Payware: My #1 complaint

[tyard]

Sites like Jointed Rail & RRMods have some great freeware, true, but their payware is fantastic! Not that I've used payware (I'm 16 & broke), but WHY MUST WE PAY FOR TRAINZ CONTENT!? Wasn't it enough to pay for the built-in content itself?! I mean, really! Their locomotives are some of the best looking & could certainly fill gaps in my operations-based aspiration! But I have to settle for staring at pictures of the payware content or (in Jointed Rail's case) waiting until they "retire" (discontinued) and made freeware. Who agrees that payware should be made free?

Getting back to the original post:
Would I like it if payware was free? Of course (I, like mostly anyone, would like it if a lot of things were free).
Do I think they should be made free? No, it would make no sense. For one thing, creating the items may have required time and resources that cost the creator money, in which case charging for an item is probably going to mostly just reimburse them (for example, 3ds Max can cost hundreds if not thousands of dollars for older versions).
Now, let's even say that a creator is just making a model in their free time, without really paying for any resources (using freely available drawings and software), because they like to. Even in this case there really isn't any reason they should make it free. They put the time into it because they wanted the model. If they so choose to release it, why shouldn't they make some cash on it? Sure, some people (even in the first category I mentioned above) make their items freeware, and that's nice of them, however that doesn't make them better people then the payware modellers. Perhaps they would make their items payware, but they just don't want to deal with setting up an online store, or they just flat out don't care as much.

In short, payware isn't going anywhere, and there is nothing wrong with it. Anything that sells well as payware will be well worth the money. Plus, RRMods and JR, to use your examples, both have freeware and both have great sales... JR even retires older payware into Freeware! Besides, wouldn't you rather it exist and be payware, then not exist at all? At least you can look in awe at it if it's there, and maybe build up the $5-10 for it!

Just my (probably more than) 2 cents

tyard

 

[wholbr]

Hi Everybody.
Apologies for bumping this posting from a few pages back, but it was a response my posting where I advised that I had been looking for a person to work alongside of me undertaking workplace route cause accident investigation for the last eight weeks. I have been unable to find a suitable person despite one in five young feel people being unemployed here in Britain and a total count of unemployed being over two and half million.

My posting drew the following response:-

At wholbr, gotta play devil's advocate here - original post is "I want it free because that's the natural order of things", overwhelming response is "you get what you pay for". With that in mind, what kind of salary are you offering for this job? Have you considered the possibility that the guy with the qualifications you're looking for ain't interested at the price, so you're getting all the losers who are willing to work for less? You get what you pay for! [/quote

Just to put the record straight, I am looking to pay a starting salary of between £28,000 and £30,000 per year (British sterling) that would equal 44,000-48,000 US dollars. That would undoubtedly quickly rise should the candidate prove to have the following skills and qualifications in line with this extract from the position advertisement

The successful candidate would hold a Nebosh certificate or diploma in workplace health and safety or alternatively an NVQ4 qualification in the same. The NVQ qualification would be preferable on this occasion as this demonstrates shop floor experience in workplace health and safety. A lower NVQ qualification may be acceptable if the applicant has the abilities to be trained to NVQ4 standard.

The successful candidate will also possess above average communication skills both written and verbal and the ability to compile detailed reports taken from interviews with those involved or injured in workplace accidents along with their relatives and partners.

The successful candidate will also interview witnesses and others which may have contributed to the accident both directly or indirectly. The successful candidate will also have the abilities to analyze such documents as Tacagraph readouts and working hours timesheets along with other documents such as " near miss reports" and local management accident reports.

On commencement of employment the candidate will work under the authorization of senior management within Britain's biggest road transport and distribution companies. Although working under the foregoing authorization, the investigation and report have to be totally independent of any views held by employees of that company regardless of position or status.

The successful candidate will find themselves working to the basic philosophy of “there is no such thing as an accident, someone somewhere is always responsible”

Bill
if anyone on the forum knows of any person who fits the above bill please put them in touch. It could lead to a lucrative position and then taking over the business from myself within the next couple of years. it's been advertised everywhere else I can think of, so I may as well advertise it on this forum out of desperation if nothing else.

 

[tyard]

Probably a stupid question but just to be sure, was that directed that the OP or me?

 

[Retro00064]

Post deleted (no longer relevant).

