Official Plugin Store

[angrybrad]

Created by: Selvin Ortiz (selvin@selvin.co) on 2015/03/10 20:43:19 +0000 Votes at time of UserVoice import: 224

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Plugin development and the Craft community as a whole would benefit greatly from an officially supported plugin store.

The plugin store would allow us developers to more easily sell/distribute our plugins and more quickly provide bugfixes and updates as well as enable our customers/users to have a single place to manage plugin licenses, request plugin specific support, and possibly have access to plugin docs right within the control panel.

Granted the plugin store is built into the control panel and provides a feature set similar to the one that has been discussed in back channels. Most of which is not public knowledge at this point.

Having websites like straightupcraft.com to discover new plugins and craftpl.us to sell/distribute commercial plugins is a descent start but I feel that an officially supported plugin store built into the control panel would benefit us far beyond the immediate problems it solves and would allow us to be better organized and to be more closely aligned with what a modern CMS should be.

Though some people have said that there are other priorities that should take precedence, I believe that the plugin store should be at the top of the list because formalizing this process would most likely motivate other agencies to invest in Craft plugin development and hopefully we can get some big guns to actually fill the gap that freelances have been unable to fill for so long and finally have fully featured commercial tools for draft/review/approval workflows and calendar/event implementations as well as robust e-commerce solutions we can deploy and that take advantage of Crafts localization, element type API, etc.

Without a formal process, we're going to continue to have quantity in plugins but not as much in the way of quality, continued development, and adequate support.

A plugin store, in my humble opinion, should be high priority on the list.

[tjdraper]

I’ve been giving this some thought over the weekend and I wonder if maybe what would satisfy me is this:

The reasoning mentioned as to why updates can't be stopped when the subscription runs out is because you can't stop composer updating in the background. But this is only partially true. You could not stop a user requiring any version of an add-on they want. HOWEVER, composer.json can be set to a specific version of a dependency. Perhaps the thing to do when a subscription is canceled and runs out is to offer the users 2 choices:

1. Re-purchase the subscription to keep getting updates, support the developer, stay safe, don't get the nag, etc.
2. Set the version in composer.json to the latest allowable (the version that was current when the subscription expired).

This does not stop developers manually changing things in composer.json, in which case, they should get a nag in the CP (honestly, with that sort of provision in place I would be okay locking that plugin out until they pay, I do that now with my own licensing: if the plugin license key is invalid or is not authorized on the domain, you are locked out until you fix it).

This allows for the subscription model and ongoing developer plugin revenue model, while still also allowing a way for the website to freeze at a certain version with the peace of mind that what they purchased will continue to work as is (all things being equal).

From what has been said and talked about, I don't expect this will be particularly well received or implemented, but it seemed worth mentioning.

[MattWilcox]

I'm trying to think of analogies to get across how unpopular subscriptions are going to be with our clients - especially for the CMS itself.

Imagine commissioning a new house from an architect. The architect submits designs, you agree, the house is built... and that's it. You are done with the architect. Now, if you want changes to be made, you may call up again and expect to pay for those changes - they are out of scope. But you don't expect to pay the architect each year as long as you live in the house they designed for you.

You wouldn't bat an eye at "subscribing to ongoing services" such as electricity, or water - which equate to hosting perhaps. But that's because there are obvious reasons for this. These are things consumed as time progresses. They are consumables.

Software that is already doing everything you need it to do is not a consumable in the mind of clients. Software that has bugs in it that need fixing is a defect in the original software, in the mind of clients. Software that offers new features... that's something that may be worth paying for.

What you're saying with a subscription model is that in order for you as an architect to earn enough money for your lifestyle, you need to be paid continually for the work you did... OR you're saying that "your house will fall over if you don't pay me each year for that work I did that time".

But you don't need to look far to see how unpopular subscription models are for people that have software that works as they want already. Look at Adobe. I don't think there are many people out there that enjoy subscribing to Adobe products; and even if they do, they get the sense of value about it from getting nice new features every now and then. They aren't thrilled to be forking over money each month to have bugs fixed. Especially bugs that they never notice. Which is the vast majority of bugs.

That's not the same for website's built on Craft. The client isn't going to get new features out of Craft updates, because we as the design agency have to implement any new stuff. All Craft updates are to 99% of clients is potential for new features. That's not worth subscribing to.

[brandonkelly]

Software that is already doing everything you need it to do is not a consumable in the mind of clients.

This is the crux of the issue, I think. You’re right! (In the minds of clients.)

Our point is that this is not based in reality. There is no such thing as web software that is “finished”.

OR you're saying that "your house will fall over if you don't pay me each year for that work I did that time".

This is much closer to reality (perhaps without the mafia tone). Not because someone will sabotage the work, but because you built the house in the middle of the Sahara Desert, and the landscape is constantly changing (to go with your analogy).

