What's Up With Moviestorm Subscriptions?
Dec
The big news this month in the Machinima world has been Moviestorm’s introduction of a subscription plan, the most controversial aspect of which is its lockout feature for mods.
Obviously, Johnnie can’t really comment on this, what with being Product Manager for Moviestorm and all, so it’s just me.
The highlights:
- A subscription costs $79 a year or $7.99 a month.
- Without a subscription, Moviestorm will not allow you to use third-party mods - apparently including ones you’ve created in the past.
- A subscription gives you access to the Mod Shop and 800 Moviestorm points a month.
- Many long-term Moviestorm users are elegible for a free subscription (although MS do ask for your credit card number) for the next year.
There has been quite a bit of chatter on the subject, much of it negative. A large number of long-term Moviestorm users, including AngriBuddhist and award-winner Iain Friar were concerned about the new plan on the official forums, and there was a similarly heated debate on TMO Radio - both attracting official comments from Jeff Zie, the CEO of Moviestorm, and Matt Kelland, the Creative Director. by contrast, Phil “Overman” Rice reacted strongly against detractors on his blog, saying “Let’s save that kind of action and drama (and comedy) for our screenplays, where it’s actually fun to see”. And Kate Fosk provided a rather balanced commentary over at Pineapple Pictures, ending up with the decision that she won’t subscribe for now.
I don’t have a hard angle on this change yet. From a business perspective, subscriptions are obviously extremely attractive as they provide steady, predictable revenue stream, rather than one-off sales. On the other hand, consumers have traditionally been very reluctant to invest in software, particularly creation software, which is subscription-based - the threat of the software stopping working, either through business change or the user stopping paying, and denying the user access to their work is a serious one. My current feeling is that this is a make-or-break decision for MS on a business level - it’ll either give them a steady revenue stream or cut them off from their early adopters and evangelists, and only time will tell which.
As far as users go, there are a whole raft of issues here:
MS has always had a Digital Rights Management system in place, but before it has effectively been invisible. However, now it has the capability to lock a user out of his own created mods, the usual problems with DRM become more obvious. What happens if MS goes out of business? What happens if MS’s management changes? Do users have any assurance that they’ll be able to access their software at any price? Commercial usage, in particular, of MS for any long-term project must now take into account that it might, perhaps, some day stop working, and that’s a non-trivial risk. There is currently some discussion of a “lifetime” subscription for MS, which, depending on how it works, might eliminate a lot of these concerns, but as it stands, if the MS authentication servers go away, MS stops working. (That’s not very likely, however.)
It seems that MS have put their good reputation directly on the line as security for this change. Most of the defenders of this policy are currently defending it on the basis that Moviestorm have a great reputation for supporting Machinima and generally being cool, which is currently true - if that changes (as can happen, as most old-time Machinima creators will be aware), expect to see confidence in MS’s value sink rapidly. On the other hand, it may well be that the only way to make a subscription like this work is to maintain a reputation for trustworthiness - the only other successful example I can think of is Fog Creek, who run several subscription-based developer tools, and are also very well-known and trusted thanks to the efforts of their founder, Joel Spotsky.
I don’t have deep insight into Moviestorm’s current finances, but it seems pretty obvious to me that some kind of additional monetisation was going to be required if the company was to continue developing MS. From that point of view, a subscription ain’t the worst deal in the world, and fits with their “low-cost” principles. An iClone-like $300 or so sticker price would probably have attracted a worse reaction.
MS will also now have to deal with security on a notoriously tricky problem - that of controlling a program running on a computer under the control of someone else. I wonder how long it will be before someone publishes information on how to re-enable the mod shop for free, and what MS will do about that? (I’m not going to discuss the technical issues behind that further, but I know if I was contemplating a large-scale project with MS, I’d make damn sure that in worst case I could crack the control, Just In Case.)
