premium" themes over the free ones? Would it hurt them financially to take steps to fix the issue, if it means that the "premium" themes can no longer continue to bait and switch?

[mrtolles]

The topic was consolidated into the forum which traditionally hosts forum structure and rules discussion topics, and a poll added to make it manageable. The other threads originally created all have a pointer to this thread. There was No Way we could have a meaningful debate in the original distributed format - remember the abuse which occurred in the Free Themes Creators' monthly competition with widespread vote rigging and bumping? Now imagine that spread over multiple forums.



How to win friends and influence people. Just insult the moderators while you're at it.

I had a relevant comment and feel that pushing the issue back here was sweeping it under the rug. I do not see where me telling the mods hey, we are talking to you is an insult and well, pkcable did not seam to take it as an insult? He was open to the idea. And well, what does a monthly competition have to do with this? That competition was posted in IRRELEVANT forums was the issue. EXACTLY the issue. You guys moved this here where in a IRRELEVANT forum after it was posted in all the relevant forums.



LittleRedDot, YES, crackberry gets a cut of themes/apps sold in the stores.

[LittleRedDot]

That I did not know. I think we need to hear from some moderators concerning their view of the issues raised, and what they propose, if anything, to do about it.

[Branta]

That I did not know. I think we need to hear from some moderators concerning their view of the issues raised, and what they propose, if anything, to do about it.

We propose to allow the community to express their views about the OP's suggestion, without the moderators attempting to influence the outcome of the debate. That is why I promoted one thread for shared discussion, added a poll, and added a link to the other identical posts originally made in each forum. It simply wouldn't work to have multiple discussions in different forums.

[pkcable]

FTR the threads WERE left in the other forums, they were just closed and a pointer was put in each one pointing to this thread. This is the Forum where site policy is discussed. And we are discussing it. I for one appreciate everything that has been said. Also Kevin and the Forum Managers are monitoring this thread, and are in the process of revamping the Forum rules. Your concerns are NOT falling on deaf ears.

[Snarfler]

brook,

just ignore those that try to threadjack the discussion over how many duplicate posts or what forum it's in, or not using a descriptive thread title. it happens.

As a consumer of free themes, thanks for making free themes. Already voted yes, but one thing I didn't really understand. You said

This Crackberry policy has put themers who post free themes at a major disadvantage.

On the surface, this doesn't seem like much of an issue. I mean, if the terminology is causing fewer people to download free themes, the free themes are free, so it's not like you're losing money over it. Can you better explain how the premium vs. pay terminology hurts makers of free themes?

[username0001]

I do not make themes BUT I do download LOTS of free themes from CB.

This got started because I noticed on several different theme forums that users were posting that Premium themes were superior in quality and had more support, etc. And then I noticed that users were responding to say "oh, I didn't know that" and "I will go purchases so and so's theme now", etc. So, naively I thought "hey let's just ask CB to change the name from Premium to Pay".

It is the word premium that is the issue for me. If you download any free software, its just that 'free'. If you get that company's 'premium' software you pay for it and it always has more options, perks, etc. that are included with the fee.

I did a random check of 50 different software apps (finance, weather, music, etc) that had a free version and a premium version. The premium version always had the above mentioned perks/options.

Themes are not like this. Everyone uses the exact same theme software to build the themes. Support can be offered with free or pay themes and it depends on the theme builder. What the theme has in it and what bells and whistles it offers depends on the builder, not whether it is pay or free.

Free theme builders are put at an immediate disadvantage because their themes are immediately labeled as free vs. the Premium ones - and the above comments support this I believe.

And I don't know exactly what the answer is, but I do believe that there is an issue and I felt that asking all the CB users who use/make/download themes would be the best audience.

[Collins521]

Ok, so I have stayed out of a lot of issues within the past few months but there are a few points that people are complaining about that rub me wrong. Ok yes CB gets a cut from the premium...oh I'm sorry "pay" themes that are sold through the Mobihand store (company different than CB). If CB didn't get a cut from places how would this site still be running? I'm sure Kevin along with other individuals that run the site can't pay for the servers and such to keep the site going without any money coming in. What would be the point in that?