So we think it’s time as a community that we start facing reality, so the Craft ecosystem doesn’t suffer from the same fate as other CMSes that kept their heads in the sand.

Put another way - we are going to either loose clients because of this, or have to find an alternative CMS solution to fit our client's needs and preferences against subscriptions for our design agency services.

In general I’d challenge this. The vast majority of the CMS landscape has moved to subscription (even WP if you count plugins (and you should)). There may be exceptions, but this is the way the world is moving (and for the most part has already moved). You may not like it, but there are very good reasons for it that benefit end-users just as much as developers in the long run.

[croxton]

I think the point is it's no longer a sensible strategy for agencies to 'build once and forget'. Unlike a house, the foundations your website sits on, the needs of it's inhabitants and the services it consumes may change dramatically from year to year. If you don't maintain it, it's only a matter of time/luck before it falls down. I do think it's time to have that conversation with your clients about ongoing maintenance; as well as protecting your client it gives you an opportunity to make regular income that will support your own business.

That said, I do agree this is going to be a tough sell for a lot of agencies, especially at the low/mid end. We already provide maintenance plans for our 'enterprise' clients, but smaller clients, not-for-profits - I'm really not sure. Would be nice to have the option of pay once as well as subscription.

[MattWilcox]

Our point is that this is not based in reality. There is no such thing as web software that is “finished”.

That's only true in your mind and from the perspective of the developers of software. There is very much software that's finished from a client's perspective. The thing is websites will not fall over if left alone. We have seven, eight year old sites still going, and never had an update. I'm not proud of that and we try and discourage it - but there are stubborn clients that don't pay and don't receive updates... and you know what? Their sites still work.

I know the modern thing to do is have SAAS hosting and constant updates etc... but many clients don't. And they don't because it's more stable and more predictable and they simply don't need the updates. How then do you say to those people they should pay for things they aren't consuming or benefiting from? If things aren't breaking, why should they pay anything more? If they're not getting new features, why should they pay anything more?

I totally agree that it's in everyone's interest to have healthy profitable ecosystems... but the client doesn't care about that. Whatever happens, the crux of the issue is: how do you get an end client to feel good about spending money? I can tell you it isn't by saying the website they already have working will continue to work "if things like their OS get updated". They'll prefer not to update the OS. And I'd agree with them. They'd rather pay if and when something is needed. Not as a hedge against it possibly being needed.

Again; it is not an opinion - we will lose clients if we tell them Craft is a subscription based CMS. The moment that happens at least some will insist on WordPress - I am telling you this from the coal face of working with end clients.

[MattWilcox]

IMO, the only way you're going to get clients happy to spend money is to offer new features in exchange for money. Subscriptions don't do that. Paid updates do.

Subscriptions are getting a bad rep - ever listened to Roderick on the Line? That's a non-tech person who's "not going to get another damn eel attached to my body; no I do not want to pay £5 per month for the rest of my life for some shit I already own".

I should also point out, our agency strongly avoids plugins where possible because we don't trust plugin developers to be as reliable as the core developers. Been burned too many times by poorly written plugins or plugins that become relied on and then disappear. The problem with EE was you needed a dozen plugins to get anything workable, and holy christ if they'd been subscriptions... Well, you'd have got around to Blocks a lot sooner I'm sure.

[MattWilcox]

Unlike a house, the foundations your website sits on, the needs of it's inhabitants and the services it consumes may change dramatically from year to year. If you don't maintain it, it's only a matter of time/luck before it falls down.

That's two different models.

The old model, where you let it age until it breaks... that's the one client's get. That's the one they understand. That's the one they automatically see value in paying for new things.

The new one, where the only reason the site stops working is because you updates something somewhere else and now it's not compatible... that's not one they get. And for the majority of clients who's needs do stay the same and don't need maintenance... it's a dud argument. And I'm not joking - the majority of our clients over the last decade have not needed constant updates and their needs haven't changed during one design. When their needs have changed enough for that to be an issue they need a re-design anyway.

[MattWilcox]

I do think it's time to have that conversation with your clients about ongoing maintenance; as well as protecting your client it gives you an opportunity to make regular income that will support your own business.

If wishes were horses. We offer these services. Very few clients choose to go for it, and when that bites them in the ass later down the line they're happy to pay one off fees to get the issues resolved.

The trouble is, this subscription concept is somewhat like insurance. It's an insurance against possible problems. Well, the thing with insurance and 'possible problems' is lots of people think "well, it's not like I'm driving my car far, I know how I use it, it's only ever the school run, and I keep it away from most dangers - I'll just take the mandatory cheapest thing and hedge my bet" - and that works out fine for most people. They don't actually need insurance. Except for the legal requirement to have it.

[croxton]

Sure we have those too - very cost conscious and would hate subscriptions. It would be nice to have the option to cater for both types of client, or I think Craft will lose the low end to WP, EE etc (which may or may not be a good thing for P&T).

