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Fenris
Joined: Sep 25, 2007
Posts: 13
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 Posted: Sun Jan 27, 2008 3:01 pm Post subject: Site funding |
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| hi - just wondering how the site funds itself? i don't see ads (unless you use our e-mail address for spam). |
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MaBi
Site Admin
Joined: Jan 01, 2006
Posts: 956
Location: Italy
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| Posted: Sun Jan 27, 2008 3:12 pm Post subject: |
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| No, I don't use your emails for spam. And I hate ads, so I doubt I will ever resort to that kind of funding. Currently the site is on a shared hosting service which is cheap enough that I can afford to pay for it. |
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Fenris
Joined: Sep 25, 2007
Posts: 13
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| Posted: Sun Jan 27, 2008 3:35 pm Post subject: |
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| i'm asking because i see Mykerinos being beta tested. is this site a privately funded venture? how can you support additional game development? |
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MaBi
Site Admin
Joined: Jan 01, 2006
Posts: 956
Location: Italy
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| Posted: Sun Jan 27, 2008 3:55 pm Post subject: |
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| This site is not a venture, it's my hobby. I develop the games in my spare time because.. well.. I like boardgames and I like to code software, so I'm just combining two of my favorites hobbies. |
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Fenris
Joined: Sep 25, 2007
Posts: 13
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| Posted: Sun Jan 27, 2008 4:11 pm Post subject: |
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| that's awesome. a while back i had the idea of offering online version of popular board games but i couldn't figure out how to recoup my development money or get the money for maintenance and additional development. i'm in business development which is why I was curious about the funding. one last question: do you have to get permission from the board game companies to code their games? do they ask for royalties? if they don't i'm suprised that they don't make you put some sort of ad to support their mission. |
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MaBi
Site Admin
Joined: Jan 01, 2006
Posts: 956
Location: Italy
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| Posted: Sun Jan 27, 2008 4:49 pm Post subject: |
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| Fenris wrote: | | that's awesome. a while back i had the idea of offering online version of popular board games but i couldn't figure out how to recoup my development money or get the money for maintenance and additional development. |
Yes, I'm sure there is no market for play-by-web boardgames, at least not the boardgames that interest me (let's call them 'designer games'). The game industry itself is just a very small niche market and the online players are a tiny fraction of that. There could never be enough money to pay the countless hours of development that a professional site would require.
| Fenris wrote: | | do you have to get permission from the board game companies to code their games? |
Yes, of course, I ask for permission to the publisher, the designer and the author of the graphics.
| Fenris wrote: | | do they ask for royalties? |
Of course not, royalties of what? I'm not earning anything form this site, on the contrary, I'm spending my own money for hosting and volunteering development time worth thousands of dollars. It would be nice if the companies would share some of the costs :), but I don't demand anything. I just ask permission for a non commercial implementation of their games.
Some companies and authors see this as a form of promotion of their games, and are more than willing to have their games available for online play. Others have a different opinion and don't grant their permission, and in this case I just pass on to another game. |
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Fenris
Joined: Sep 25, 2007
Posts: 13
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| Posted: Sun Jan 27, 2008 5:09 pm Post subject: |
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facinating. i'm really quite astonished that you have the time and money to fund an operation like this one. i'm a systems integrator at Lockheed Martin which is how I know that this operation is no small feat. i just never imagined that your answer to my original question was that you do the work yourself.
i would like to add you to my linkedin.com contacts - or at the very least get your personal e-mail address to keep you mind if I have any software questions or side work (i'm not a spammer). i'm always interested in getting to know more about creative people I come across. thanks for taking the time to answer my questions. |
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MaBi
Site Admin
Joined: Jan 01, 2006
Posts: 956
Location: Italy
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| Posted: Sun Jan 27, 2008 6:11 pm Post subject: |
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| Fenris wrote: | | facinating. i'm really quite astonished that you have the time and money to fund an operation like this one. |
As far as I know, it's the same for most of the other play-by-web sites (spielbyweb.com, ludagora.net, yucata.de and a few others). The only difference is that usually they have more people involved in the development, and they accept donations to pay hosting expenses (but probably they run on dedicated servers so the cost is much higher than mine, I couldn't afford a dedicated server). |
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spearjr
Joined: Feb 02, 2006
Posts: 42
Location: St. Joseph, MI
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| Posted: Tue Feb 05, 2008 9:01 pm Post subject: |
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| Anytime you make a change in policy to allow donations to recoup your costs, just post, I'm sure the donations will come in happily. (Me included.) |
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Wernazuma
Joined: Feb 18, 2006
Posts: 19
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| Posted: Sat Feb 09, 2008 8:25 am Post subject: |
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MaBiWeb would be the very first website I'd fund.
Your work is awesome, and while I'm all for the policy to let everyone use every feature for free, and I'm glad you don't spam your site with ads like others, I think it would be just fair to let us support you a bit - even if your costs are low, and you love to do what you do. |
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Schuyler
Joined: Aug 21, 2006
Posts: 54
Location: Albuquerque, New Mexico, USA
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| Posted: Tue May 20, 2008 3:41 pm Post subject: |
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| I'd simply like to say thank you for a great site! :D |
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ontnagent
Joined: Feb 24, 2006
Posts: 22
Location: brighton, england
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| Posted: Fri Jun 06, 2008 11:27 pm Post subject: |
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If you would want to give donations too having playing since you started. I still offer my web development services for PHP or HTML if required.
http://tristanbailey.blogspot.com/ |
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Gordon
Joined: Jan 16, 2009
Posts: 2
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| Posted: Fri Oct 16, 2009 5:21 pm Post subject: |
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| I'd pay. This is a fantastic site and you should be very proud of what you have done. |
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