The big issue here is clearly the control over third-party mods, including those that were created before their creators knew about this upcoming change. Many creators are feeling betrayed or insecure. It’s early days yet, and I’m unsure as to whether MS’s management team anticipated the outcry that has resulted. Hence, I’m watching this space to see if they can find a good way to resolve those concerns. Again, watch this space on the lifetime subscription issue.
There are two ways to look at the risk represented by MS’s subscription model. On the one hand, film projects always overrun. If we’d decided to use MS at the start of making BLoodSpell, would we really have thought that we’d still need it 5 years ahead? Would we have budgeted for that? On the other hand, whilst I always make sure I can still access and use old film production material, I haven’t touched the assets for any of my films in the last 12 years after production was complete. It’s important to remember that MS’s license controls the 3D assets, not the 2D footage, which at the end of the day is more important for film production.
Personally, I’m finding this entire episode fascinating. I’m not using Moviestorm at the moment, nor am I likely to be for a while (until there’s an easy import route for motion capture data, basically), so I’ve not got a dog in this race. As a businessman, it’s really interesting to watch as more experienced biz people (Matt and Jeff, amongst others) try new models to find one that works for their business. Almost makes me wish I was in the boardroom with them.
(Almost. I learned a long time ago that amongst the things I’m very good at, software development ain’t.)
And as a Machinima commentator, it’ll be fascinating to see how this all plays out. Will it turn out to be a damp squib? Will subscriptions prove themselves worth it? Will the mod tools for Moviestorm improve now that they’re driving revenue? Or will the discontent turn into an en masse rebellion? Will MS decide to make changes to their policies, or will they stick to their guns? In particular, will they find a way to solve the “but it might die on me some day” problem, or the “but I want control of my content” problem?
What do you think?
(Some full disclosures on this article: I’ve consulted on Moviestorm several times and used it professionally, and many of the people involved in its development are personal friends of mine. I have also consulted for their competitors, although that company is no longer in business. Finally, I’m involved with several organisations whom are heavily critical of restrictive software licensing and DRM in general.)
“by contrast, Phil “Overman” Rice reacted strongly against detractors on his blog, saying “Let’s save that kind of action and drama (and comedy) for our screenplays, where it’s actually fun to see”.”
Um, wow. What a characterization of what I said. My post was 95% positive language, making a case for the merits of the new business model. Just about everyone who has responded to it on my blog or in the forum or privately has responded positively. First of all, context clearly shows I was not scolding anyone for their dissent but addressing those who are using the issue to divide and/or pit communities against one another. Secondly, that was part of a two sentence coda that was of a wholly different emphasis than the rest of the lengthy post. But you choose THAT quote to represent my reaction?
The only “reaction against dissenters” I engaged in was one of reasoned persuasion, at the tail end of which I expressed my distaste for opportunists looking to divide people.
The quote is correct, but completely out of context. How it is characterized above is both unfair and inaccurate.
My impression from reading that blog post was that you were unhappy with the hoo-hah raised on the forums (a stance that your commenters seemed to be praising you for) and wanted to present your own impressions of the decision.
The reason I chose that quote was because it stuck in my mind as representative of the post. I can remove the mention of your post, if you like.
As one of the people who responded in the MS forums to Phil’s post, I didn’t take it as an admonition do detractors in general, but as Phil said to opportunists who seek to “stir the pot” within the community. Being a detractor, if I felt Phil was admonishing detractors, I likely would’ve either spoke my bit or overlooked the post rather then comment at all.
Anyway, I personally think the subscription plan is a great deal. By going annual you are getting two months free, which in points translates to free content (as opposed to the monthly plan).
But as an ardent MS supporter, I strongly opposed the restriction of modding and 3rd-party content.
My concern with content is mainly within the “but I want control of my own content” area. If someone spends a lot of time creating their own content, they are not likely to feel comfortable with it being restricted. It is inevitable that there are going to be those who believe “what I create should be mine”, and that could cause them to look on the MS product unfavorably.
