after you pay all your bills, you still have some money left, usually a pretty decent amount. instead of spending it on other luxuries, put all of it into a server, or scale the server back to pay less.
there's no reason to compete with all those 1000-member big servers, other than seeking attention.
too many servers these days are created to earn money without paying any taxes rather than to have a place for you and your friends to play.
if there's one thing that's killing this community, it's all those scam servers and a "me too!" mentality for creating new ones to get their 5 minutes of spotlight.
it's definitely not mojang finally starting to enforce their eula they had for so long.
hell, i wish mojang enforced a license on servers that want to monetize things. if they want to sell anything, they need to pay mojang their share.
May I just quickly ask what server do you >like< to play on? if any. If you don't I understand how you might feel this way. I'd like to see if it's popular, if it has donations and if it does I'd like to ask the Owner if he never got any donations if the server would still be alive.
The issue with your post is that not all servers are started for business, or have become about the money. those that do fail, if a server owner only cares about the money, the community leaves. Simple fact in a lot of cases (not all) but a lot.
Personally I've never made a profit with my server. I can tell you I make just about 1300 a month (as a student with a crappy job). My rent is $1815.44. Now luckily I have a roommate to pay half of that, Which makes my rent $907.72 a month.
Leaving me with: 392,58$ for everything.
now lets say a server is 305$
website is 30 + a bit extra for domains and whatnot
This leaves me with about $57 for groceries and everything in a month. That or a bunch of loans.
And this is before potentially paying webdevs, staff, graphic designers, builders and plugin devs.
Needless to say, without any support from our players I would not be able to provide the quality I do if any server at all.
and trust me I don't make a profit for my server, I never have and I don't deliver any gameplay breaking donations. In fact I've closed my donations for time being.
so please don't tell me that we should just magically be able to afford paying for the server without any help. Maybe a few can, but you have to realize it's a minecraft community. We're not all 40 with a finished education and a stable job.
I'll bet you that most server owners aren't even 18 yet. And most importantly. MOST servers are not about the money, it's about the game and community. Like mine, Whether you think I'm stupid or not. I would not be running minecraft servers for over 2 years without making a penny if I did it for the money... So please, stop assuming everyone "does it for the money" or the wrong reasons or whatever you call it. Some do. Yes, but those that do don't survive very long. Mojang is hurting all of us. Not just those that do. Don't forget that.
And for the record. I don't think any of us would have anything against paying a license to host a server. Personally I'm for the idea, it'll shove out a lot of bad servers, those who cares about the community paying for license or not will get it. Mojang will make money off us which they seem to love. And we can all be happy. So yeah, make us pay a license to use the game as the game engine it has become... Not this.
And yes, we might not be able to compete with the servers that has the players to actually create jobs around this amazing franchise. But we can still provide a quality service if Mojang lets us. and not everyone wants to play on the top 10 servers. While they have amazing content cause they have to money it takes to pay for it. We have a community. I have the ability to care for every single one of my players. Cause there's not 10.000 of them on at one time. Some people appreciate that. So please stop thinking about money and think about quality of the game.
I just recently personally had a problem relating to servers selling in-game perks: Maddyncraft, one of the servers running the Yogscast Complete modpack has certain items and abilities banned due to griefing uses (Ars Magica dig, Portal Guns, etc.) and trying to keep lag down (chunk loaders), but you can buy banned items via donation. All well and good, really, since it means griefers can't just come on and find the one thing they need to get around anti-grief, but as it turns out, chunk loading behavior breaks an automatic farm I built...so in order to use the in-game work around a mod bug, I would need to pay the server money.
I really hope that they notice this and change; the server is otherwise good.
Definitely look forward to not seeing a ton of "pay us X and get free items daily and the ability to fly!" servers around.
It's too bad though that nothing can be done about servers that give in-game rewards for voting for the server on server ranking sites. That completely breaks the whole point of ranking servers with voting by turning "best server has more votes" into "server that can award the best stuff has more votes".
I just recently personally had a problem relating to servers selling in-game perks: Maddyncraft, one of the servers running the Yogscast Complete modpack has certain items and abilities banned due to griefing uses (Ars Magica dig, Portal Guns, etc.) and trying to keep lag down (chunk loaders), but you can buy banned items via donation. All well and good, really, since it means griefers can't just come on and find the one thing they need to get around anti-grief, but as it turns out, chunk loading behavior breaks an automatic farm I built...so in order to use the in-game work around a mod bug, I would need to pay the server money.
I really hope that they notice this and change; the server is otherwise good.
Definitely look forward to not seeing a ton of "pay us X and get free items daily and the ability to fly!" servers around.
It's too bad though that nothing can be done about servers that give in-game rewards for voting for the server on server ranking sites. That completely breaks the whole point of ranking servers with voting by turning "best server has more votes" into "server that can award the best stuff has more votes".
Simple fix, don't join a server that sells gamebreaking mechanics for money >_<
e.g. A simple survival server should never sell items for money, this works cause simple servers doesn't require a 300$ server to run
if they do, they have a massive playerbase where the few donations they would get from cosmetic stuff would be enough to cover the costs.
The issue is not survival servers, just don't join them if you don't like what they offer.
