Discount offer for HouseBot users
While I appreciate your generous offer, as an existing user of HouseBot I am more interested in future versions of HouseBot. I use HouseBot for a home automation control system which does not include any home entertainment equipment ... and as such I don't have any particular interest in Meedio Essentials. Is there any indication of the availability and pricing of future versions of HouseBot? Will it still be available as a stand-alone application?
Andy
Yes HouseBot will be available as a standalone application and we will be posting more details on our roadmap soon. Anyone who was registered on the original HouseBot forums will receive a free copy of all 2.x releases. And whenever a version 3.0 comes out we will offer those users a special 50% upgrade discount.
Our acquisition of HouseBot was made relatively recently so there is still a lot that we want to do before releasing the first commercial version. We'll be working very closely with Scott to see how we can apply our joint resources to best support the product and our users. In the meantime we appreciate your patience.
Thanks,
Our acquisition of HouseBot was made relatively recently so there is still a lot that we want to do before releasing the first commercial version. We'll be working very closely with Scott to see how we can apply our joint resources to best support the product and our users. In the meantime we appreciate your patience.
Thanks,
Soooo....
What your saying is that you took a freeware app...bought it.. as is.. and now your gonna charge people for it? Good call... I guarantee that it will make the company much money, as I see HTPC and HA as a perfect combo. Problem is that you just lost at least one plug-in developer and and a plethera of others into Home Automation ...... Housebot is/was a great Freeware app... but is has yet to become a great Home automation control program...potential is there...use it wisely.
I wish you the best of luck excepting members to build the program for you (ie Plugins).
thanks for charging me for the only freeware app I had left on my computer and not improving it...instead...asking the community to do it for you...
Housebot is dead to me.
edit: Flame away if you feel the need....
_______
"they are the ones who made it what it has become", 1734; Cintrara Komplotschi
What your saying is that you took a freeware app...bought it.. as is.. and now your gonna charge people for it? Good call... I guarantee that it will make the company much money, as I see HTPC and HA as a perfect combo. Problem is that you just lost at least one plug-in developer and and a plethera of others into Home Automation ...... Housebot is/was a great Freeware app... but is has yet to become a great Home automation control program...potential is there...use it wisely.
I wish you the best of luck excepting members to build the program for you (ie Plugins).
thanks for charging me for the only freeware app I had left on my computer and not improving it...instead...asking the community to do it for you...
Housebot is dead to me.
edit: Flame away if you feel the need....
_______
"they are the ones who made it what it has become", 1734; Cintrara Komplotschi
Treetop, I can understand how you feel but just want to clarify a few things that I think you've mis-stated. While we encourage users and third-party developers to build plugins we don't expect that they will do our development work for us. One of the reasons Scott transferred HouseBot to us is because we will have greater in-house resources to develop and support the program, and to partner with other companies who can add new features and functions.
We also recognize the contributions that Scott's original HouseBot users have made to the program. (In fact, I'm one of them, having used HouseBot for a long time and contributed the weather plugin). That's why we offered to provide all 2.x versions of HouseBot for free to pre-existing users, and to provide a special 50% upgrade discount when HouseBot hits v3.0. We expect that at version 3.0 HouseBot will be much more advanced than what Scott could have done on his own.
So again, I do understand how you feel and that you were used to getting Scott's services for free. Let me just assure you that our goal is to turn Meedio HouseBot into the leading home automation software and that it will be well worth paying for. I have run my own home with HouseBot for a while now so I too have a personal interest in seeing the software enhanced to its maximum potential. With the combination of Scott's talents and our own resources I'm confident we can bring that to you.
We also recognize the contributions that Scott's original HouseBot users have made to the program. (In fact, I'm one of them, having used HouseBot for a long time and contributed the weather plugin). That's why we offered to provide all 2.x versions of HouseBot for free to pre-existing users, and to provide a special 50% upgrade discount when HouseBot hits v3.0. We expect that at version 3.0 HouseBot will be much more advanced than what Scott could have done on his own.
So again, I do understand how you feel and that you were used to getting Scott's services for free. Let me just assure you that our goal is to turn Meedio HouseBot into the leading home automation software and that it will be well worth paying for. I have run my own home with HouseBot for a while now so I too have a personal interest in seeing the software enhanced to its maximum potential. With the combination of Scott's talents and our own resources I'm confident we can bring that to you.
Treetop,
Some of your points are exactly the reason why HouseBot will benifit from being commercial.
We had a good three years of getting it to the point where folks, like yourself, feel that its a viable solution for their automation needs. I've worked hard at building plugins and core functionallity that meet the majority of needs.
However, in the three years, 95% of the plugins were developed by me. I needed to develop plugins for many of the mainstream equipment just to make HouseBot usable out-of-the-box. Now the work involves writing plugins for less-mainstream devices. This is something that I really can't afford to do providing freeware. For example, if I wanted to develop a Lutron RadioRA plugin, I would need to spend a chunck of money on hardware that I will never use. Hopefully with the combined communties, more plugins will be developed by the users. There's also a much better possiblity of plugins being written internally, now that there are more Meedio developers involved.
