Greed And D.e.p. Options

[Alykia]

So I heard news of this new adult tag system. It was wonderful, great, well worth the risk and about time some of us were able to have proof of age with whom we are dealing with.Then I find out that apparently they want you to fork over, not only your personal information, (Which is understandable) But cash too.

I dont care about the amount, that is absolutely ridiculous! (They make it small just so they can maybe squeek out whatever they can out of this deal. It is beyond pathetic. And I had respect for the company as a whole!)

Tags are supposed to be supportive to RP and responsible gaming.
Your already paying the postage for sending the information to them, not to mention putting trust into D.E.P. that they will treat your privet information with respect and confidentiality.

Asking you to pay on top of THAT both undermines the principal of the system as well as discourages anyone from going through the bother and risk involved with getting them.

What costs you. = postage and risk of ID theft.
What it costs them to turn the tag on once the get the information = Nothing
And now they want people (who don't tend to have a lot of cash anyway) to pay on top of that?

They are supposed to be encouraging honesty and responsibility, not the other way around!

I was planing on applying for the tags when they came out, but with this over complex money-grubbing attitude, forget it.

[Alykia]

Posted out of frustration before reading Emmy's thread.. . though the point still stands.

Suggestion, have this item be something that will go away when the char expires, as it is not quite like any other dingo and is more of a player showing proof of age rather then any connection to the char itself.

[Grimsly]

D.E.P needs to eat too. Shoot, if they can get people to buy the age verification, and make adults happier in the long run, more power to 'em. Furcadia is free, as long as people are paying for the basics, like the SS, Digo Market items, etcetera. D.E.P isn't, and never was, forcing anyone to send a copy of their ID, or buy this digo. It is just a special feature that allows access to another map, or two, or any dreams that are AV only. You aren't losing anything if you don't buy it, and D.E.P will be able to make the menial profit to be able to keep Furcadia running, and free for those whom cannot afford to support it. And maybe there will be enough money left over for Emmie and Fel to have dinner. They aren't forcing anyone, it is just like any other digo.

[Alykia]

This isn't about forcing anyone; Nobody has to get it.



This is about those of us who -want- it.



Dingos are, as a whole, extremely expensive. But that is the bread and butter for furcadia and helps this game going and keeping it what it is.
Silversponcership is also a very important contribution [one of which I plan on getting when I can afford it]

This is not quite like any other dingo, however.

This is about registering the user with proof of identification. A great and wonderful idea and something that a lot of us have been really excited on seeing happen. This is something that I think -everyone- who is of age, should go through.

D.E.P. is a responsible company that would keep personal information, personal. Heck, they deal with credicard numbers every day. However this thing with going through the system to register age and personal information is also not something that I think should cost 5$ a pop for every bloody char.

Here is an idea. You go through the id verification and register your ID and get a separate 'adult name/password'. Then when you open your furc window, a first window will come up asking if you have an adult tag. If you know the name and password, you log on with that, then pick your char. Thus the tag is still yours without all this muddling about with setting it on particular chars.

Dingos and such are already used to help D.E.P. keep afloat. This paper prosses is not that much and I think it is extremely discouraging for others to even bother with going through the process that is mostly on their end due to the added cost.Which is sad because it should be encoraged rather then makeing it more of a pain then it needs to be.
{sorry for the troll, logging off for night}

This post has been edited by Alykia: Jan 28 2006, 11:15 AM

[yamato mitsarugi]

Okay, if you would like to sort through all the Adult Verification applications and see who's lying, who's not and so forth for free go right ahead. It's a prossesing fee. Besides since you don't have to pay for the overall game they have to make money some how (they are a company).

By the way this really should have all been posted in the Forever Free disscussion thread.

This post has been edited by yamato mitsarugi: Jan 28 2006, 11:20 AM

[Mino]

Does anyone know Dragon's Eye's gross annual income offhand?

[Samuel Michkron]

D.E.P needs to eat too. Shoot, if they can get people to buy the age verification, and make adults happier in the long run, more power to 'em. Furcadia is free, as long as people are paying for the basics, like the SS, Digo Market items, etcetera. D.E.P isn't, and never was, forcing anyone to send a copy of their ID, or buy this digo. It is just a special feature that allows access to another map, or two, or any dreams that are AV only. You aren't losing anything if you don't buy it, and D.E.P will be able to make the menial profit to be able to keep Furcadia running, and free for those whom cannot afford to support it. And maybe there will be enough money left over for Emmie and Fel to have dinner. They aren't forcing anyone, it is just like any other digo.

