ID:1628511
 
I don't want to derail a preexisting non relating thread we already have going on here, but I am wondering something.

How much would you say you or your team has committed to BYOND? Now, I don't just mean how much time you have spent using the product. I would like to see how many people are really committed to BYOND. How much time and money have you sunk into keeping BYOND alive, how hard have you tried to advertise and "shill" on BYOND's behalf?

Do you have any liability with BYOND? (I don't think anyone but Tom really does).

If BYOND were to go down, how much of your life has been ruined and must be started over from scratch? Not some small project for funsies, but something you invested a lot of money into and had a long term plan.

I personally don't believe there are more than a small, smaaaall handful of people that have a real commitment to BYOND.
I Akama/Tobi3308/Baird/Daimond/Daimondxz/Dakumonki/Murowko/ Marc Techie/ Baird Techie, am committed to using BYOND. A ton of people dislike me for my arrogance and speaking the truth*don't even think Tom gives a shit about me* and it's so easy to deceive people on the webs but there's no need I'm fine with it that's why I'm still here people are just losers hence fail projects everywhere.

I believe it's extremely easy to profit from BYOND but a-lot of people lack the skills to do so. BYOND has a-lot of potential and can still be improved in many ways it just needs help from its community which is one of the biggest issues. Everyone's bent on worshiping programmers and pixel artist but aren't even committed to playing their games once it's finished*gee I wonder why*. I believe if BYOND games were playable in a web browser its popularity would spike easily, and Ter told me that's being worked on so I'm just waiting for it. And if I become successful through my BYOND projects I said it once I'll say it again I will donate to help BYOND reach its goals, I hate the forum community but love the gaming community in BYOND*I kinda hate them too*.

No matter the subject, someone will always look down on another causing conflict, no matter if it's race, financial standings, grammar, creativity, skills, it'll happen because there's all kinds of people in this world and one person can't just simply understand another person ideas.

We're all trash in our own way, and we all can see what makes us all trash. It's better to look at each-others strengths in make use of that but some people judge a book by its cover but not what the knowledge that's inside of it, those people, stuck up blind trash.
I think about £500 in adwords campaign stuff, for BYOND Anime of all things, back in the day, represents the extent of my genuine commitment to BYOND.

Maaaaybe the BYOND Linux repositories I ran also, would count, maybe? Mind you, they also ended pretty much when I felt like it, with serious no consequence to BYOND as a whole, so they don't essentially meet the cut either.

Much of the rest of it is waffle, my moderation position is about the most uncommitted of such positions I've held, especially due to the number of moderators on the register. My few libraries can rot or be maintained essentially as I please, https://github.com/BYOND is essentially as productive as I feel like making it and has no real commitment from anyone else either. It's all volunteer stuff, can be stopped whenever.

Donations are donations, so my $$$ there is basically done without commitment either, and represents "spare cash", that I can stop contributing whenever I feel like it.
In response to Baird Techie
I think EG was more going for commitment, as described in:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Chicken_and_the_Pig

Basically if BYOND dies, is sued or hits any other serious problem, Tom is a 'pig' in this analogy. He carries debt, he is the one that needs to pay a lawyer to defend BYOND / himself, he has to solve it etc.

Where-as, you and I, well ... we just go "Well, man, that sucks" and move on with our lives. We lose the work we put into our games, but ... hey-ho, no massive deal. Even the money you put into art isn't lost really, you can take those art assets to another platform. We're 'chickens' in this analogy.
In response to Stephen001
You got it boo.
In response to Stephen001
Stephen001 wrote:
I think EG was more going for commitment, as described in:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Chicken_and_the_Pig

Basically if BYOND dies, is sued or hits any other serious problem, Tom is a 'pig' in this analogy. He carries debt, he is the one that needs to pay a lawyer to defend BYOND / himself, he has to solve it etc.

So it seems like the commitment y'all are looking for is just "how much money you spent in BYOND? how much time you spent in BYOND?" basically, screw BYOND, how much would you lose if it goes down? Not "Will you help it get back up if its down?" my bad for misunderstanding.

Sounds like more of a commitment to ones projects than BYOND because you can just carry it on to something else. While BYOND dies and farts.

Where-as, you and I, well ... we just go "Well, man, that sucks" and move on with our lives. We lose the work we put into our games, but ... hey-ho, no massive deal. Even the money you put into art isn't lost really, you can take those art assets to another platform. We're 'chickens' in this analogy.
Well, there's also the question of "could BYOND function / have functioned just as well without you". Like if I had banned you, for example, some years ago, and kept the ban ... would BYOND be materially much worse, or even dead, as a direct consequence?

So yes, how much money you've invested, but also, how much money have you generated.

There are a few people, to whom that applies, but not many.

Teka123, as you assume if he was banned early, BYOND would be $10k+ out of pocket, and some of that will have been when Tom really really needed it to balance the books.

SilkWizard, as you assume if he was banned early, BYOND would not have been the platform for NEStalgia, BYOND would not have pocketed the subscription revenue it did, got the a game that had gaming press releases about it, had a game that was greenlit on Steam. It would materially have had less exposure and thus new traffic, putting it worse-off both financially and in terms of being able to attract finance. Similarly SilkWizard stands to lose a fair bit, financially and organisationally, if BYOND just packs up tomorrow. It puts the active business side of NEStalgia in some jeopardy, does he have to refund his subscribers due to lost service, etc etc?