[ijy]

I completely understand the thinking behind a subscription based model for plugins and updates. In the nature of software nothing is finished and if things are standing still in a changing landscape then they're in effect just decaying. However, I have to agree with the opinions regarding subscription concerns here.

It will be a very tough sell and it will be harder for freelancers and smaller agencies who can't buy in bulk and who don't have the revenue streams to pay for another subscription service. Sometimes you also don't have the luxury to walk away if someone refuses to pay you a monthly service charge for something they don't understand (the sell is quite often hard because they don't see any tangible benefit despite explaining until you're blue in the face). Using the analogy of a house in the Sahara desert, the clint can see if it's being eroded one sandstorm at a time and will pay to get it fixed. In the digital space a lot of people feel lost and don't get it. The visual people among us need to see some tangible benefit for what they're paying for.

I'm also a little concerned that the model is being based on the huge marketplace that is WordPress. There is talk of all the bulk discounts, discussions with plugin developers, and references to targeting businesses I do get the feeling that the sole developers and smaller shops are being overlooked.

I've heard a lot of the discussion in this thread and the Slack channel and I'm still not sure exactly how this model will work in terms of whether this subscription is intended to be taken on by the agency, the client, what happens when clients move on, how it will work if plugin developers are allowed to set their own tiered pricing (as has recently been stated) etc, etc. I'm sure a lot is yet to be decide and clarified but either way it does sound like it would place an added administrative burden on the developer/agency.

All in all I can see that a lot of people could very well be priced out of the Craft market by the insistence on a subscription model which doesn't work for everyone. We're also competing against a lot of people offering WordPress, Drupal, Umbraco as alternatives for a lot cheaper and without ongoing subscription charges. There is already a battle to introduce Craft amongst the better known players in the game as well as a rise in website builders and hosted solutions of all kinds. If you force a subscription model and maintenance contracts into the picture as well then a hard sell can almost become unsellable in a lot of cases. Surely there can be an option for one-time purchases which is working so well at present?

[brandonkelly]

We have seven, eight year old sites still going, and never had an update. I'm not proud of that and we try and discourage it - but there are stubborn clients that don't pay and don't receive updates... and you know what? Their sites still work.

@MattWilcox Yikes! In all seriousness, do what you can to get those sites updated. Either they have already been compromised and you’re just not aware of it, or they’ve been lucky so far.

We have been told by a very reputable security team that Craft is one of the most secure off-the-shelf CMSs they’d ever seen, and yet in the past year alone we’ve fixed 12 security issues, one of which we even had to mark as a critical update because there was a zero-day exploit. Security is no joke.

We understand that this is not a comfortable conversation to have. Watch the hangout video if you haven’t already; we talk quite a bit about this. But it’s not unsurmountable.

Client threatens to move to WP? The WP ecosystem is way ahead of us on this front. (And subscription pricing for WP plugins aside, please don’t built a WP site without a maintenance contract that keeps them up-to-date; too many agencies/freelancers have learned that lesson the hard way, dealing with the aftermath of a compromised site!)

That said, I do agree this is going to be a tough sell for a lot of agencies, especially at the low/mid end. We already provide maintenance plans for our 'enterprise' clients, but smaller clients, not-for-profits - I'm really not sure. Would be nice to have the option of pay once as well as subscription.

@croxton If priced right, subscription pricing can actually be easier for SMB than a one-time fee. Even if in the long run they’ll end up paying more, a lower monthly/yearly fee is better for cash flow than a large one-time sum.

[dwhoban]

@MattWilcox curious - in your model, who pays for hosting of the website?

[damienbuckley]

Something that seems to keep being missed in this discussion about WP / Joomla etc (which is what clients generally refer to) is that those sites are a low bar to entry - typically they are cloned sites using themes. There may be ongoing fees involved in some plugins but I'd certainly never heard of it in relation to WP until now.

The reality is that WP theme sites go for $3k and under. Throwing a subscription on top of that may not be a big deal. Craft is not in this market - at all. Craft is custom design/dev territory. I know we ballpark Craft at AUD10-15k so realistically we can't consider any comparison with if people pay for addons with WP. And that's before we start talking about clients who are being pitched Wix/Squarespace by agencies at networking meetings. I shit you not…

I watched the hangout video and it was super-instructive and gave me a lot to think about however I still see this being a tough sell for the smaller shops like ours. It's all well & good if you're an established agency, your average site is $30k (a figure knocked around in the video), and you have a queue. That's not us and I imagine there are plenty in the same boat.

I also agree it's the higher value clients who have less issue. Most of the clients who spent over $10k with us on EE or Craft are on maintenance plans. Under $10k - none.

I also have Textpattern sites in the wild which are 8 years old, and fine, so it's not fair to suggest that Matt is entirely wrong with this. You can't force people to spend money, unfortunately.

