It's not 10$/month
Its 5$/month
Yea it's not dead tree but you can download pdfs and they will be usefull for more than 3 days (like your TIMES RSS)
You also get tools and stuff, but i don't need to tell you that as you seem to know anything.
I can't eat as much as i wanna barf for every misinformed and unimaginative thrtead.
Blabla
It's not 10$/month
Its 5$/month
Yea it's not dead tree but you can download pdfs and they will be usefull for more than 3 days (like your TIMES RSS)
You also get tools and stuff, but i don't need to tell you that as you seem to know anything.
I can't eat as much as i wanna barf for every misinformed and unimaginative thrtead.
In point of fact, it's $10/month, $20/quarter, or $60/year. It's never $5/month - I can't, at any point, say "Here's $5, let me get my yearly subscription started."
In point of fact, it's $10/month, $20/quarter, or $60/year. It's never $5/month - I can't, at any point, say "Here's $5, let me get my yearly subscription started."
While you can't pay $5 at a time the math DOES mean that $60/year is $5/month.
Both ways of stating it are correct - with the proper qualifiers.
You could buy one month per year for 10$ but you would have to wait that long.
That's a new one.
I think I'm going to go back and sue all those companies that I got free stuff from for beta testing their products who now charge me to use them because they're now no longer the products I originally tested.
No wonder when I complain about something I get attacked. People probably lump me in with things like this without ever listening to what I was trying to say. Can't say I blame them either.
BTW, maybe you should go attack Adobe too: http://webdesign.about.com/b/2009/03/03/adobe-extends-introductory-pricing.htm
And that's just the first result that comes up on Google. There's quite a few more, but I won't sit here all day grabbing examples.
Results 1 - 10 of about 4,170,000 for introductory pricing. (0.21 seconds)
While you can't pay $5 at a time the math DOES mean that $60/year is $5/month.
Both ways of stating it are correct - with the proper qualifiers.
Well, if you're gonna bust out math and stuff, then I'm outta here. ;)
But seriously - it is fine to say it's $5/month without qualifying it at all; I think it's more accurate to include "if you pay it all up front" also. But it's not required, except by me.
When I am God-King of the Universe, these sort of things will be standard language.
Bait & Switch: An illegal tactic in which a seller advertises a product with the intention of persuading customers to purchase a more expensive product.
1 : a sales tactic in which a customer is attracted by the advertisement of a low-priced item but is then encouraged to buy a higher-priced one
2 : the ploy of offering a person something desirable to gain favor (as political support) then thwarting expectations with something less desirable
Bait And Switch is the trade practice by which attractive sale offers, which are non-existent, were made with an intention to sought customers or traffic towards other products or activities. Eg. Offering discount sale after increasing the price, 2. Influencing customers to switch their buy when they visit the shop to buy bargain sales.
Oh I get what your doing, your doing a bait&switch on what bait and switch actually means. you cheeky person you
In all honestly, this pretty much hits the nail dead-on. There were a lot more posts like this all around, even in General Discussion, about other topics than DDI. A lot. Really a lot.
That's why many regulars have built up a reflex reaction of sorts...
Anyways, I'm still wondering why the OP compares WoW and the Times to DDI. Really, I read your sig and all, but I can't grasp it. This is a service for PNPRPGs... neither a MMORPG nor one of the biggest newspapers in existance... really, that is one comparison you can't really make, simple because clientele and intended purpose are very different things.
But keep moaning and complaining uselessly. You might want to lock yourself in at home, though, because Intro-Pricing is a common practice everywhere and has about zilch to do with Bait&Switch... Ah well, I guess the OP won't even come back here, though...
Yeah, I get it. It's unfortunate though, because as a result it takes 3 pages for someone to finally understand the point I'm trying to make just to get to an answer that could probably be found in 2 or 3 posts. That's why I made my current sig, to at least let people know where I'm coming from before the flames begin.
As for the whole comparison thing, I'm fatigued on those conversations myself. I just finished one up on the Miniatures board yesterday where D&D Minis were being compared to Warhammer minis, which are completely different products and are almost impossible to compare apples-to-apples.
I can't think of any clearer way for a company to prove it doesn't care about its customers than to use "introductory" pricing. Also known as "bait & switch". There really isn't much more to add.
Are you saying that all subscription products, from magazines onwards, are morally required to lock in their initial starting rate and never change it? Ever? That seems a terrible way to do business. It is certainly a good thing that economics aren't founded on the principle of customer entitlement, as you seem to feel should be the case.
Honestly, what you are saying is sheer nonsense.
First off, it is their product to sell. That means they get to set the price. You, as the customer, get to decide whether that price is a worthwhile one. This is how buying and selling products works. You don't get to claim that because they sold something to you for $5 a year ago, they are required to sell something similar to you for $5 a year later.
It also isn't bait and switch. Not even remotely! If they changed the price in the middle of your subscription and then charged you the difference, then yes - that would be dishonest and despicable, not to mention probably illegal.
That isn't what they did. The amount you paid for your subscription goes unchanged, and all that product you purchased for that amount will still be delivered to you as promised. When next you go to buy your subscription? The new prices will be clearly listed. If your subscription is set up to auto-renew? They have given an incredible amount of advance notice to inform you of the price change. If you choose to go ahead and purchase at the new price, you are paying them with full awareness of what you are being charged.
No 'bait.' No 'switch.'
Even though all the other fine folk in this thread have already largely pointed out the nonsense of this claim, I felt the need to throw in my thoughts as well. Possibly because this keeps cropping up, and I just don't get how people can genuinely feel this way...
That isn't what they did. The amount you paid for your subscription goes unchanged, and all that product you purchased for that amount will still be delivered to you as promised. When next you go to buy your subscription? The new prices will be clearly listed. If your subscription is set up to auto-renew? They have given an incredible amount of advance notice to inform you of the price change. If you choose to go ahead and purchase at the new price, you are paying them with full awareness of what you are being charged.
They have also implemented the ability for people to *extend* their subscription by an extra X months[1] at the current prices.
[1] If you have a 1-year subscription, you can extend it by a year. If you have a 3-month subscription, you can extend it by 3 months.
Oh I get what your doing, your doing a bait&switch on what bait and switch actually means.
Thank you for saving me from having to type all that.