...

...

I think that's the bulk of it? I mean pretty much, even with your projects Baird, you can move to another platform if BYOND dropped dead tomorrow. Whether you do or not, is your choice, but you have the choice. Where-as Tom doesn't have the choice about repaying BYOND's debts. That's commitment, vs involvement.
How much money and time you have spent on BYOND is not the complete gamut. It's also how much will you continue to do so for an elongated period of time. How much of these has an individual put in to going off and marketing on their own (probably not the best option).

We have tons of people here with real professional skills.

But how many of them have the commitment (rather than just dedication), to putting in 20-40+ hours a week to provide their skills for BYOND? And I don't mean getting paid by Tom, I mean straight up providing your professional skills at your loss.

Honestly, I just don't have the commitment to BYOND to do that. I cannot afford to have that strong commitment to BYOND to help it out using my professional skills, I can't find the value in the business or product anymore in 2014.

A lot of members have the dedication. They will put up with some software issues and use it. They'll make some games, fail, and either leave or keep trying. Sometimes they even dump a few thousands into them. But that's because they have dedication. Dedication does not equal commitment.

Edit: Though I guess people see dedication as more passionate and zealous than commitment... Maybe we should restructure these tiers.
In response to Stephen001
Absolutely, Teka is only recently giving his shot at pixel art and putting together his own projects, but before that (and even now), he still shows a commitment not just in the software but in the business.

Look at those massive jumps in the top donators section. Teka has put forth thousands of dollars ahead of everyone else, not because he wants to be number one (he is a very humble enjoyable guy), but because he has this die hard love for BYOND and what it is so much that he is essentially a prime investor.

If you don't have the money to keep giving to BYOND, that's definitely okay, it isn't everything. However, when you don't necessarily have the money and you keep doing it, it's pretty significant.
I sacrificed my first born son for byond.
Lots.
EnigmaticGallivanter wrote:
How much would you say you or your team has committed to BYOND?

In short, very little.

How much time and money have you sunk into keeping BYOND alive, how hard have you tried to advertise and "shill" on BYOND's behalf?

Regarding money: $24 over the course of 7+ years. As for advertising, I mostly spread the word about BYOND when I was more active on other websites and online gaming.
I've sacrificed my parent's credit cards for Byond, I now live in a apartment because of it.
For about ten years, the only site I went to (besides my own sites) was BYOND. The only programs I used were Dream Maker and BYOND (with a few exceptions here and there). I spent countless hours every day working on something for BYOND. I spent thousands of dollars every year on BYOND and my projects on BYOND. It would be impossible for me to calculate the magnitude of time and money I put into BYOND things.

It would be really sad for me to see BYOND shut down, but I went through my BYOND-life crisis last year and branched out away from BYOND, essentially starting over from scratch, so I have removed myself from my BYOND dependency. My games dying off helped me to do that. I love BYOND and if I had the money, I'd throw it at it, but last year was the best year of my life.
I think it's safe to say that many, many people have put a lot of time into the project over the years. Whether that is "investment" or "commitment" to me is largely irrelevant because time spent on BYOND could be used elsewhere, and I consider it a great honor that people have chosen to spend it here.

I hope that our upcoming update keeps some of you oldbies on board, and brings in a new generation of people to our community!
Support thy developers.
In response to Nadrew
Nadrew wrote:
Lots.

for me, nada

not until recently i came to the conclusion that if you aren't making games or doing something that's otherwise productive(e.g. creating libraries) then you shouldn't be on byond. it's a waste of time. i'm not belittling the engine or the community—it's great. however, for many developers, the ROI just isn't worth it.
In response to Tom
I won't leave you, Tom!
This is a hard question to answer. As far as pushing the project and the community, I can't say I've contributed a ton. There were times in the past when I was a lot more naive and pushed for certain changes in BYOND and in BYOND's community, which may have had some effects at certain times. As far as money, I've maybe given somewhere around 200 dollars total - possibly more. Not a whole lot.

BYOND's been my internet life since I first arrived here 8-or-so years ago. (Damn, has it really been that long?) I've spent a lot of time working on cool projects, proof-of-concepts. Maybe some of those had some impact. I remember my early attempts at pixel movement made some waves. It's really hard to judge how much effort I've put into BYOND.

A few years ago I was quite a bit more gung-ho about advertising BYOND games outside of BYOND. If there was a game that I really liked (Casual Quest and Regressia come to mind), I would post it somewhere like TIGsource. I was really passionate about getting TIGsource to accept BYOND as viable game creation software. Alas, there are a lot of preconceptions about BYOND out there.

To sum it up: I've done very little. I'm not so sure it's my job. I'd love for BYOND to get out there more, however. An HTML5 client would certainly rekindle that passion (assuming I can plop up whatever game I want on a hub, including single-player games, demos, and proof-of-concepts).

About how much of my life would be ruined if BYOND went under - not a lot. I don't have any massive projects that would be destroyed by BYOND suddenly going away. As far as those kinds of commitments go, I have none.

My tie to BYOND is that I love both the software and the community (even with all of your occasional problems, I must admit that I have a soft spot for you guys). I would be devastated to see BYOND go under, and I know I'm not alone. Tom realized this when he saw the response from his donation campaign. Though not many people have any true investments into BYOND, we all cherish the software for one reason or another.
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