So you're suggesting it's going to actually cost DEP $5 dollars per tag per character?

[Grimsly]

Does anyone know Dragon's Eye's gross annual income offhand?

I do not.
D.E.P is a company, a company without shareholders. Due to that fact, they do what they want to, when they want to, as long as all of the members of the D.E.P administration agree to it.
It really isn't a whole lot of the consumers business what happens, as long as what we have paid for, is insured. Such as digos, sponserships, etc. They verify an entire account, for ten dollars. Which beats the five dollars a character option.

[Grimsly]

So you're suggesting it's going to actually cost DEP $5 dollars per tag per character?

I'm not suggesting that, I am simply saying that they can charge what they like for their product, it is up to the consumer to make the decision whether or not they are going to purchase it.

[Sidereal]

So I heard news of this new adult tag system. It was wonderful, great, well worth the risk and about time some of us were able to have proof of age with whom we are dealing with.Then I find out that apparently they want you to fork over, not only your personal information, (Which is understandable) But cash too.

I dont care about the amount, that is absolutely ridiculous! (They make it small just so they can maybe squeek out whatever they can out of this deal. It is beyond pathetic. And I had respect for the company as a whole!)

Tags are supposed to be supportive to RP and responsible gaming.
Your already paying the postage for sending the information to them, not to mention putting trust into D.E.P. that they will treat your privet information with respect and confidentiality.

Asking you to pay on top of THAT both undermines the principal of the system as well as discourages anyone from going through the bother and risk involved with getting them.

What costs you. = postage and risk of ID theft.
What it costs them to turn the tag on once the get the information = Nothing
And now they want people (who don't tend to have a lot of cash anyway) to pay on top of that?

They are supposed to be encouraging honesty and responsibility, not the other way around!

I was planing on applying for the tags when they came out, but with this over complex money-grubbing attitude, forget it.

No offense to you personally Alykia, but I am astounded that anyone could compose such a rant.



Of course there would be a charge, and it would NOT be from "greed".



Beyond the costs of overhead that a service like this verification might have, there's the simple fact that DEP must pay a staff member's wage to sit down and process each individual registration... that isn't something that takes a mere minute of time either.



Server equipment and usage cost money. Programming and art cost money. Management costs money. Labor time costs money. Add it all up, and $5 to validate age for a character (or $10 for all the characters on your user account) is actually quite reasonable as a fee... barely more than most S&H fees you are charged to purchase something online.

[Grimsly]

I agree with Sidereal.

Things aren't done by themselves. D.E.P is a real working business. It may produce Furcadia, a game, but it is a company, and the staff require payment for what they do. It isn't a mere hobby to them, it is their livelihood.

[Mino]

D.E.P is a company, a company without shareholders. Due to that fact, they do what they want to, when they want to, as long as all of the members of the D.E.P administration agree to it.
It really isn't a whole lot of the consumers business what happens, as long as what we have paid for, is insured. Such as digos, sponserships, etc. They verify an entire account, for ten dollars. Which beats the five dollars a character option.

I'll have to disagree with you in part. Sure, DEP is a company. But we've all heard that speech one too many times already and we get the picture. It's a company whose product was released "forever free." It still is, in fact. They're just finding more ways of getting income from an in-development online game. I'm sure most adults with online access have the means to prove their age and pay the nominal $5 fee, but that's not the point.

The players of Furcadia have financially supported the company without question for a while. When Dragon's Eye stopped selling art prints with free wings and started selling Digo items, their purchasers became informal stockholders. Not to say that somebody with a Phoenix has any legal rights to the company or that somebody with three life items has more right to know what's going on than somebody with only a portrait space. Any donation is still a donation. And that's what a Digo signifies, a donation!

A digo is a token of the customer's faith in the company whether they're aware of it or not. You wouldn't buy an airline ticket for a flight whose plane isn't capable of flight, would you? Similarly, I wouldn't keep giving a kid $10 every month to mow my lawn if all they do is soak it in gas to "keep it short" while he saves up enough for a lawn mower. I don't question the competence of the programmers or administrations, I just want to know what they have to work with right now.

In my opinion, spreading a two year project over twenty isn't the way to go, especially when the demand for the type of product is potentially waning with each jump in technology. If Digo sales aren't going to cut it anymore, the Verified Adults are just going to have to dish out the $5, plain and simple. But wouldn't anyone more concerned with keeping both children and adults safe be more than willing to offer the service for free, regardless of whether using credit cards or government issued IDs?

