Do you make any money from it? - Page 2

Sr18

Netherlands1141 Posts

July 05 2015 08:21 GMT

#21

To be fair Torte, regardless of what the literal text of your blog says, I take away from it an entirely different underlying message. To me the blog comes off as a longwinded way to seek community approval for the eventually inevitable monetization of the project. If that is not what you want the reader to take away from your blog, you should have probably made it very clear that monetization is not an option and will simply never happen. Instead of doing that, you explicitely leave the monetization option open by saying things like: "If I do somehow decide to open up a way to support the project (my friends have been wearing me down into considering the prospect of it), I'll get the permission from selected contributors first along with a few survey questions to ensure fairness and acceptance.".

So basically you are asking the community if they will be mad at you if you decide to ask for coin. On that topic I have no input. I don't use (your) hero guides and I don't know how much of the end product is created by you instead of by others. In the end you should probably just add the donation button and see how it plays out.

edit: typo

Torte de Lini

Germany38463 Posts

July 05 2015 08:35 GMT

#22

On July 05 2015 17:21 Sr18 wrote:
To be fair Torte, regardless of what the literal text of your blog says, I take away from it an entirely different underlying message. To me the blog comes off as a longwinded way to seek community approval for the eventually inevitable monetization of the project. If that is not what you want the reader to take away from your blog, you should have probably made it very clear that monetization is not an option and will simply never happen. Instead of doing that, you explicitely leave the monetization option open by saying things like: "If I do somehow decide to open up a way to support the project (my friends have been wearing me down into considering the prospect of it), I'll get the permission from selected contributors first along with a few survey questions to ensure fairness and acceptance.".

So basically you are asking the community if they will be mad at you if you decide to ask for coin. On that topic I have no input. I don't use (your) hero guides and I don't know how much of the end product is created by you instead of by others. In the end you should probably just add the donation button and see how it plays out.

edit: typo

Yes, you're not alone as I wrote it out spontaneously because it's been building up for the past two months or so. Community approval or not, it'd be privately between contributors to get their input as I have some community approval in the past for years now.

However, I concluded in my rambling that it wouldn't solve my problem, but ultimately create obligation from it and tear myself away from what I really want to do and my own personal security.

Thanks for being forward about it. I tried to summarize it better in my edit; but it just adds to the extra weight of a long-winded text.

edit: It's a misimplication that I had set myself up for.

NeThZOR

South Africa7387 Posts

July 05 2015 08:48 GMT

#23

Blame capitalism for surfacing this greed that is a savage trait that should be characteristic of ancient human beings, not modern.

Jelissei

193 Posts

July 05 2015 11:39 GMT

#24

Please don't answer to this Shaella guy anymore. It's pretty obious that he is using you to vent.
He may have a valid opinion (or not), but that doesn't excuse such a shitty attitude.
I kind of wonder how old he is, since he clearly does not understand that organizing stuff does create value for people. Even if the stuff is not your own.

While criticizing is easy - as seen above - I wanna try to help you a little bit.

I think the main problem is that game communities have build an entire industry by themselve through mainly unpaid work (or hobby) while still living with their parents.
To now shift away from that attitude would surely alienate some people. I suppose, mostly people who don't work themselve.

A way that might help could be the creation of an app. That way the guide could still be used in-game for free and you wouldn't have a donation button, that you don't feel comfortable with.
With so many subscriptions it might be enough to only reach 1% with the app. But I'm not a numbers person. Just an idea though.

edit:
As a thought experiment:
Would people stop using the guide, if you would stop compiling it? Then it adds value. Then you deserve compensation (if through payment, donations, adds, ...).
The difficulty really is to find a way that's not alienating to yourself nor the community.

And if you don't want to receive money out of it, but want to reduce the work load, you should maybe just ask for voluntary help. If not only Shaella feels so strongly about the subject, there will be people who want to help the guide as a hobby.

Torte de Lini

Germany38463 Posts

July 05 2015 12:37 GMT

#25

On July 05 2015 20:39 Jelissei wrote:
Please don't answer to this Shaella guy anymore. It's pretty obious that he is using you to vent.
He may have a valid opinion (or not), but that doesn't excuse such a shitty attitude.
I kind of wonder how old he is, since he clearly does not understand that organizing stuff does create value for people. Even if the stuff is not your own.

While criticizing is easy - as seen above - I wanna try to help you a little bit.

I think the main problem is that game communities have build an entire industry by themselve through mainly unpaid work (or hobby) while still living with their parents.
To now shift away from that attitude would surely alienate some people. I suppose, mostly people who don't work themselve.

A way that might help could be the creation of an app. That way the guide could still be used in-game for free and you wouldn't have a donation button, that you don't feel comfortable with.
With so many subscriptions it might be enough to only reach 1% with the app. But I'm not a numbers person. Just an idea though.

edit:
As a thought experiment:
Would people stop using the guide, if you would stop compiling it? Then it adds value. Then you deserve compensation (if through payment, donations, adds, ...).
The difficulty really is to find a way that's not alienating to yourself nor the community.

And if you don't want to receive money out of it, but want to reduce the work load, you should maybe just ask for voluntary help. If not only Shaella feels so strongly about the subject, there will be people who want to help the guide as a hobby.

