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There is a different between an unprofitable business and an NPO. In the US there are legal definitions for this/laws/regulations...guidelines. In the normal moral sense and just ethically from a business standpoint...you shouldn't treat your customers like volunteers and your game like a charitable work. Neither is neither.

I really dislike ANY business or business person who tries to sell this idea they are in a labor of love all the while they are trying to make money. Which is it? Are you trying to make money, or are you running an NPO??????????????

BB might change if they started to think of themselves as a business and their customers as customers. It might straighten some things out.

I have been preaching this for the last few years and I guess the BBs would agree to those statements. However there is a huge number of dull users that will hate and condemn you for what you said there, just because they do not seem to understand how businesses work...

That said, we're certainly not against growing our userbase, and if you can think of ways of involving the current community to help us grow, I'm happy for us to do what we can.

(249779.1)

Just sayin' :-)

Last edited by Gamer at 10/27/2013 16:34:33

At the same time, we are faced with the usual dilemmas of a start-up web company. Buzzerbeater employs a full time development team, and it is run off an ever expanding server farm. These costs aren't cheap, so in order to support ourselves as a real live business, we have introduced BuzzerBeater Supporter. It gives users the opportunity to help with the development of the game, and get some value out of their contribution through some extra, server-intensive features.

This does not sound at all vague as to the nature of this business. Supporter is, in fact, a donation. You do not have to pay to play this game. If you do pay, however, I see no reason for the company to refund anything. No one forced a payment out of anyone.

What's more, to buy Supporter and then, after a few months, say you want a refund because it is not fun anymore is like ordering a pizza, eating two slices, and asking for a refund because you would rather have pasta.

There is a difference between a donation, which is defined as something given to help a person or organization, and a tax-deductible donation. IF I choose to pay money to help this free game, I donate it to help offset the costs of running the business. In return I receive benefits.
My point is that BB never claimed to be anything other than a company running a business. You seem to think they are trying to walk some gray area , which is not at all true or defensible, in my opinion. There are, however, many business models in the world. Because an online company accepts donations to offset their operating costs in exchange for bells and whistles does not mean that what is given is not a donation. It is a semantic argument, and not worth more time wasted considering it. I consider the money I pay the game a donation to help them offset operating costs, and I gladly accept the benefits that I receive in return. If I suddenly ( or not so suddenly but after months and years of making sure to let everyone who would listen know how upset the game makes me) decided to leave the game, I would think about the fact that I freely chose to cough up a little less than ten cents a day before I wanted it back.

You are right about my analogy. It would be more accurate to say that I went to a free all-you-can eat pizza party where I could give an extra two bucks to get mushrooms on my pizza, paid the two bucks, ate a bunch of the mushroom pizza, then said I wanted my two bucks back because I didn't want to eat any more mushroom pizza.

Actually, It seems to me that BB sells advertizing space. In lieu of advertizing space, you can pay about 11 cents a day.

What's more, to buy Supporter and then, after a few months, say you want a refund because it is not fun anymore is like ordering a pizza, eating two slices, and asking for a refund because you would rather have pasta.

Not even the same. It's more like ordering a pizza and you take a bite and you find out it is cold and the crust is stale. Yes, you would get a refund in that case.
I don't know where you got the.."rather have pasta" bit, but in that sentence it would be referring to me asking for an exchange. I don't want an exchange as I stated in my earlier post.