I think if the new model comes in and if once-off purchases cease we will be faced with this dilemma:

1) Pitch Craft, explain the monthly impost, sell the benefits 2) Pitch EE (or whatever your alternative CMS is) as not having the ongoing costs* 3) Pitch Craft AND other CMS, explain the differences in cost models, allow the client to decide

• we spent years selling easily against everyone else on the basis of NOT having ongoing monthly fees and it was extremely effective. Times have changed though and this is no longer the case.

I suggest for the busier, more expensive agencies, with deeper-pocketed clients for whom every sale isn't life or death, option #3 is most likely. For everyone else I suspect #2 will be the default due to not wanting to risk losing the sale and client. I don't see many scenarios where #1 will be the default position as I suspect it is now.

Either way, if the once-off purchase cease, I for one will need some serious help and advice from P&T in how to sell it. The video was a great discussion and did touch on this, and I recommend everyone watch before commenting further. I'm worried also but we all have other options so I'm trying to keep an open mind at this stage.

@brandonkelly in the hangout video, Leslie was asking for some case-studies. I'm more than happy to open up our books with this if it helps. Who/how should I send stuff to?

[brandonkelly]

@damienbuckley Thanks for the feedback. You make a good point contrasting typical WP project budgets to Craft - worth considering.

@brandonkelly in the hangout video, Leslie was asking for some case-studies. I'm more than happy to open up our books with this if it helps. Who/how should I send stuff to?

support@craftcms.com

[brandonkelly]

Thanks to everyone for all the amazing feedback over the past few days. We mentioned in the hangout but worth repeating, we honestly feel that we have the best community in the world.

As much as we believe that subscription pricing is absolutely the way to go, at some point realism needs to take priority over idealism, and I'm thinking we will need to compromise a bit here.

We'll take a second look at the Sketch/JetBrains/Atlassian/etc model, where you pay for updates/support on a yearly basis, but you can use whatever version you’ve already got forever. We can probably get around the Composer issue by making the plugin store its own Packagist repo, which takes subscription status into account (which would also make it possible for us to support private Git repos). That still leaves the security concern (we really don't want to block access to security updates), so maybe we still allow build updates (the Z in X.Y.Z) after a subscription lapses, so devs have a way to go back and patch old versions if they feel like it's warranted.

And as for support, we already plan on making it easy for devs to quickly check plugin licenses by email, so they can reference that before answering support tickets (or even integrate their help desk software with a license status API).

[MattWilcox]

@brandonkelly I wish we could convince clients to pay for us to update their sites. Honestly I do. I'm totally with you on why, and how important it is. But this is exactly my point... almost no client, no matter the size, has been willing to pay a subscription fee to us to do so. At any price point, and we have gone really really low. It doesn't matter. They will not subscribe to that sort of thing.

I really hope this sinks in for you; you're not having to convince developers. You're having to convince the end users who pay the money - and they are a very different group of people.

[MattWilcox]

Also; we have had clients complain that sites stop working after five years and argue the toss that they shouldn't need to pay for us to run updates on that website just to get it running again today.

Clients are not tech people. They do not think like us, and it is really hard to get them to understand the value of updates if they aren't seeing new features on the front end of the website. They don't care about CMS updates, they don't care about bugs - bugs are things the CMS doesn't do properly that they already paid for it to do properly (in their mind).

We've tried educating clients about that over a decade, various people, in various ways, with most of our clients. It just doesn't work 90% of the time. So you leave things alone and end up with a website that's running 5yrs old software on 5yr old OS's on 5yr old hardware... and a very happy client. And when it breaks? Then we charge to fix. We've had clients where we have said for years that they need a new website, their software is end of life, we can not offer support of any kind if it goes wrong. Clients that have business' running off those sites... they still won't do it. And that's not an isolated example of one persnickity client either. I could point to a number of them.

The crux is this: clients don't see websites as consumables. They're deliverables. One shot jobs. It's only when new functionality is desired that they see additional payment as justified.

@dwhoban - in our model the client pays for the hosting. Hosting is literally a separate line item from the website. The website is the deliverable, complete and working. Hosting is up to them - they can go elsewhere or they can host with us, but it's a separate transaction.

[bgarrant]

@MattWilcox @brandonkelly Same issues here Matt. We try to sell "maintenance" packages to clients and maybe 5% or less actually pay for them. Hosting is a completely separate item as clients can host anywhere (even though most host with us). You can't really bundle maintenance with hosting. We have offered to keep sites up to date for almost nothing and clients still won't pay it. They feel the finished product is a deliverable and that is the end. It is a really hard thing to sell when clients do not fully understand the value. But we all have to remember that clients are owners, managers, sales people, etc but they are not developers. They just don't get it.

[bgarrant]

Here is my opinion...When you buy a plugin for version 2.x they should work for version 2.1 to 2.999 without extra cost. I can see having to pay again for a plugin update to version 3 of Craft. No subscription pricing though. Clients will never pay that.

