16 replies to this topic 2 votes

[+remixedcat]

Please note... anyone can add any suggestions to them as well here....

I have been a fan of Stardock since 2000. I have really liked thier products and company.....

PLEASE NOTE!!! I AM NOT GOING TO DISCUSS THE LAWSUIT IN HERE DO NOT UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES BRING THAT UP!

I am aware that they own 40% of this site... I am not afraid, however to call them out on a few things...

First of all I am in love with Fences. It has kept my desktop neat since 2010. It's been an amazing piece of software to tons of people.



I just found out today that it isn't free anymore. That kinda makes me mad. I know that you work hard on your software and all that.... but you had it free all this time and you seem to be doing fine financially....
so why did you do it? I hope that there is a good reason.

I know that you now have the "Portal" feature where you can turn a fence into a file manager window, however was that really necessary? Could you have stuck that in the pro version? That seems like more of a pro feature to me.

I guess everyone's gonna stick with the old version as long as they can.....


I also hear of the start8 thing as well.... again, the same.....

why why why?

[Cute James]

I think you may have forgotten to include the 'suggestions' part of the message...

[+Brando212]

i don't understand why either

the Free version gave you the basic features that made it a nice app, while the Pro version also gave you a bunch of nice bonus features

it was a great system they had going on, why change it

and why change Start8 to pay-for when you had already promised to keep it free, that's just bad business practice

[+remixedcat]

The suggestion was to have the portal features, on the pro version and leave the free version alone

[+jamieakers]

I'm honestly not trying to flame-bait here, but I honestly had no idea Stardock were still in existence. I thought they closed their doors after WindowBlinds for XP. My suggestion would be to invest in some marketing as I can't imagine I'm the only person who think they've disappeared into the abyss.

[+remixedcat]

That's fine.... Many don't think they exist anymore... and thanks to people like you coming out and saying this... might help further thier need to improve and realize that if this is how people hear of stardock again... making a bad decision.... that ...will hurt them even further.

This is not just about 10 bucks... I have no problem at all paying for it....

It's about changing your mind and flip flopping on things... like the start 8 thing.... not about money.... it's about emotions... You can't expect people to accept being jerked around like this....

I'm sure that there may be alternatives popping up soon and rivaling your features now....

[Arceles]

remixedcat, on 10 October 2012 - 09:23, said:

That's fine.... Many don't think they exist anymore... and thanks to people like you coming out and saying this... might help further thier need to improve and realize that if this is how people hear of stardock again... making a bad decision.... that ...will hurt them even further.

This is not just about 10 bucks... I have no problem at all paying for it....

It's about changing your mind and flip flopping on things... like the start 8 thing.... not about money.... it's about emotions... You can't expect people to accept being jerked around like this....

I'm sure that there may be alternatives popping up soon and rivaling your features now....

Fences is neat... but I've found far more useful this app:

http://xwidgetsoft.d...-7-31-287497352

[+remixedcat]

Wow! That's nice. Thanks Arceles!

[InsaneNutter]

Its a shame there is no free version any more, same with Start 8. However I can understand why this has been done.

I have used ObjectDock 1.90 since 2007 and it does everything i want. I have never felt the need to upgrade to the paid version. I can see that happening with Start 8 / Fences too, people are not going to pay if a free version exists that does everything the user wants.

At the end of the day nothing stops you from keeping the older free version, however if people want updates and new features i guess that person need to decide if its worth paying for a more updated version.

Arceles, on 10 October 2012 - 09:30, said:

Fences is neat... but I've found far more useful this app:

http://xwidgetsoft.d...-7-31-287497352

I don't like desktop icons, however that does look pretty awesome!

[+remixedcat]

Stardock makes enough with Windowblinds and thier games don't they? or have sales went down so they have to find new ways to keep profits up?

[Deranged]

Well, they are giving away Fallen Enchantress to a lot of people who bought Elemental before a certain date, so there is that. But I imagine the number of converts from Free to Pro was just not high enough to make the old system worthwhile.

You might get a direct answer though, since they're obviously around here.

[InsaneNutter]

I couldn't honestly say having never looked at Stardocks books, as someone else mentioned you dont really hear about Stardock a lot, so who knows?

I agree i would like the apps to remain free, however at the end of the day i can understand why this is not the case.

[Deranged]

InsaneNutter, on 10 October 2012 - 09:52, said:

I couldn't honestly say having never looked at Stardocks books, as someone else mentioned you dont really hear about Stardock a lot, so who knows?

I agree i would like the apps to remain free, however at the end of the day i can understand why this is not the case.

they have books?

[HawkMan]

remixedcat, on 10 October 2012 - 09:45, said:

Stardock makes enough with Windowblinds and thier games don't they? or have sales went down so they have to find new ways to keep profits up?

Good business practice, sell one app and spend thousands of man hours on other and give them away. I'm guessing you don't run a business ?

My guess why they decided to charge for fences is that noone bought the pro version, and thus that project ended up going very red in the budget. So something had to be done.

As for start 8. Personally I don't use it as I find it completely necessary replicating functions in win8 that already work better. But they actually did promise to keep it free. I suspect something of the same happened. The app got a lot more expensive tomake and maintain than they first expected, and economically, they had to charge for it.

[+remixedcat]

Well the portal thing prolly would have gotten people to buy the pro version alone.... so they should have just added that to the pro version...


Thing is they got rid of thier gateway drug... the thing that gets people hooked on them...

I was very close to buying start 8 BTW.... but after they did this.... that kinda makes me put that off till I find out more about the reasoning behind this....