Some of your points are exactly the reason why HouseBot will benifit from being commercial.
We had a good three years of getting it to the point where folks, like yourself, feel that its a viable solution for their automation needs. I've worked hard at building plugins and core functionallity that meet the majority of needs.
However, in the three years, 95% of the plugins were developed by me. I needed to develop plugins for many of the mainstream equipment just to make HouseBot usable out-of-the-box. Now the work involves writing plugins for less-mainstream devices. This is something that I really can't afford to do providing freeware. For example, if I wanted to develop a Lutron RadioRA plugin, I would need to spend a chunck of money on hardware that I will never use. Hopefully with the combined communties, more plugins will be developed by the users. There's also a much better possiblity of plugins being written internally, now that there are more Meedio developers involved.
Scott
I think that this partnership will definitely benefit both the program and your company. As stated before... this is a perfect marriage (HA and HTPC). Sorry if I came across as an a$$.. I was just a bit peeved to find out that the last bit of freeware I use was going commercial. I cannot, however, ever be upset with any coder for wanting to get paid for his/her hard work.
If you all can do to HB what you have done for myHTPC, then you will have a great application...one that I will have to check out.
Once again,
I wasn't trying to knock the program or Scott's choice to sell it to Meedio, and I am sure that this will be great for all involved (users too).
Regarding the authors of other plug-ins... can they choose to sell it... as of now they are available for free... did you ask them if you could distribute their work first? They were developed for freeware, and now that there are plans to make it commercial, they should be able to get in on it too. Then again.. this may just begin to look like Homeseer.
Treetop
If you all can do to HB what you have done for myHTPC, then you will have a great application...one that I will have to check out.
Once again,
I wasn't trying to knock the program or Scott's choice to sell it to Meedio, and I am sure that this will be great for all involved (users too).
Regarding the authors of other plug-ins... can they choose to sell it... as of now they are available for free... did you ask them if you could distribute their work first? They were developed for freeware, and now that there are plans to make it commercial, they should be able to get in on it too. Then again.. this may just begin to look like Homeseer.
Treetop
Will probably stick with HB but Meedio is not for me
For quite some time I have thought that HB was rellay too good a product to just remain freeware. One of the realities of life is that the poor sucker at the end writing the code needs to be able to fund his life somehow. As HB has become more and more sophisticated is has just obviously moved from a freeware hobby to a commercial product.
I ended up with HB having evaluated a number of others including commercial products such as HomeSeer. I thought that HB was the best product functionaly. The fact that it was also free was an added bonus!
All that having been said, I'm not really into Home Media. My pronto, Tivo, Housebot and other half
together give me all the automation that I need. I have a very large number of DVDs that I keep on the shelf, not on a video server.
Therefore Meedio doesn't offer me anything that I can see.
Here's hoping that HB will be available at a reasonable price without the need for what for me would be an uneccessary wrapper.
Nick
I ended up with HB having evaluated a number of others including commercial products such as HomeSeer. I thought that HB was the best product functionaly. The fact that it was also free was an added bonus!
All that having been said, I'm not really into Home Media. My pronto, Tivo, Housebot and other half
together give me all the automation that I need. I have a very large number of DVDs that I keep on the shelf, not on a video server. Therefore Meedio doesn't offer me anything that I can see.
Here's hoping that HB will be available at a reasonable price without the need for what for me would be an uneccessary wrapper.
Nick
Treetop,
Sorry I missed this post earlier. This busy board is an adjustment for me.
Soon you will be able to download all of the existing CEBotics/Meedio plugins from the Meedio site. I think if users want to charge for their plugins, they will probably need to host the plugin themselves and do the selling else where.... I'm not sure how this would be handled, but it's not currently an issue.
Sorry I missed this post earlier. This busy board is an adjustment for me.
We are not distributing any user contributions without their permission. They own the copyrights and can do with the code whatever they wish. Even with the old freeware version of Housebot, users could sell their plugins, provide them for free, or just use them for their own systems.Treetop wrote:Regarding the authors of other plug-ins... can they choose to sell it... as of now they are available for free... did you ask them if you could distribute their work first? They were developed for freeware, and now that there are plans to make it commercial, they should be able to get in on it too.
Soon you will be able to download all of the existing CEBotics/Meedio plugins from the Meedio site. I think if users want to charge for their plugins, they will probably need to host the plugin themselves and do the selling else where.... I'm not sure how this would be handled, but it's not currently an issue.
Scott
Re: Will probably stick with HB but Meedio is not for me
Ain't that the truth!NickLe wrote:the poor sucker at the end writing the code ...
I've learned that freeware's biggest enemy is it's success.
Scott
Found that, but the link goes to http://www.meedio.com/forum/coupon.php
That has codes for meedio ess. and meedio tv, but says nothing about housebot.
That has codes for meedio ess. and meedio tv, but says nothing about housebot.