Community vs Consumerism
 

An issue that's been nibbling away at the back of my mind, in response to the recent conflagration of threads on Why Graal Isn't Making As Much Money:
You don't go to WalMart and they ask you to support the business. Businesses don't do that in America; NPR does. National Public Radio, the Public Broadcasting Station - all those things which have pledge drives - will Ask you for your money, and a big business just shows you shiny lights and takes it.
So, Graal is a community-funded enterprise. Arguably it's not-for-profit, though I imagine the top admins would love it if it was bringing in a profit...there's gotta be like 5 years of unpaid server bills backing up.
Anyway, getting to my question - Should Graal be Community-Funded, or should it become a Consumer Entity? Should it switch its business model from:
"What do you, the players, think? Less pledge drives? Hmm, no, can't do that...but if we get 100 calls in the next hour, we can stop the drive for the rest of this week, how's that?"
to:
"Alright Barnaby, the numbers suggest our average player's free-income level is about five bucks below what we're charging for upgrades. So we should have a sale? 'Blue light special, Graal upgrades $5 off, one day only!' There, that should get them upgrading again...and next year they better have the money. Put it on the calendar, next sale has to be about a month before their accounts come due so they can't get $5 off /next/ year."

Is one necessarily more caring than the other? Is one necessarily more profitable?

This is the dumbest thread I've seen here in quite some time. Do you have to make a new post every time your brain has a thought?

Why do you have to paint a picture for every little thing? I think the majority of people know what boat Graal is currently in. It was started as non-profit but eventually required to make some sort of money to cover the server costs. It's a start-up business that isn't doing as well as it could be because of bad PR and business strategies.

Obviously a company that is just out for the bottom line is not more caring than one that cares about what the customers want. To be a successful business you just need to care about both things, and sometimes do underhanded things for the money without letting your customers know... or at least not letting them think you're just after their money.

Ive seen quite a few dumb threads around here these days. And they all seem to come from this dude.

I honestly doubt you even know who this 'dude' is.

I just find it funny how you guys just whine and moan about the problems GraalOnline is having, but you never actually post ideas to help, like Tyhm is doing right now. So until you do so, you have no place to criticize him.

And so what if he does? What is it hurting? If the posts annoy you, don't read them. He has good intentions.

Seriously, wtf? I ask an honest question and you rip into me like I'm suggesting the moon is made of walnut shavings?

ESPECIALLY given that at least one of you - not naming names or anything - has been whining for the past two weeks that "A real business doesn't ask its customers how to run the show". Well?!? Is Graal a real business, or isn't it? Is Graal a Walmart, or is Graal a PBS? Koni, you say it's obvious, but if it's so obvious ANSWER THE BLOODY QUESTION! You can't because Graal is in the middle, well DUH. But which one SHOULD it be aiming for?

Honestly, read -> post.

I'm just getting tired of seeing countless threads from you about the same things. If you're going to ask the forumgoers a question, it's usually not good to give them an answer while asking the question...

Graal is obviously a real business... They sell something that people buy, and they try to turn a profit from it. You can't compare Graal to something like Wal-Mart in any other sense. Wal-Mart has millions to spend on advertising and staff and whatnot... Graal does not.

Graal is not like PBS or a charity organization either. It's just a small company that has taken bad directions and had a lack of quality customer service/treatment. That doesn't make it a community based business just because it's asking players what they want.

You're the last person to be making "read -> post" comments. I believe you should "think -> not post". I was all for your threads when you were keeping it contained into one small package... but now you're still bringing it up like you've come back to the forums to save Graal from itself. It's really just getting annoying.

Mykel, this post annoys me yes, but that doesn't mean I can't read it or don't want to read it. It just means that I'm expressing my opinion about the thread... Sheesh. It's not hurting anything other than just being another Tyhm thread.

Tyhm is one of the reasons graal got so popular. (Classic)

Look graal is going to be consumer based because they are trying to make a effing profit. End of the damn story.

People want graal to be free, well to bad. Im sure hundreds of people want WoW to be free but its just not going to happen.

And it can't be both?
Offer good customer service, appeal to your largest demograph, advertise, make sure your sales cover your costs, update often, take customer's advice,and you will be successful.
Simple.

Yes, ideally something CAN be both - just like ideally Pearl Harbor is both a war movie and a romance, instead of a bastardchild of the two that fails utterly at wooing either audience.
I see much the same problem with Graal - are we saying "We're better than WoW or FFXI, play Graal!"? Are we saying "We could really use your support, and we're a pretty good game with lots of potential"? I'm not seeing the essential message of Graal - and like it or not, if Graal's going to be advertising, SOMEONE's gotta know what that message is.
Maybe I'm dumb, maybe all these questions have really obvious answers that everyone else in the world's in agreement on. Maybe corruption was banished years ago and the only people who complain are madmen, maybe advertisement's clearly not a priority and playerworld development has always been an in-joke and there already is a Hubworld, and I just don't know it because I've been out of the loop since October of 2003. Maybe that's why I'm the only one who's asking these questions. Well, and Rufus too.