[Yun Liu]

Mino, you and everyone else that attach 'greed' and 'money grubbing' to DEP are drama ######s sadly. If you were an actual adult you would just shrug it off and leave it be. Who really cares as long as this tag keeps both children and adults safe? IF someone lies, they get a long vacation from furcadia. A simple fee for this tag is fine to me. I dont see a real reason to argue over it. Its all drama you and ALi are helping extend. As for this tag, the fee prolly is about as much as it would cost them to process it and attach it to the char. I could be wrong but... everyone has to make money and look at furcadia. Getting 4000 furres on when i still remember max being 300 to 500 at one point. Forever free yea, who cares really? Why do any of you ###### and argue over this? Selfish reasons I think, smacks of hate. Who cares? Only thing i care about is the fact that a lot of you ###### and argue and most of you are between 15 and 25 arguing about how suxor it is. Come on, grow up yall. Do you really have to care about this or is it just another reason to bash Dragon Eye Productions and those that run it? THink on that, think about the real reason you are complaining about a measly 5 dollar fee. Sad... thats what it is... very sad.

[Sidereal]

But wouldn't anyone more concerned with keeping both children and adults safe be more than willing to offer the service for free, regardless of whether using credit cards or government issued IDs?

Technically, they pretty much are. The fee mentioned

for the registration is a processing fee

From the announcement:

We've been looking at a solution for this problem for several years and have decided upon voluntary adult verification of your age in the form of a copy of legal indetification along with a signed letter declaring you are over 18 and a nominal fee for processing.

To cover our costs for processing and the aditional services we will offer with this, we will be charging a $5 one time fee per name you want verified or $10 for an entire account.

[Mino]

Mino, you and everyone else that attach 'greed' and 'money grubbing' to DEP are drama ######s sadly. If you were an actual adult you would just shrug it off and leave it be. Who really cares as long as this tag keeps both children and adults safe? IF someone lies, they get a long vacation from furcadia. A simple fee for this tag is fine to me. I dont see a real reason to argue over it. Its all drama you and ALi are helping extend. As for this tag, the fee prolly is about as much as it would cost them to process it and attach it to the char. I could be wrong but... everyone has to make money and look at furcadia. Getting 4000 furres on when i still remember max being 300 to 500 at one point. Forever free yea, who cares really? Why do any of you ###### and argue over this? Selfish reasons I think, smacks of hate. Who cares? Only thing i care about is the fact that a lot of you ###### and argue and most of you are between 15 and 25 arguing about how suxor it is. Come on, grow up yall. Do you really have to care about this or is it just another reason to bash Dragon Eye Productions and those that run it? THink on that, think about the real reason you are complaining about a measly 5 dollar fee. Sad... thats what it is... very sad.

Please refrain from making fallacious arguments to blow things out of proportion or promote flaming. Asking questions makes me a hater? Peculiar reasoning! I just asked if anyone knew what Dragon's Eye makes from Digo sales a year. Grimsly said that it's not our business and I responded. Never once did I say I had a problem with being verified. I am, in fact, over twenty years of age and live with my girlfriend of three years. Trust me, I'm an adult. #SD Unfortunately your post was based on a misconception and as a result, I'll allow you to restate any remaining point if you so desire.

[Mino]

Technically, they pretty much are. The fee mentioned for the registration is a processing fee

Right, and every other competent company that I know of uses credit card validation, including multiple adult web sites and even Second Life. FurryMUCK has a similar system but I think even they offer it free of charge. Correct me if I'm wrong, though!

[Youlanda]

For about two dollars you can pretty much completely eliminate the risk of your ID information being stolen by mail. Just go to Kinkos and send the information by Fax.

This post has been edited by Youlanda: Jan 28 2006, 02:36 PM

[Gar]

It would take probably(educated guess) 8-10k $5 adult verifications just to pay for the work of multiple people that it will take to impliment the new system. The fee is a processing fee yes, but that basicly means that this feature will be running at a deficit, taking a small amount of the fee to 'pay itself off' for a long long time. This isn't about increasing profit margins. This is about defering expenses. This is about DEP trying to not eat its shirt over a feature which hopefully is going to be more of a benifit to the community over all.