Yes I'm sure it would be in a perfect world that people would do everything for free for everyone but a lot of the moderation team as well as the owners go through many hours of time to keep the site going and keeping a clean environment for the BlackBerry user to be able to get resources (information as well as apps, themes, etc) on their own. Now you can't tell me any of the individuals that seem to want to bring up the issue about CB being partial to the "premium/paid" themes that they work for free? I mean come on let's be realistic here. Sure there are some free themes that are great and rank right up there with the "premium" themes...there are also "premium" themes that shouldn't be there and should be free in some people's opinions. The key word for all of this debate is the "opinion" of the user.

People these forums are for everyone enjoyment but when groups of people get on here and bash other people for what they want to do then it brings down the forums as a whole. CB is one of the largest BB communities around and has a great group of people that frequent all of the sections and has a wealth of knowledge. Why bring down the community with little arguments here?

It all comes down to the owner & moderation team of the forums...cause quite frankly the users don't run the forums. Yes they have a influence of how and what should be added but really if a small group of users leave the site I'm sure the site won't be that hurt by the loss of those small group, same goes with a corporate world. A company's main objective is a profitable business no matter what it takes.

[usualsuspec#CB]

Can someone honestly tell why this is an issue? With all the problems in this world, a week long discussion ensues about what is premium versus pay? What a joke! If you don't like a premium themes, just ignore it!

Mr Tolles: didn't you and others leave CB and create your own blogs because CB was so unfair? I find it hypocritical that this same group is still in the middle of a fight over themes but come to CB when they want to divert traffic to their own sites (just like you claim pay themers do)!

Give the mods a break, they do a thankless job here and have to deal with this crap, including mine on occasions

Posted from my CrackBerry at wapforums.crackberry.com

[shank69xo]

Did not mean to offend, just letting you know about the cross posting rule. Guess I could have been a LITTLE nicer. At least I didn't whack you with my mod stick! Anyways like I said it's worthy of being discussed.

A whack with the mod stick, sorry guys, but I'm drunk and that is just some funny *** **** right there. Seriously though, I care neither way. We got alot of "Premium" free themes here, I could care less what they're named as long as they look good.

[LittleRedDot]

Mr Tolles: didn't you and others leave CB and create your own blogs because CB was so unfair? I find it hypocritical that this same group is still in the middle of a fight over themes but come to CB when they want to divert traffic to their own sites (just like you claim pay themers do)!

This is another good point. If the "free" theme creators are jockying to change the rules just so the links to their "pay" site get more traffic, then that taints their efforts.

On the surface, this doesn't seem like much of an issue. I mean, if the terminology is causing fewer people to download free themes, the free themes are free, so it's not like you're losing money over it. Can you better explain how the premium vs. pay terminology hurts makers of free themes?

This is a good point too. But I think the issue isn't about money. These developers make these themes and post them here because they want to share them. They don't want to post a theme and get no replies and no downloads. It may not be about money, but it can certainly sting their pride. Plus these developers that offer free themes want us to have the best theme possible, they want us to be happy. They don't want their themes to seem like a "downgrade" from the ones that cost money. And in many cases the free themes are built to a higher quality as the pay themes.

I knoe on the surface that this issue seems slight, and maybe a little hard to understand. But seriously, isn't it worth the small amount of effort it would take to change the name from "premium" to "pay"? No one would be affected negatively, but these developers would be happy. The solution is soo simple.

[Branta]

Can someone honestly tell why this is an issue? With all the problems in this world, a week long discussion ensues about what is premium versus pay? What a joke! If you don't like a premium themes, just ignore it!

That is not an option for an insignificant minority of activists who aim to force all themes on CB to be non-pay. They will continue to disrupt forums, and harass the site and premium theme makers for as long as we host paid themes. We are stronger, and will continue to support both free and paid themes to give regular members the choice they want.

