Video on blog was $20, now $80. No notification = Bad business.
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I just read:
“Space Upgrade…
“To upload and embed videos directly onto your blog, you need to purchase VideoPress. The new policy is active since May 6, 2009. All video blogs with active space upgrade before or on May 6, 2009 automatically receive a 1-year free VideoPress subscription.”
So does that mean that as of May 6, 2010, all my videos will be yanked? That is pretty sad considering the contract I signed up for with the space upgrade would enable me to upload & share video. That’s the product I bought. That’s the product I have.
Is WordPress now telling me that they changed the contract between us, without due notification of the revocation of my rights and capabilities, and WordPress will flip a switch killing a good portion of my blog content unless I fork over another $60 a year (on top of the space upgrade $20) !!!
That’s pretty sad stuff if it is true. Very out of character for the “underdog*” to do such shady business practices.
*http://en.wordpress.com/aboutI would have expected that those who were early adopters and bought into the space upgrade when it enabled video would be grandfathered until the blog was terminated, or they stopped renewing the space upgrade– just like cell phone contracts keep the initial agreement going after the contract ends. They don’t say, “at the end of your 2-year contract, we’re gonna take away your capabilities unless you pay us an additional $60 a year” like WordPress is doing.
It was never presented like an “initial offer” that will change after something like “90 days” or 1 year. There was no notice when I bought in to this that said, after 1 year rates will change. No. My agreement was Space Upgrade = video on blog. That’s the product I bought.
That’s really skeevy business and I seriously hope WordPress reconsiders their stance on this.
The blog I need help with is: (visible only to logged in users)
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Volunteers ie. your fellow bloggers obviously have no role to play in the setting of corporate policies. We answer questions and provide technical support — we do NOT provide emotional support. Please direct your communications to the folks who have the authority to deal with them ie. Staff http://en.support.wordpress.com/contact/
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There was a notification about this, plus I recall a note suggesting that the already uploaded videos will not be yanked out from your blog if you do not purchase the upgrade.
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And what of that Space Upgrade… if I upload video, and WordPress compresses it, do they keep the original and the compressed version? What if I don’t want or need a high-bandwith HD version?
WordPress charges for space, and video is a HONKIN bit of space, but they do not devulge how the video is managed, offer any tools to manage it, or allow the user to make any decisions about the videos other than existing- or deleting. Can I choose heavier compression for smaller file sizes? No. Can I choose widescreen SD as opposed to HD? No. So WordPress can choose very light compression, big files and in pretty short order, your $20 space upgrade has to become a $50 space upgrade to hold all the video.
There’s a whole lot of data management here that we’re being charged for, but have no control over.
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Please communicate directly with Staff as they are THE only ones who have all the facts. http://en.support.wordpress.com/contact/
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Way not just go the free route and upload your video to a 3rd party site like i.e. Youtube, Vimeo, and just embed it on your site
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Because that’s an extra media management step that I avoided by paying for the Space Upgrade.
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Interesting dichotomies:
Automattic, Inc. pays a staff of more than 40 people.
In November 6,380,052 posts were made,
1,390,120,928 pages were served from WordPress.
That’s serious computing horsepower.
Yet Automattic.com, WordPress.com, etc
are owned by: “Matt Mullenweg, PO Box 5446…”It’s a major business being treated like its a hobby.
You can change pricing whenever you want when it’s a hobby.
Not when it’s a business with hundreds of thousands of paying customers. -
Please communicate directly with Staff as they are THE only ones who have all the facts. http://en.support.wordpress.com/contact/
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Do I have to or three copies of a single video counting against my allowable space?
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“we are happy to announce that we have encoded all of our video inventories in Theora/Ogg format as well as the usual mp4 formats.” -
You have already told the same thing 3 times. We all know about contacting support.
Please let him express it! There are others here who would want to know about this..
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TimeThief, I had replied, to you directly after ismailmail, but I do not see it here.
I HAVE communicated directly with support. They have been gone for 9 days and have a backlog of stuff to wade through.
http://en.blog.wordpress.com/2009/12/18/support-holiday-hours/ismailmail, I’d like to know what sort of notification was made because I have a paid agreement between me and WordPress. With any other financially binding agreement, it takes written notification, and both parties have to agree to the change in terms. I haven’t received any written agreement updates from WordPress, nor any direct e-mail. And that’s what’s required when you pay cash for an offered service, and the seller of the service wants to change what they provide.