[Alykia]

Honestly didn't think of it in that way, that is that it costs to get ID's confirmed or that they were even bothering with confirming IDs. But makes sense.

All in all, good points well made.

For about two dollars you can pretty much completely eliminate the risk of your ID information being stolen by mail. Just go to Kinkos and send the information by Fax.

Thanks youl, Not a lot know that, (I didnt), and it's important to note.

[Felorin]

There are a number of points I'd like to address and clarify here. I'll start with this:

If Digo sales aren't going to cut it anymore, the Verified Adults are just going to have to dish out the $5, plain and simple. But wouldn't anyone more concerned with keeping both children and adults safe be more than willing to offer the service for free, regardless of whether using credit cards or government issued IDs?

If Dragon's Eye were bringing in $100 million dollars a year, like some big games do, and say we needed $50 million a year to pay for server and bandwidth expenses & for an adequate size staff to do customer service, tech support, etc. then sure, I'd love to provide more services for our wonderful community of players for free. Big games like World of Warcraft can easily cover the costs of putting in some special Christmas events and items for no additional charge, paid for out of their profits. Well, we do free holiday events too actually - those are easier, because there isn't a per-user cost. Making christmas art or a christmas game costs you a fixed amount, once, whether it's looked at by 1 player or 100,000 players. Providing a free service that takes a non-zero amount of time per player for a staff member to process something from them, talk to them, etc. is trickier. (That's why even the big profitable places often outsource their customer service to less expensive overseas call centers and train people there to know about the game.)

We do, in fact, already provide a lot of free "takes time for each user" services - customer service and tech support being big ones, also having Guardians respond to calls from people with trouble is another. We are woefully understaffed, even with some volunteers helping out there, and the two people that handle most of our emails from the public are very overworked and I'm amazed they don't fall behind more. I've been trying to figure out how I can get them more help for a couple of years now. We answer many emails from people who don't pay anything to play Furcadia (the majority), too - whereas on a big commercial game, every player is paying $10 to $15 a month to play, and some percentage of that can go towards having dozens of customer service staff to handle that. That we DO provide as a huge free service, and it's one that's a lot costlier to us to provide than the adult verification service. I don't think people would prefer it if we gave adult verification away free, but only offered tech support, guardian help, etc. to people who pay for it! All things considered, the things we give the community free (including "being able to play the game") hugely outweigh the things we charge for, even with this small addition.

I briefly considered whether I should try to make adult verification a "major new income source", or just charge a small fee to try and cover costs. I chose the latter, because it's more intended as a service to the community. Anyone imagining this is going to bring in the kind of money that wings and dragons do has a very vivid imagination, I think. It's $5 for life, one time payment only, and it's not fun or flashy or pretty like wings or phoenixes or dragons. And if you want it on 10 characters, instead of paying 10 times like you'd have to for wings, you can get a whole account full of characters for $10. That's $1 per alt, for life - not very much. Even less if you have digos & thus have more than 10 characters on your account.

Gar has a very good point, too - while the $5 easily covers our expenses of processing these and fililng them away in a filing cabinet, with some to spare, it really isn't budgeted to cover the amount of staff time involved in implementing all the programming and other details of setting this up. That we are also, in a sense, "giving" to the community. Time spent programming a monthly or annual subscription feature like Group Packages or the new Kitterwings brings us a lot more money back. But we put progrramming into many new free features each year - 24 bit art support with translucency is coming out free this year sometime, as is truetype font support, colored text, bears and cows/minotaurs, lots more for free. I think sometimes the amount we give away for free goes beyond being "not greedy" to being "somewhat stupid" from a business standpoint, in that if we charges for more of the things you can do in Furcadia we'd probably be making a lot more money.

As it is though, we're not making even a million dollars a year (I hope we will someday, and a lot more, but we'll see!) Once costs are paid for servers, bandwidth, office supplies, taxes, medical insurance for some of our staff, etc. pretty much all the money goes to paying a handful of people to work fulltime (or in a few cases part time) on Furcadia. And it's not enough to cover the amount of customer service staff we need, the amount of programming and art we could use, etc. We work hard and accomplish as much as we can, and when we make more money we'll hire more people and accomplish more. Even the help we take from volunteers is costly in terms of management and coordination time, which we can only afford so much of with just half a dozen or so staff members. Trying to deal with the number of volunteers we do with so few people here is kinda insane, but we do it anyway.

There's some more points I want to address, but this is what I wanted to say to start with. More later.