 

[johnwhelan]

Anything that sells as payware will be well worth the money.
Just my (probably more than) 2 cents

tyard

I'm not quite certain I totally agree with this comment, I've seen payware where the wheels don't turn, and some were the quality of the payware was not as high as I expected. Also I've seen a number of items that do not work perfectly in TS2010 and there are posts floating around the forum on how to fix payware so it works in TS2010.

If you are saying based on the time and effort put in compared to building it from scratch yourself yes I might agree, if you are saying all payware is high quality then I don't think I do agree but this maybe cultural, I've noticed that many Americans think that if they pay for something the quality must be better.

Cheerio John

 

[prre6]

Look, I think this thread is a waste of MB's that Aruan puts up on these forums. If the kid doesn't want payware them he doesn't have to pay for it. No one is forcing him to buy it and people should not over react to this kind of statement. Someone need to shut this thread down. My reasoning: I saw a few personal attacks on the guy/girl.

Fred

 

[tyard]

I'm not quite certain I totally agree with this comment, I've seen payware where the wheels don't turn, and some were the quality of the payware was not as high as I expected. Also I've seen a number of items that do not work perfectly in TS2010 and there are posts floating around the forum on how to fix payware so it works in TS2010.

If you are saying based on the time and effort put in compared to building it from scratch yourself yes I might agree, if you are saying all payware is high quality then I don't think I do agree but this maybe cultural, I've noticed that many Americans think that if they pay for something the quality must be better.

Cheerio John

As far as TS2010, that's only a problem if it claims to work in 2010-if you buy a TRS2004 payware model you can't really criticize for not working in TS2010 (at least in my opinion).
Onto your main point, I actually didn't mean it either of those ways and apologize for what was actually extremely poor wording. What by my post was not that ALL payware is of amazing quality and worth the price, but that the payware that sells well and is consistently and generally considered good is worth the money (like, say, JointedRail or RRMods, to use the OP's examples once more).
Hope that clears up what I said-I'll be sure to give my post a once-over and fix it up to be clear.

Lastly though, I certainly don't study anything like this, but perhaps it is unfair to specify that as a trait of Americans? I'm sure the ratio isn't much different in plenty of other nations. At the least, I'm American and not like that.

-tyard

 

[ZecMurphy]

Hi All

First off, we are happy to allow this thread to continue (as always, discussions like this can have useful/interesting info in them, so long as they stay on topic), just remember to keep it within the COC


On the original post, and some of the replies... People are telling the person to 'get a job', to earn some money to be able to pay of payware. Well, there's a few out there that actually somewhat look at payware this way... Namely that payware gives them pocket money to buy other 'fun' stuff, or do more research. Although a locomotive or wagon may be a little out of their skill level, a good quality house/building set can be welcome as payware. It may not sell hundreds of copies, but if it were, say, $3/building, and you sold 6 of it, that's $18. Enough to hopefully cover costs, and to buy a payware locomotive...

An example of the cost of content creation though is some of my recent projects.

One of my current WIP locos shows that some projects can be rather expensive to get the best research. The loco has limited info available, with the most photos being in a book worth well over $125AU. Strangely, this one is going to be freeware. However, this same project saw me buy another book twice (albeit one copy at $40 and another at $20), so I could 'strip' one for scanning (handy idea if you can get a second copy of the book!). No idea on the hours spent on this project though. Granted, one of the prototype is preserved, but the location it's in is currently closed...

My current 'freight wagon' project (to be payware) has had well over 90 hours spent on it. That's a lot of time spent on something that's going to earn me some pocket money. On the other hand, I've learned new techniques (part of the reason it has so many hours in it), so I would estimate about 40-50 hours without my 'messing around' with various things. Still a lot of hours. And this doesn't include research. In this case, it includes an HO scale kit (well, a few of them now ), various books, and many hours of research (such as starting at a photo trying to work out if a detail is there or not!).

Any project will likely have a similar amount of time spent on it, however, those that sell payware do so to help cover their cost on research, etc. This somewhat allows more freeware to also be produced (e.g. a lot of the books I buy for research cover multiple items, hence buying it for payware means it's available for future payware and freeware).

 

[JimDep]

That makes sense, Zec, however all payware is not created equally.

I would hope that someone who is going to charge for their creations is going to put the research time and effort into the project, and have the artistic talent to bring it to life and scale using the best practices as you describe.

There is no quality control however, except for the consumer. If a creator builds a positive reputation by getting positive feedback from the trusted consumers, they will probably do ok.