Maybe a discounted price if you have the 2.x version to update to the 3.x version would be fair. That way it is not free and we can approach the clients about the 3.x upgrade and explain Craft is FREE to update but the following plugins cost $x.xx.

It should be a global discount as well. Maybe 30% off for updating any plugin in the store to the 3.x version.

[MattWilcox]

I honestly think that subscription is a bad fit for CMS'd. Period. End story. The crux is, end users won't do it at any price.

There is nothing wrong with the "old school" method of having a plugin or CMS that's paid for in one hit, then only receives security updates. Release new features behind a new version every 6-12 months. That is a model clients understand, appreciate, and will pay for.

Perhaps the problem is being looked at the wrong way around. It isn't that subscriptions are a great way to support developers (which it isn't if no one will pay the subscription), but that developers should not be rolling out continuous feature updates for free.

Look at where end users do pay subscriptions for software... it's only in places which leave them no other options anymore. The problem Pixel & Tonic have is that there are plenty of other options for a CMS.

Google Docs and Office are only successful as subscriptions because the alternatives don't share the compatibility that business' require. But people as individuals don't use those services, they buy software and keep using it until it literally doesn't work anymore.

And even Adobe is suffering because people have bolted to other solutions that don't require subscriptions (Sketch etc) and yet Adobe is an unassailable cornerstone of the huge majority of creative and design agencies. Even they resent subscribing.

[brandonkelly]

And even Adobe is suffering because people have bolted to other solutions that don't require subscriptions (Sketch etc) and yet Adobe is an unassailable cornerstone of the huge majority of creative and design agencies. Even they resent subscribing.

First, Adobe isn’t suffering. What they pulled off with CC is pretty impressive. Their users may not love it, but they pay it, the world keeps spinning, and Photoshop & Illustrator keep getting better.

And Sketch? They’re on subscription too. Different model – the price only buys you a year of updates, but you can keep using what you’ve got if the subscription lapses. That’s the exact model I just said we’ll take a second look at in my last comment.

Paid upgrades is undeniably the traditional sustainable pricing model, but there's a reason the entire software industry is moving/has moved away from it, in favor of subscriptions: it sucks for developers, and results in bad software. Why? Because developers are incentivized to be constantly thinking of new features that will sell, rather than giving them the space to focus on under-the-hood improvements that are even more important.

We would rather incentivize developers to improve their plugins’ security, performance, and stability. The way to do that is with a subscription.

[AbbeyDesign]

Adobe boils down to ransom plain and simple and I would hardly call it a success. They own the market, there are no alternatives and they shoved this down everybody's throats. Though we're testing things like Affinity, we are still stuck with Adobe.

With that said, Adobe does not charge me per project and in the ~30 years of using Adobe, I have never had to use a plugin to make it function.

I get the whole subscription argument, and it's not a pretty pill to swallow, but pricing will be key to determine if we can keep moving forward with Craft.

[ghost]

@brandonkelly In your Craft CMS and Craft Commerce subscription conversations, are you considering keeping the current one-time price repaid yearly or lowering it?

[brandonkelly]

@stephencallender TBD, sorry..

[bgarrant]

This whole discussion is really the decision of Brandon and the team. We can all add out thoughts and suggestions, but in the end they need to make money to keep Craft moving forward and the fantastic CMS that it is. Whatever the future holds for Craft core pricing, we will not know but please grandfather the existing ones that purchased with the understanding of "lifetime updates". We have even advertised that feature to get Craft clients coming from EE so please keep that benefit.

Subscription based models are a dangerous game. You can lose client and market share quickly going down that road. End clients do not want to pay subscriptions. They don't get it, they don't care, whatever the reason....they don't want to pay them. I think it will be a hard sale to get small business to start paying subscriptions on top of hosting, development costs and Craft licensing fees.

Don't forget the little clients that helped make Craft a success.

[brandonkelly]

Whatever the future holds for Craft core pricing, we will not know but please grandfather the existing ones that purchased with the understanding of "lifetime updates". We have even advertised that feature to get Craft clients coming from EE so please keep that benefit.

If Craft core pricing changes, we absolutely will grandfather existing Client/Pro licenses into free updates.

[MattWilcox]

@brandonkelly - Adobe have the whole industry over a barrel, and that's why subscriptions have been a financial success for them. But talk to the people paying the subscriptions - you will be hard pushed to find anyone who's happy about it. I could pass you over to our accountant if you like, lol! The fact that Sketch etc have any success at all in the professional industries (rather than only with hobbyists) is down to Adobe's decision to move to subscription only. For all the loveliness of Sketch and other software, agencies didn't use them until Adobe went subscription only. Because we needed PSDs, because everyone else worked with PSDs. Moving to a subscription model where you couldn't use Adobe software at all unless you were paying the monthly fee was enough to prompt some smaller business's and agencies to move from Adobe. It wasn't the quality of competition software. Larger agencies are still over the barrel, and put up with the subscription. They don't see it as a benefit. I could even say that a fair few people in our company actually dislike getting rolling updates, because Adobe keep fucking up our workflows. Hell, the new New Document prompts are awful, they cost us time and money. We've turned them off. They're often anti-features.