I personally don’t have a problem this content obtained from others being restricted. But if a consumer is thinking about investing in Moviestorm, they are going to consider the 3rd-content matter as a whole, and start determining value for cost. If they are aware of iClone, which to my understanding does not restrict 3rd-party content, it is possible they may consider that product to have more value, despite the hefty price tag. If another competitor enters the market with no restrictions, this just compounds the issue. No one is going to like the idea that their legally obtained, or originally made content is “held for ransom” by any business entity.
Hopefully, the lifetime plan will offer a viable solution to this dilemma, but that will ultimately depend on it’s inherent value.
Another problem is the restriction of the modding tool. 3rd-party content is ultimately going to be a driving force on sales for MS, since each piece of content produced that fills gaps in what MS is providing gives the overall product added value. Modders who wish to sell their content have to now take into consideration cost vs. gain, whether they stand to make enough to offset the subscription cost and maybe make enough money to make their business a worthwhile venture. But by requiring a subscription that will get costly for someone focused solely on modding, along with only having the ability to sell to a limited market, may discourage some modders from making the effort, which translates into a value loss for the MS product.
The bigger issue is those who mod and freely distribute. Paying a subscription just to mod with the intent to distribute freely doesn’t make sense to them. There have been some who have already said they will not mod for MS as long as they have to pay to do it. There is the attitude that their efforts would be helping MS, so they shouldn’t have to pay to do it. This again translates into a value loss.
The modding issue is possibly the biggest of the two, since 3rd-party content is going to be extremely important to the overall value and appeal of the MS product, and if modders find the method of being able to mod unappealing, that reduces the overall quantity of content out there.
They need to find a way to rectify this if they hope to have a truly robust modding community to support and add value to their product.
Although I’m sure they didn’t expect quite the amount of negative feedback they have gotten, I think it’s better they got it now. It affords them the opportunity to address the concerns. Hopefully, they can do so in a way that keeps them viable and competitive.
@Hugh - Did you mischaracterize me because you were looking for “contrast”… to draw up battle lines and make this story more dramatic than it actually is? The alchemy you had to apply to what I wrote to turn me into The Antidissenter is mind boggling.
“I can remove the mention of your post, if you like.”
Nope. Let’s just leave all these comments here in the public record. After all, you said so yourself, what OTHER people comment on a post is more influential than what the blog author actually wrote. So let’s try that on for size over here as well.
@Phil - I’m far from unbiased here, and I’ll openly admit as such, but I thought your post was excellent. Level-headed and sensible, whilst at the same time addressing, in an intelligent and modular fashion, the concerns raised by several members of the Moviestorm community.
My reading of your post does indeed see you as speaking out against “detractors” - “detractors” being, as Sean suggests above, those who would perhaps seeks to inflate the discussion into something more controversial (and divisive) than it actually is. I didn’t read the post as being one in which you “took sides”. As you said yourself, a Moviestorm subscription makes sense for you right now, but doesn’t for others (and you laid out the reasons for that very eloquently).
I’m certain that it wasn’t Hugh’s intention to deliberately misrepresent you, or to set you up as an opposition figure to other bloggers and community members. Perhaps the word ‘detractors’ was the wrong one to use - I can see how that might be. But even though Hugh quoted only a single line from your post, he did link to the entire blog post in the very same sentence. I really don’t believe his intention was to mischaracterize or antagonize.
I got caught by Antics: despite promising Antics users a perpetual license the servers are now closed and any Antics user who wants to re install their copy can’t because they wont be able to activate it. MS may go the same route so investing in a subscription now seems like a bad decision in the long run.
The Antics experience soured me to online software, which is a shame as there’s a couple of good Machinima types that have recently appeared which are online only. There’s muvizu from a bunch of Weegies and Xtranormal which is really easy to use - and doesn’t come from a bunch of Weegies - if you can get past the automatic updating every time you load it up.
IIRC, Antics went out of business because they weren’t making money off the software.
From what I read online, Antics had over 20,000 downloads but only 1,000 people bought the commerical version of Antics.
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