And I'm ever so sorry these Tyhm threads hurt your delicate sensibilities, but I feel a certain sense of responsibility where the future of Lifetime Classic is involved. I choose to address this by discussing plans on the forum, by way of breaking an insurmountable issue into its many facets and presenting them as I see them. Would I be guilty of spin-doctoring? Probably, but that's what a discussion's for. Am I spamming the forums? Debatable; I see it as a proper discussion when there are ten threads on ten different issues by the same person, and spam when all ten threads have the same person interrupting the flow of discussion to say "SHUT UP! STOP TRYING TO CHANGE THINGS! WHO DO YOU THINK YOU ARE, JOHN RAMBO?!?"
Clearly I am alone in this theory.

Yeah, there's a lot of crap graal should change.
A lot.
But the difference between "we need money, help us" and "you need us, pay us" isn't that different, and doesn't change much.
They can say to current customers "keep Graal alive, upgrade!" and to new ones, "join the hundreds[why lie?] having fun now!"

These dozens of threads are doing nothing but insulting unixmad's management capabilities. I guess he doesn't close them because he doesn't realize that they are doing that? I'm not sure.

Either way... there are 20 somethings out there with start-up businesses turning a profit of over one million in their first year. What does that say about Graal, which has been struggling for years to get off the ground?

Tyhm, I'm just becoming annoyed at these threads where you bring up problems and suggestions that anyone over the age of 10 could have thought of. Yes it's obvious Graal isn't doing well. It's obvious that Graal needs to pull itself together and advertise. It's obvious that the game should be polished up and the website updated and customer support improved and the upgrade packages reworked, etc. All of this is common knowledge.

It makes me sick to see such a great game/development program suffer so much when it could be pulling in millions each year if it were done right. Who can you blame? Unixmad is the owner right? What's he doing with Graal? Eventually he needs to come to the understanding that he's not very good at managing this game and that he should probably hire someone else to do it. I don't know when that day will be... probably when they get so few subscriptions that they can't pay to cover the server costs.

Why do we need to be coaching this guy on how to sell this game? It's elementary stuff.

edit: It's like being handed a lemonade stand with some run of the mill lemonade. Anyone with any management/marketing skills could figure out the best location for the stand and how to improve on the taste so that it sells better...

They're doing something WRONG.
;) Just wanted to make it more clear, in case they didn't get the point :)
To us.
Well...apparently not anyone :\

Since when are threads made with suggestions regarded as insults to the person managing? I certainly don't see it that way. I see it as, suggestions to help the game do better.
There were more insults in this one post from you towards the management, then in all these threads. :\
Can't we just post our suggestions, and opinions about those suggestions without getting angry and making it about bashing the management or the game? Just one time, I would like something like this to produce something positive without people spouting off against the management, or the person making the suggestions.

Well, as long as I'm the one insulting Unixmad's management capabilities. ;)

(Incidentally, I've spoken with him and the only thing he had to say was that he didn't care for me saying "save Graal" like it was in such dire straits it was going out of business - bad for morale, why upgrade if the company's going to tank)

If everyone over the age of 10 sees that these answers are clear, why aren't they being acted on? Why aren't they being discussed? Why have we decided en masse to skip the debate, assume everyone's on the same page, and then NOT ACT? You could look at these questions as a confirmation and a call to action if you like - I know where Graal should be headed as well as you do, but do the players? Does the community? Are there really people out there who think Graal should advertise on the back of cereal boxes, and are their ideas necessarily more flawed than my own? That'd be rather vain, I think - after all, Moonie was the one who thought of bumperstickers, which led to an entire branch of thinking on Merchandising; and Rufus has been doing some excellent brainstorming on the best Banner Graal can get...
We've been given a rare opportunity, via the now-closed-due-to-spam Lifetime Classic thread, to discuss Graal's business strategy and suggest courses of action. If you don't think we should act upon it you're free to abstain, but we could certainly use your expertise.

I can agree with that. Probably should be just suggestions in ways to help Graal progress.

Unfortunately, the people who post here on the forums are just a small percentage of the playerbase of Graal. :frown:
Maybe a good idea would be to open up a section of the forums to be free for all members of Graal for the sole purpose of polls, suggestions, etc...
Meaning, the management could make polls on certain things, or suggestions that everyone would be able to take part in. No one should be able to make their own polls/threads except management, or staff working with management on this, but everyone should be able to vote, or post their suggestions on the chosen topics. Eh, just an idea....

(Yeah, I've been slowly changing it over to How to Save Lifetime Classic, cutting out the assumption in the middle, for all the power I have so to do.)

I like it...give the Globals special access to that area. A Referendum Forum.
All I could suggest for that would be beyond the pale - for each server to have its own areas, with its own access, either here or linked-from-here or linked-from-the-main-site, but that's rather a larger undertaking...Globals will suffice, possibly each PW's owner could get special access, as Owners change rarely enough. I hope.