I don't think there's a problem with the "subscription" model that you're proposing, which Sketch uses, where you get to use the version you had before the subscription lapses. But that's because it is really not a subscription at all, it's the old "pay for what you got, pay more later to get more" model.

But I am saying that for the vast majority of our clients, that first payment is the one and only payment you'll get. They won't continue to subscribe. Meanwhile, the term "subscription" will have put their heckles up immediately, and we'll basically have to say the following to get them back on board with Craft:

These are optional subscriptions, if you subscribe the plugin (or CMS) will continue to receive bug-fixes and new features as you use the software. If you don't subscribe, it's effectively a one-off fee you'll pay and you won't receive updates other than critical security ones. We recommend you subscribe, but if you do not everything will still work as it does now.

I am telling you what almost all our clients will choose to do in that scenario.

Here's the thing; the whole industry is struggling to force subscription models onto buyers as an answer to profitability problems. To do it with any success they're forcing the issue. There's this idea that stagnant software is bad - and technically it is. And an assumption that developers need to continue developing their software for quality not features - which is debatable because it boils down to whether enhanced quality is something end users will pay for.

The assumption that end users must want to buy updates is at fault. They generally don't. They only care when something breaks or there are new features that they need. No software house is going to change that.

Users think of it like buying cars. They bought the car, and they really don't care about next year's version and what it can do or what safety improvements it has over theirs. They're happy with the car they bought. If their car has a safety problem, they expect the manufacturer to call it in and fix it and it not to cost anything because they got sold a broken dangerous car.

Some people go on the "subscription" model where they get a new car every three years as long as they pay X per month. But that's not everyone, that's people that have the spare money to pay constantly. A lot of people pay once and drive that car until it pops.

[brandonkelly]

I don't think there's a problem with the "subscription" model that you're proposing, which Sketch uses, where you get to use the version you had before the subscription lapses. But that's because it is really not a subscription at all, it's the old "pay for what you got, pay more later to get more" model.

Our hope is that the model encourages more agencies to pitch maintenance/retainer contracts to their clients, for several reasons stated previously, so we will continue thinking of it as a subscription to updates. But if you don’t like the word “subscription”, fine, don’t pitch it to your clients. Let’s stop beating the dead horse now :)

[MattWilcox]

My point is that we already pitch that stuff for maintenance contracts. Almost no one bites. But we always pitch - why wouldn't we, it's money in our pockets and peace of mind for the client.

[mrw]

First of all, thanks to Brandon, Leslie, Brad, and other P&Ters for opening this discussion up to the community and listening to feedback. I've found it really helpful and interesting.

In general I'm totally supportive of any steps towards accomplishing P&T's stated goals of making plugin and license management easier, increasing end-user security, and making sure development is sustainable for developers while also affordable for clients.

Brandon's latest comment is:

We'll take a second look at the Sketch/JetBrains/Atlassian/etc model, where you pay for updates/support on a yearly basis, but you can use whatever version you’ve already got forever ... maybe we still allow build updates (the Z in X.Y.Z) after a subscription lapses, so devs have a way to go back and patch old versions if they feel like it's warranted.

I'm personally a big fan of this model. I think clients and developers have an existing expectation that most downloadable software installed at a certain version will continue to run indefinitely without further charging (which I know you said was how it would work). That seems to be what many in this thread are pushing for and I think it's reasonable.

I also think developers need to be charging ongoing fees to provide ongoing services. That's why I like the idea that you pay, get something like a year of updates and support, and then have to continue paying yearly for any additional years of updates and support. If you don't pay you lose updates and support but not access to run the latest version you had access to. We buy our Atlassian software that way and it works well. It's also how many plugin developers already implicitly charge, with a time-limited support period and paid major upgrades. And developers can be free to offer a free minor version of an old version if they want to address a very serious, but old, vulnerability. That's what Microsoft did last week by releasing security patches to some old OSes.

I think it's admirable and smart that P&T wants to make sure plugins stay secure and developers are compensated to keep them secure. That helps the Craft community and internet at large. But I also think there's only so much that can be reasonably done for clients that won't prioritize budget for that.

Thanks again for allowing us to give feedback on your decision. I'm looking forward to seeing this!

[theskyfloor]

The Envato marketplace works like the Sketch/JetBrains/Atlassian/etc model as well. I really like this model and we often will re-up a support period if we are having an issue. Here is their little sidebar bug for reference. The plug-in represented here costs 24.00 dollars regularly, you save money by renewing early, and to renew support after the 6 month default period it comes with costs 17.50 - interesting pricing structure to say the least. Having support renewals is not very cut and dry and as I think about it I guess it isn't 100% a good 1:1 for Craft because it assumes that a client would want direct plug-in support when it is probably the developer who really uses that. I guess the better term is really updates/support... as Brandon has mentioned!