An attempted disruption and thread hijack has been removed without changing the debate about thread titles. The location of this thread is irrelevant... 5 pages of posts in a few days suggests it is adequately visible to anyone with enough intelligence to use our forums.

[pkcable]

A whack with the mod stick, sorry guys, but I'm drunk and that is just some funny *** **** right there. Seriously though, I care neither way. We got alot of "Premium" free themes here, I could care less what they're named as long as they look good.

Once and a while I come out with a good one.

[Collins521]

This is another good point. If the "free" theme creators are jockying to change the rules just so the links to their "pay" site get more traffic, then that taints their efforts.

The group that is trying to change this has no "pay" themes to offer, they only offer free themes, but since they don't get as much hype as they feel then they want something to change.

This is a good point too. But I think the issue isn't about money. These developers make these themes and post them here because they want to share them. They don't want to post a theme and get no replies and no downloads. It may not be about money, but it can certainly sting their pride. Plus these developers that offer free themes want us to have the best theme possible, they want us to be happy. They don't want their themes to seem like a "downgrade" from the ones that cost money. And in many cases the free themes are built to a higher quality as the pay themes.

I knoe on the surface that this issue seems slight, and maybe a little hard to understand. But seriously, isn't it worth the small amount of effort it would take to change the name from "premium" to "pay"? No one would be affected negatively, but these developers would be happy. The solution is soo simple.

Again the "opinion" is to the user on what they feel if the free themes are more of a higher quality than paid themes not the whole forum itself. I myself have released many free themes as well as "paid" themes and I know how it is when you don't get a lot of responses from a free theme, as well as a paid theme cause quite frankly there are many times that a user doesn't post that their opinion on the theme. My paid themes I can post here cause they fall under the rules but the free themes that I make I can't post here due to the rules of pulling traffic away from the site. Do I sit here and complain and make threads about how things should change on how I feel it should be?! Nope I go along with it and be happy with it. In fact there was a thread in the Storm section on a free theme that MANY users downloaded and loved but I didn't get hardly any responses from CB users since I couldn't post the thread. It's the fact of forums people, come on, really this is a mute point in the whole picture of the forums.

[CrackBerry Kevin]

Just saw this thread.. wow. Kudos to the passion. I love it. There's one thing that makes for a great community... healthy conflict! If everybody agreed on everything all the time these forums would be boring.

Now, as for the topic at hand... having started this site, I honestly can't even remember exactly when/how we started using the "premium" verbage. I don't think I invented it. Maybe I did and it just became standard use from there? I'm pretty sure that when we started blogging about themes, we needed a way to differentiate free vs. not free for blog post titles, and premium was the word we started using (flows a bit nicer - "Premium BlackBerry Theme for Curve 8320" vs. "Pay Theme for BlackBerry Curve 8320") and it sort of just became standard for many of us to say free or premium and that carried through to the forums. I honestly can't remember if I saw this termed used elsewhere, or if it's just the term I came up with... lol. Usage wise, whether we say pay theme, premium theme, not free theme, etc. it all means the same to me.

So personally I have no objection to changing it, but at the same time I don't really see why we need to since it's sort of become the standard that we have used here on the site for so long now. I think most people get that free means it doesn't cost anything, while premium means it costs money (you pay a premium for it). I think everybody knows you can find some amazing free themes by amazing developers who are very responsive, and you can also find some not so great themes that cost money from developers who aren't not responsive enough and you find everything else as well. Great themes that cost a bit, not great themes that are free. No matter what you'll have to look around and find feedback to figure out which you want and like.

MAYBE the thing to do there is just Create a second themes forum... Call one forum FREE THEMES and the other PAY THEMES. then we'll put the device sub forums into each one. then the forum threads don't even have to say FREE or PAY as you'll know which forum you're browsing.