Point is, is that just because it is payware does not necessarily mean that xx amount of research and time went into it.

 

[colhad]

I reckon everything should be free, I truly believe that we shouldn't pay for anything at all.

 

[sniper297]

I'll drink to that!
Who's buying? :hehe:

 

[sawyer811]

I'll admit, i used to complain about payware, sit and drool over paulz trainz and jointedrail, but no more. I can't really get a job-job (Don't drive, even though i'm 18...just don't have the courage yet) but i started doing work around the house to earn some money. 5 bucks a day adds up quick. So last march i splurged and bought myself the Utah Belt Payware pack from JR, and i realized just why they're payware to begin with. the quality of the skins alone makes them worth the money, in fact i now find myself looking at posts in the screenshots forum and saying "If that engine isn't payware, i'd be highly surprised." the attention to detail in the cab of the UB SD-45 is nothing short of astonishing, and the operating plye light is a nice touch that just tickles me every time i turn it on.

So the moral of the story is, i'm sure we all had our "why must the good stuff be payware?" phase at some point or another, but we all got over it once we set that first payware engine on the track and realized just why they're payware.

 

[Davie_UCF]

I reckon everything should be free, I truly believe that we shouldn't pay for anything at all.

You callin' for a revolution colhad?

 

[prre6]

I think that to. It's enough that we bought the simulator, but you have to understand BOTH sides of the argument. That is why I don't mind payware.

Fred

 

[mccarrolli]

I really don't mind buying fantastic models if you're planning on spending your money on other things that's your decision, if you're just too lazy to work to get the money though, that is also your decision. I get money from my parents and grandparents/other relatives for birthday, Easter, and Christmas (I'm 14 and I don't work) and I get more money for helping my dad with carrying boxes to and from seminars, and I get money for that. I don't spend money on payware because I pay for Microsoft points, games, etc. So, it's my decision what I pay for and I also plan and save my money for other things that I want. Boohoo, for you if you get money and don't pay for payware, as for the rest of the forums we don't mind. One or two people will not change anything, (believe me, I've tried), so you might as well go and get a job or stop complaining and save your money. Jointedrail is a company that makes these models and are very detailed, so that's why they make it payware, to make money. Also a membership for GMax/3DSMax costs $300+ so the entire team has that expense and much more, so you're lucky JR makes them at such a low price.

 

[cascaderailroad]

You can cut my grass come summertime ... but in the mean time, I will pay you $ 20 to shovel my snow.:hehe:

Vostock Base Antarctica
Tuesday, 19

-67 | -90 °F
Mostly Cloudy
Tonight: "Dark"

Wednesday, 20

-62 | -87 °F
Mostly Cloudy
Tomorrow: "Dark"

Thursday, 21

-45 | -83 °F
Partly Cloudy
Extended Forecast: "Continued Darkness till September"

Friday, 22

-42 | -72 °F
Mostly Cloudy & Dark

Saturday, 23

-44 | -67 °F
Partly Cloudy & Extreme Darkness

Coldest Temp:
-129°F (-89°C), Wind Speed 227 Mph, with Blowing Ice Crystals, on July 21, 1983

 

[Retro00064]

<snip> Also a membership for GMax/3DSMax costs $300+ <snip>

Gmax is free.

P. S.: Cascaderailroad, are you really located in Antartica?

Regards.

 

[qassaquyangli]

my chat

I choose payware should still be payware, because it costs money to own/rent a site (Most of them i think). That's why JR and RR mods have "Donate" buttons.

 

[JCitron]

At least the freeware isn't so-called shareware where the features die off after so many days then nagging messages pop up about buying the products.

Payware is just that pay ware, which means you pay for what you want. After our long diatribe that has gotten off on different tangents, this seems to be one of the more obvious things I think that hasn't been mention at least once. :hehe:

Now that I've been visiting JR's website, I've been saving up my money to purchase some of their goodies.

@Colhad. I wish everything was free. Even when something is free, there's a cost associated with it somewhere else. This is true even with sunlight we get everyday on earth. The heat is really the effect of the nuclear reaction taking place on the sun.

John

 

[Klinger]

If you can't afford it, don't buy it

Simple as that.

I could not buy payware until I got my recent job, not that I got that job just to buy payware, but since I have money, I can now buy a thing or two here and there

Maybe someday you will have a job, and can buy payware