[narration-sd]

It's been great to see the level of insight, expressed from each person in the community on this discussion.

What a small voice has kept mentioning to me is the word 'continuum'. That a way to answer everyone's needs is somewhat individually, because each of us are at some point in a continuum of employing Craft, and of what we can expect to successfully offer our appropriate customers.

What might our continuum of engagements look like, at strategic points, identified by level of commercialization -- with all appreciation of other contributions and measures?

1. Deep 'enterprise level'-and-profitable consultative and developmental relationships, such as Craft itself and more established agencies very positively look to have with size- or topic-significant customers, such as national marketers, direct corporation clients, or political campaigns.

2. Smaller but wide-service agencies with a full-spectrum sales capability, basing themselves around Craft as a platform both for its technology and its very valued practices.

3. Designers and developers often contracting to agencies and sometimes to their own customers, making choices on opportunities as to which areas of the possible to contribute in, on a per-project basis.

4. The very important sea of individuals who use and contribute often surprisingly to Craft or its support and projects, whether out of personal interest or on a path of growing into abilities or connections to make something of an income, as the potentials accumulate.

Looked at this way, it seems clear that Craft benefits well from each of these partnerings, and that setting things up so each of them has appropriate opportunities is going to give the best picture overall.

• Especially listening to what persons here have been saying, it would be only the first tier and some of the second who would be at all able sell any variation of a subscription -- because only their customers are able to appreciate the importance of a solid, safe, and forward-progressive platform.

• To continue to encourage everyone from the least-commercial onwards, to go forward with the great contributive community and its feelings which Craft most unusually has, must be of great value -- in the business-attentive sense as well as that we like it.

What are some points that might support this view?

a. Going for the gusto, if you have the necessary, as far as real consultations and developments with well-to-do customers. I think Craft has had visions of its own future in this area, and I think I would really encourage this. People who know they need individualized and add-on attention are usually quite willing to pay its real costs; it was ever so, and in the corporative language of today, it is to pay for 'talent'. If we know that there are actually many kinds....

I feel that this avenue for getting Craft's future assured, by its own consultancy and by payment for acknowledged privilege from partner agencies, is maybe the key thought missing at the moment, from the entirely sensible as well as intuitive drive to 'do something about the visible future'.

Consulting speaks for itself, and will be a fine driver of new abilites for Craft, its innovation. The part about partner agencies means their taking of responsibility they will appreciate as much as their significant customers, to price in an ongoing support for the Craft platform as part of their maintaining, upgrade, and innovation budget line item to the customer.

You can fill in blanks about acknowleging such sustaining partners, but I think in the sense of the unusual Craft culture in particular, they shouldn't (and wouldn't want to) be made exclusionary to the larger community. This was a problem definitely with a past company we will remember. More responsibility taken, more recognition -- but not more privilege, save for specific contracts with Craft's consultancy side. As an approach....

b. So, in essence, larger players will pay subscriptions-in-principle, and also specific contracts will pay for innovation that builds the product for the larger community.

It occurs to me that some intermediate customers might be willing to take on some size of ongoing payments -- as an option, to support the platform.

A soft sell here, then, not attacking subscription-resistance, but rather suggesting in the way that 'big boys and girls' do contribute to things that strengthen the software industry depends on, using as open source as the big example. In a reverse-judo sort of way, this might help with take-up of own maintenance plans also? We can but try....

c. Encouraging that immense resource by now of the greater Craft community, I'd think as before that the mechanisms for the Store (and anything else around Craft) should be open to anyone -- as I believe is already agreed. People should be able to deploy their plugins in a safe and simple way, thus ever reducing Craft's own support burden.

How they charge for them...is then the matter of thought as we know. I somehow can't see personally how a one-plan-for-all can work on this, if really very much appreciating the thinking about establishing a baseline to up plugin long-term dependability and quality. Again, we have experience.

I wonder if a self-certifying framework could do the trick? You agree to a certain level of Craft-authored guidelines, to achieve a certain 'stamp' in the store. Then pricing, including possible maintenance plans (that only as a subscription, and optional) can follow appropriately. That Craft authors the requirements means their so-often good thinking gains the benefits necessary for themselves, and good for everyone.

A continuum can then be fit, from free-entry/experimental-community-support offerings, to full-on commercial plugins as we understand them, to individualized-corporate-paid-support enterprise packages.

Allowing those last on the store might be a way both to publicize what you did, and also to benefit the original developmental customer by spreading out thus minimizing their future costs.

d. Going to stop here, as no doubt this is long enough -- and I am warming to the feeling of how this community discusses things. Older dogs can indeed learn where we didn't expect to...we find out!