Re: forum policies. As I have written on some other threads, I'm actually in the process of going through them and re-writing them so they're more clear and up to date and more targeted. Right now they're a little too dang long and too dang detailed. In some areas they need to be, others not so much. So stay tuned for that. I think it's something everybody will like and appreciate.

anyways.. gotta jet for christmas stuff. love the passion here, but hate to see ppl stressing on stuff. i just look for the logical win/wins. if there's something we can do better we'll try and make it happen.

K

[username0001]

I think the idea of the Pay Forum and Free Forum is a great idea! I think this may tbe the way to go to fix some of the issues that many have brought up and evidently some issues that have been festering long before I ever even logged on to CB.

When I started this thread I did not realize that it was going to get this out of hand

BUT - I do like the discussion because most of it actually has been very informative and helpful. There have been good debates going on from both sides, which is always a good thing.

I do hope that we can in the end maybe just agree to disagree, but come up with some sort of compromise. The seperate forums may just be the answer

Kevin- thank you for taking the time to read our grass roots thread and offering to at least think about some alternatives.

[LittleRedDot]

MAYBE the thing to do there is just Create a second themes forum... Call one forum FREE THEMES and the other PAY THEMES. then we'll put the device sub forums into each one. then the forum threads don't even have to say FREE or PAY as you'll know which forum you're browsing.

Now that's a **** of an idea. I knew the solution would be simple enough to satisfy both sides.

[Collins521]

Personally having come from a forums that has the free and paid themes separated, I don't particularly care for it, I like it all grouped together so I can see what the latest themes are no matter what the cost. I like the forums as they are and think it works just fine

[username0001]

That is not an option for an insignificant minority of activists who aim to force all themes on CB to be non-pay. They will continue to disrupt forums, and harass the site and premium theme makers for as long as we host paid themes. We are stronger, and will continue to support both free and paid themes to give regular members the choice they want.

An attempted disruption and thread hijack has been removed without changing the debate about thread titles. The location of this thread is irrelevant... 5 pages of posts in a few days suggests it is adequately visible to anyone with enough intelligence to use our forums.

I just wanted to make sure that I am not lumped in with the "activists" on this one

I am hoping that this thread will allow for changes to the titles of the forums where the themes are posted because I do think that it will be better for the users who are looking for themes and in reality easier for themers because there is no ambiguity about where their themes need to be posted.

BUT I am in no way advocating for all themes to be free!! If a themer can make $$ by selling their themes and that is what they choose to do then by all means do so and in the same turn if a themer wants to offer theirs for free then go right ahead.

The thread I started is just to lobby to change how and where themes are posted, that's it.

[Snarfler]

What about donationware themes? Not really free, not really pay. might better to just stick to the thread title rules, change premium to pay and leave forum divisions as is. Or just post a sticky in the forum sections that defines premium as indicating cost only, that assigning quality assumptions to the word "premium" is invalid at CB, and move on.

Posted from my CrackBerry at wapforums.crackberry.com

[username0001]

Just wanted to add some info. I went to appworld today to look for a new theme and found 394! and you can choose if you want to look for "paid" themes or "free" themes or "free and paid" both. Not to dismiss what other's have posted, but even at blackberry they are not using "premium" to indicate a pay theme.

[CrackBerry Kevin]

What about donationware themes? Not really free, not really pay. might better to just stick to the thread title rules, change premium to pay and leave forum divisions as is. Or just post a sticky in the forum sections that defines premium as indicating cost only, that assigning quality assumptions to the word "premium" is invalid at CB, and move on.

Posted from my CrackBerry at wapforums.crackberry.com

i think free would include donationware.. as it's free initially at time of download.

thinking more and more that doing a Free Themes and Paid Themes forum will be the way to go. it's the most user friendly from the point of view of knowing what you're getting/seeing as your browse. though maybe not. errg. i don't midn the switch from Premium to Paid though. will likely make that happen soon. working on a bunch of change-ups at once and will roll them out in one shot.

stay tuned. K