Sorry if you guys want to coach someone in managing a company then open your own and try it. If you like to play Graal then play it, if you like to develope then develope, if you like to chat then chat. There are many forums where you can post bug reports, suggestions or talk about events. There is a place for everything. But please stop thinking you need to count the number of subscriptions or whatever, that is not your cup of tea, sorry.
About public polls: that idea sounds good, although I am not sure if it's possible to do with the forum. Might be easier to add it in Graal.

Who are you referring to? Am I wrong in seeing nothing wrong with making suggestions, or leaving suggestion threads on the forums??

I have reopened the thread but like I said the management or company organization is not something people need to care about, when someone has a suggestion then post it in the suggestion/improvements forum, stop making comments about the management of a company when you have no clue (kondidias and partially Tyhm).

I love'd to develop. I've lost a lot of interest in it now though. Release the new engine with mutli-layers and I might upgrade.

Weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee. I've created several threads with suggestions or bugs and neither get read or fixed by you or your team.

Eeeep, sorry Chief. I was just doin' like Unixmad said and discussing ways to advertise, etc.

I find it highly embarrassing that all these threads are on these forums, and that Graal needs as much help as it does.

Maybe unixmad should have studied up on business before going into business.

Think about how this all looks for the average joe who has just signed up, or is browsing the forums, wanting to upgrade. If I was a newb, and I saw all this crap, I would go spend my money elsewhere.

*shrugs* If Graal is a community, it asks its fellow villagers for advice and support much as I've been doing (incessantly) on these forums. If Graal is a business, it doesn't so much care if a minority of the villagers leave as long as sales stay strong.

They've been around for how many years now? They're fine doing it themselves, all these stupid threads you're making are most likely going nowhere, but this can be explained in one sentence why.. "This is Graal, and this is what happens". You of all people should know this, Graal isn't dead, or dying, it's just hit a huge brick wall.

Yes, fine, I've retracted "How to save Graal" all I can, which is not at all since I lack the power to edit topics I've started. It's a question of How to save Lifetime Classic, which is probably itself a fallacy, as I have no control nor power over the subscription process of Graal Online, nor Cyberjoueurs in general. You may have noticed this thread is titled Community vs Consumerism, and the topic some of us are attempting to discuss is:
Is Graal wearing the big-boy pants?
Is Graal seriously competing with WoW and FFXI?
Is Graal still trying to get on the shelves of a GameStop near you?
The rules of engagement are entirely different if Graal's a Product instead of a Project. Products you buy based on the packaging, Projects you invest in based on the future. If Graal goes up on the shelves at Hastings, inbetween Spyro 7 and Everquest, it's gonna need a serious edge - either in price, or in quality, or something. The same is true if Graal's only going to be in GameInformer, inbetween the ad for WoW and FFXI - if Graal can say One low price instead of monthly, that's something to be proud of. If Graal can say "Our graphics are a million times better than WoW", that's a selling point. If Graal can say "You can make your game here!", that's a project, totally different marketing campaign.

Graal has the edge in the way of making your own playerworld, there is no way in my lifetime that Graal will have better graphics than WoW, so they will never be able to put that on a package.

At the end of the day, these idea's will not be used for the simple fact no one is listening, and these ideas are falling on deaf ears. I've tried in the past to help Graal out, and at what cost?

The definition of insanity is trying the same thing again and hoping for a different result.
By that definition we're all mad here.
Given that everyone's crazy, a Sane Graalian is meaningless.
Meaningless terms can be reassigned at no cost.
Thus we're all Sane Graalians too.
What defines a crazy Graalian?
Well, given the norm, they'd have to be really out there.
Thus, a Crazy Graalian is one foaming at the mouth. A Sane Graalian is just normal-crazy.

Oh wtf, I didn't ask for a total spout of bs to come out.

You are wrong, and Stefan has already stated that they are being read, and some are even being looked into, or used.

This is what Stefan posted in the advertising thread, if you missed it:

It's konidias. At least spell my name right... I've only been around Graal for like 5 years now... and talked to you personally on many many many occasions. Why should we not make comments about the management of the company? We aren't customers. I'm not a customer. I've been an employee of the company itself. This is exactly what we're saying.

Graal is by the players for the players. Whether you coded the engine or not. We the players put the worlds together. We are the ones working hard to make new content for this game. Then you sit here and say Graal's management isn't something we should care about? I really don't understand you sometimes.

We worked together on many occasions yet you still see me as just some random player? Hell, Graal is using a ton of my work as we speak. There are tiles in the default tileset that people use and see every day which I made. Yet you can't even spell my name right or listen to what I have to say about the management. This is just sad. Why do I have faith in this game so much? I really don't get it. I must be stupid.

See this is my point, staff want players to HELP them out when they can't even give the satisfaction of spelling a persons name correctly, or referring to them as a previous staff member, what a joke.

Close - Stefan's saying he DOESN'T need us to help.

Sorry, I'm still giggling over the reversal. This is why I ask if we're consumers or conspirators, if this is a product or a project, a company or a community. It's too gray-area, and in this gray things happen that shouldn't happen in either - things that aren't altogether good for Graal. Just my opinion, but I happen to think rather highly of it.