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Like TT has said, you’ll have to communicate with staff. Any volunteer here who could give you an answer would just be pulling out of their ass. We haven’t the faintest idea.
Except that I suggest you read the terms of service again; there’s a clause in there about changing offers.
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Nothing gets yanked, you just cannot upload any more.
As for changing pricing, every company I have ever dealt with changes prices be that Apple for their computers or my local store. We do try and communicate all changes and we always err on the side of the purchaser in extending upgrades where we feel it is right.
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Mark, Thank you for chiming in. Every company changes prices? Apple? They may change the price of their computers, but it only matters if you haven’t bought it yet. Otherwise, you make a price/product choice and paid a price for a product. That doesn’t work at all.
WordPress offered a service- Space Upgrade enables video on a WordPress blog.
At NO point in the beginning was it offered as a “beta test” with information that the price to have video on our blogs will triple, or quadruple.This would be like your local cable company offering “tiers” and if you want more than the basic tier, like movies, you pay an extra $20 a year. Okay. I do that. Then, they CAN’T decide, in the middle of our agreement, without prior notification, that the movies will cost 3x the basic rate, in addition to the basic rate. It’s simply against the law. Don’t worry, I’ll be contacting the FTC for you.
TimeThief, thanks for the link. Clearly not a notice sent out those those who were actively paying for a product, nor is it a clear change in policy. In fact, subscribers to the Space Upgrade would literally have no way of knowing about this casual post unless they were in a daily search for possible changes to policy. This is not the way customers should be treated.
Let’s look at the wording:
“The video feature was part of the space upgrade previously and for those that helped us test it we have now extended a one-year free video upgrade. We just want to make sure existing video users can continue to use it without any hassle. For new users, the video upgrade costs about 5 bucks a month.”I like how it’s “about” $5 a month because, across the whole year, it’s only 3¢ shy of $60 so it’s (3¢ ÷ 12 or) $4.9925 a month. But I digress.
It’s clear that video was part of the Space Upgrade.
For NEW users, the video upgrade costs $5 a month.
Nowhere does it clearly explain that those who purchased the Space Upgrade will now NO LONGER have the ability to upload video without paying an additional $60 in addition to the $20 for the Space Upgrade to keep the videos they have already uploaded. It does not address what happens to already uploaded video if the ransom, er, new fee structure is not paid.This casual paragraph reads like a college kid changing the fee structure of his fledgling service by a few bucks, and assuming everyone will just go with it. No real explanation needed, no cost/service explanation. No terms of service. Just a happy note that we’ve given those who have the Space Upgrade a “one year free Video Upgrade” that we didn’t ask for, pay for, and didn’t need because we are already paying for a service that, when purchased, said it included video- with no note as to it would be removed after some “testing” that he mentions.
This just makes me more and more pissed off.
“Please communicate directly with Staff as they are…”
Yea, Yea. I already did that, and I also fired off a direct e-mail to Matt using the address he provided to INTERNIC for his domain registration for his personal web sites- Automattic, WordPress.com, etc.
As of yet, the only “official” response has been on this forum.
Ironic, isn’t it. -
Littlesophia, if you’re serious about growing an audience for your videos then it’s best to go the youtube route. Your YouTube posts will drive traffic to your blog in far greater numbers than simply uploading them on the WordPress platform. That’s one of the reasons I didn’t renew – and therefore missed all this price increase hassle entirely. I think had I stayed on and run into this like you have, I’d have dropped it on price grounds, because it now seems like way too little bang for the buck. On Youtube if you have good video there is no noticeable difference in quality compared to WordPress, and more people see the videos. Simple.
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@littlesophia those who paid for a 1 year space upgrade, back when video was included, got what they paid for. More so, in fact, since they got a free 1 year VideoPress upgrade as well.
We’re not offering new subscriptions to the old upgrade now that VideoPress is a separate upgrade of its own. But everyone who subscribed to the old one got more than what they paid for.
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You know, I never did get that. What was the purpose of charging another $20 for the video upgrade, when you still need to buy the space upgrade to do anything with it? (I’m not complaining, and I don’t mind, like lettershometoyou, I use blip.tv to share my videos, I’m just curious).
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tbol3 you don’t need the space upgrade to use the VideoPress upgrade. Only if you want to upload more than 3 GB of video files.
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