I agree, I welcome disagreements; just on a fair attitude/level.

Yes, I agree. I think ESEX faced similar fears and issues where they didn't want to come off as money-grubbing, but they did want to make this self-sustaining for a community that loves their work (and it is very unique and well-done).

There is actually an app out that is suppose to do what the project does: Bruce.gg. I haven't tried it out myself, but they're a very talented group of people.

The subscription number is somewhat misleading, but the only measurement I really have. It's 84 million subscriptions, but a person can subscribe to more than one guide (one per hero, so a maximum of 110). Assuming our highest subscribed guide (1.45 million), 1% is about 14,500.

If I stopped updating them, they'd lose a good chunk of subscriptions, but the core majority would stay on. That's what I'm seeing with Purge, eXplosion and Greyshark. However, as patches push forward and remake a lot of heroes; people will notice how outdated they become and soon large bulks move forward (about 2 months after a patch hits). 6.83 was a huge boost and so was 6.84 because the updates were prompt with the new builds and items.

In the end, I think I prefer the support and feedback via reminders of X guide is dated or there's Y typo over financial support. As the guides is a passion project and I still want my career.

Rainling

United States456 Posts

July 06 2015 02:10 GMT

#26

You can do whatever you like with your work. It represents your effort and nobody else is entitled to access it.

If you want to put it behind a paywall, that's fine, if you want to add a donation button, that's also fine. If you feel like putting a donation button would mislead into thinking you need the money, just add a disclaimer that says that you don't need the money.

If restricting access to your work significantly reduced the well-being of others, I might be against it. However, your guides help improve the skill of people playing an entertaining video game, not provide food for starving people. Don't sweat it, do whatever you want.

In particular I would say that adding a donation button with a disclaimer that you don't need the money is 100% harmless, as it will mislead no one and enable those with the wherewithal to support you.

intotheheart

Canada33091 Posts

July 06 2015 19:29 GMT

#27

Have you thought about handing parts of the work to someone else? This way as DotA grows, you don't have to contribute the same amount of physical hours but the same quality will exist.

QueenKK

Vatican City State16 Posts

July 08 2015 02:44 GMT

#28

I won't lie, a lot of this does have a subtext of "See community! I tried to do it for free, look, I've resisted monetization in the past" that'll come in a few months.

That said, you'd be entirely justified. I think that this is an interesting look at how community efforts often turn commercialized and how that can be good and bad. You definitely would have a strong basis to have a tip jar, but that's a slippery slope.

itsbluething

United States38 Posts

July 10 2015 17:05 GMT

#29

Just my input torte, I don't see putting a donation button as being desperate. I see it as a gauge of interest and a way for people to invest in something they enjoy. If people like your guides, they can express this by donating to you. Of course, your concern of lacking passion and being desperate for money is valid, I suppose.

TBone-

United States2309 Posts

July 10 2015 22:50 GMT

#30

On July 11 2015 02:05 itsbluething wrote:
Just my input torte, I don't see putting a donation button as being desperate. I see it as a gauge of interest and a way for people to invest in something they enjoy. If people like your guides, they can express this by donating to you. Of course, your concern of lacking passion and being desperate for money is valid, I suppose.

Donation makes it seem like a charity, a tip jar sounds more appropriate.

Corgi

United States408 Posts

July 15 2015 08:01 GMT

#31

1. You cannot put it behind a paywall. The guide system is great but it also severely lacks a bunch of features that makes it more accessible and reborn doesnt really seem to improve it greatly just yet. Putting it behind a paywall will kill whatever gains you've made while in the short term making you some money ( a small amount of it).

2. People are interested in the money because its important. Its important to have some sort of value that's tangible and the first thing that comes to mind is money. You should explain or find the value to explain to these people after you tell them no.

3. Maybe you should use pateron (even if you think its lame). Or maybe you just keep it as a hobby. People are helping you create guides only because your guides seem to be default appearance on every hero making their input accessible instead of being lost in the builds.

4. Valve could have solved this problem by creating improved official default guides and advanced ones for more variables or just improve the guide system but they have not. They don't either because of icefrog philosophy (anything is possible) or their work system sucks (nobody volunteers for it).

5. Your default guides are fine but I think any player looking for a 1 guide to rule them all per hero, your guide is lacking. It definitely doesn't cover every item for every situation. The item description and skill descriptions definitely don't cover all the best points about why X and whyY and situationally Z.

CursedRich

United Kingdom737 Posts

July 21 2015 12:38 GMT

#32

I use your guides all the time and they have been really helpful so i wanted to post a thank you torte.

Plansix

United States60190 Posts

July 22 2015 14:43 GMT

#33

I just want to put this out there: Although I value your work and the servicing it provides for new players, I cannot support you making money while the Jungle Lifestealer guide exists. I understand it’s your most popular guide, but it is also a blight on dota and you know it.

You can have my money when the guide is gone, but not a day before.

Note: + Show Spoiler +

This is for funnies, because the internet is a bad place for sarcasm.

KurtistheTurtle

United States1966 Posts

July 30 2015 21:01 GMT

#34

Hey man, I know you're thinking all hard about this and all, but have you ever thought about the people who want to give you money and you won't let them?

That's pretty rude of you. Just sayin.

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