I'd like to close with one specific, among the many nice things that might be said for Craft themselves, in the reflections on that simply great online discussion. I've already complimented what we all recognize and appreciate in Brandon's actual front-end leadership, in the principles he and Brad have been making so solidly thoughtful and present in all the Craft experiences. As an 'older guy', and a friend, I get to do that, I think....

With this, something I particularly found to ground the many facets of talk, and add to what was satisfying, was how Leslie came forward this time, so that we could understand much better what his thinking is, and natures then of its influence.

I had a much better feeling afterwards, including the sense of histories being recognized; and freed thus, what the futures now can hold. Thank you, Leslie, and for the Craft team approach of recognizing, bringing in, each of the voices.

-- Clive

[putyourlightson]

In case anyone missed today's Plugin Store FAQ update...

How will licensing work? When you buy a plugin license, it’s yours to use forever, however access to updates will be cut off after one year, at which point you will have the opportunity to buy another year of updates for a renewal fee.

Personally this feels like a great outcome to the discussion and it has been a wonderful process to witness unfold. Thanks to everyone involved, great to see everyone's point of view listened to!!

[michaelrog]

How much will the renewal fees cost?

It’s up to the developer, but we will recommend somewhere between a 50-80% discount on the initial license fee.

The decision to allow the initial and renewal costs to be different (and developer-controlled) is a BIG DEAL in my view. (I'm all-aboard the "normalize subscriptions as the go-to plugin biz model" train. This will make it way easier for me.)

THANK YOU!!!

[damienbuckley]

I think that model makes total sense and is fair all-round. Good discussion. Good result

[michaelrog]

p.s. I'm assuming what's meant by access to updates will be cut off after one year is that the easy one-click updating in the CP wouldn't be available if your subscription isn't active, but technically one could still update manually via Composer?

(That'd make sense, in context of previously mentioned technical constraints. In those cases, I could envision the "Update Plugin" button being replaced by a "Renew Subscription & Update Plugin" button, or something along those lines.)

[MattWilcox]

That model feels fair for everyone and one that we can sell our clients on. Great stuff, thanks for the discussion :)

[brandonkelly]

p.s. I'm assuming what's meant by access to updates will be cut off after one year is that the easy one-click updating in the CP wouldn't be available if your subscription isn't active, but technically one could still update manually via Composer?

Nope, we came up with a way to prevent Composer from updating past the licensed version: the plugin store is going to be its own Packagist repo, so it can factor in the plugin’s license status before telling Composer which version to update to.

[BenParizek]

I've gone back and forth on how to potentially offer a free version of our plugins for certain use cases. It sounds like the existing store will allow plugins to be free and allow us to offer a Free Trial option of a commercial license. Both good options.

However, I'm not sure that I've seen a discussion of how to give a plugin with a commercial license an option to be free in some instances. Whether this is supported out of the box or not, one way to approach it could be to allow a commercial plugin to make itself free if the free version of Craft, Craft Personal, is in use.

Giving commercial plugin the option to be freely used with Craft Personal could be a nice baseline for Craft to judge whether a commercial plugin has a free option or not, and, if a commercial plugin desired to restrict any features, it could take extra steps to check for the version of Craft that is installed and display the user an upgrade message in a plugin.

[narration-sd]

@BenParizek this may seem an easy win in some ways, but I think it precludes an important case.

What about a non-profit, etc., which benefits from Craft's support in having a higher level license that they need? Or one which could have a similar permission from the plugin provider?

My feeling is that it should always be possible to permit registered plugin users to be granted free use.

This shouldn't be a big demand on design, as the ability's requirements should already be there with the Free Trial feature, no?

[BenParizek]

@narration-sd Here's a breakdown of the distinction I'm trying to make:

• Free Trial - let a user test a plugin for free for a limited number of days
• Free License - let a plugin developer take action to issue a free license to a user for an unlimited amount of time
• Free Version - let a plugin developer offer a license for a full-featured version of a plugin for an unlimited amount of time, with the ability to restrict the user from certain types of use (such as using it on different versions of Craft or using advanced features)

I'm not taking any issue with Free Trial and Free License options. They are essential and enough to get started with. My interest is the potential for a plugin developer to easily grant a user free access to their plugin (with conditions) without restricting the time it can be used for or requiring all features to be granted for an unlimited amount of time.

[narration-sd]

@BenParizek Ok, this framing of what you want makes sense.

My point would be that Free Version should be its own permiso, enacted by the developer, and not tied by the Store to a particular license level of Craft. The ability to do that could be part of the developer-enacted permiso, when desired.

[davidhellmann]

A Badge on each installed plugin would be nice :)

[brandonkelly]

@davidhellmann now that the Plugin Store actually exists, let's post new feature requests as their own issues, thanks!

[ghost]

Done ప్రచురణ