The issue is the other servers that require a ridicolously expensive server to run smoothly for a rather small amount of people. Due to plugins. And where it gets really expensive is that servers that aren't just vanilla, are a lot more popular. So they need even more expensive hardware to both being able to handle the plugins but also a lot of players from all over the world.
I've seen plenty of survival servers out there with no donations, like I said. It works for them, not for others. I just wish Mojang would see that as well.
Simple rule to follow - just don't join a server that does it for money >_< it's never a good experience. If you're playing on a server where fly gives you an advantage. Don't play on a server that sells /fly for money... Not that hard
The Meaning of Life, the Universe, and Everything.
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brunyman
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Mojang gave freedom to anyone to create a minecraft server, a lot of us made one and most of them were closed. I started to play in alpha version, the servers evolved as the plugins evolved in time and the community grew. And i think that is great, there are lot's of servers to chose from, if you don't like one you look for another, if you can make your own server as you like you can make it. So i think we should stop raging that there are lot's of crappy servers because this diversity helped the community grow to what it is today, some dedicated server owners created servers that are years old, and i think that requires a lot of work and if they make some money from running it it's admiring and this also means that the server will not be closed.
If you want a minecraft server to last there must be some money revenue to keep the team that works behind to maintain the server alive. Among the lot's of servers you can find also lots of good servers, i think that if the server owners won't get anything like some revenue from their servers we will have a lot few servers online, if there is some money interest there will be lot's of servers online some bad some good, i think the bad servers are also fun because you can go and have a lot of fun abusing bugs that will make the server owner ask what's happening?!
Good servers always survive, but to keep them online years there must be some kind of revenue, or else you will just get tired and the server shut's down. So i don't thing that we should kill everybody that makes money from their server everybody is free to play on what server they like and pay if they want.
Sorry if I missed a post talking about this, but how much of the EULA enforcement will be the letter of the law vs the spirit of the law?
For example:
Server A is advertised as a "Griefer's paradise", but requires a $10 payment to sign in. After paying the $10, you get in and are dropped into the void over and over again, while the automatic chat posts links to a video Rickrolling you.
Server B keeps vanilla items available to everyone. They have an in-game currency which can be earned, or bought with real money. They have a rank system, but everyone can progress through the rank system in game. Alternatively, people wanting to short cut the grinding can pay for a rank. They have their own custom plug-ins, with some options for those plug-ins only being available to those who buy them.
Server A is the crap server that no one wants to be on, but is still firmly inside the EULA. Server B is trying to be balanced for it's players, and is looking out for it's community, but is breaking a few points of the EULA. Should Server B really get punished while Server A stays up?
a private server hosted by a friend for our own community. there's around 10-15 people or so there, a bunch of mods/plugins and absolutely no payments of any kinds. everything is free.
Ahh that explains your little misunderstaing of the situation
hosting a small time server for friends 10 - 15 people is easy and cheap no reason whoever hosts that needs any help to support his server.
So I don't blame you for this not affecting you at all
i'd prefer to play there than on some 1000+ person server any day. a community is made out of people who know and respect/like each other, not hundreds of annoying teenagers who spout memes and spam the chat 24/7, and who need to be kept on a leash to prevent them from wrecking the place within moments.
I actually completely agree on this one. Before I decided to give up finding a good server and make my own I was specifically looking for a server with between 10 - 50 people online, I wanted to be a part of a small community. Not a city of people I'm completely with you on that one, and that is also why I today provide that exact enviroment
why would you need all of that unnecessary stuff just to run a minecraft server?
webdev: for what, it's a minecraft server, not some corporate website/portal.
staff: minecraft ops? why pay them, they're players just like anyone else, except they also have some extra power. in an actual friendly community they don't even need to do anything, otherwise all they have to do is ban someone.
graphic designer: see webdev.
builders: so wait, you actually pay people to do stuff on your server rather than having them do what they want?
plugin devs: isn't there enough mods/plugins around to pay people to make more of the same?
Here I'm gonna have to disagree with you.
Just because I don't run a huge server doesn't mean I don't have to compete for players.
There's lots of other servers out there, there needs to be a reason players want to play on my server instead of theirs (besides just the good support and staff we have - which they won't see before they join)
What they do see before choosing to join a server is all of what you mentioned is not needed.
Webdev - It's essential to any slightly successful server to have atleast a moderately good looking website. And those don't come free unless you happen to have a highly talented webdev as a part of your staff.
Personally no, we don't need to pay them. But I'd sure as hell be proud doing it. How good doesn't it feel to get some extra support in the community and be able to actually pay your staff for doing such an amazing job for so long, for free. My staff isn't made up of immarturity or powermungers, they actually do an amazing job. They honestly deserve a hell of a lot more than a thanks even though they never asked for it. That's just part of being a good owner for those that actually make more money than they need to pay for the server. Sadly I never did, I've never made a profit of Minecraft nor should I. Every penny I ever got was put directly back into the server. This sadly also means I havn't been able to pay my staff as much as I'd like to. (Cause they honestly deserve it) and yes there is still lots of work for them to do in our community even though we do have an amazing playerbase. I havn't seen griefing in months! O.o but we do run a whitelisted roleplay server with loooong biographies, rp that needs monitoring sometimes and so much more.
Same with graphics. To get players you need to look professional. Who wants to join a server that looks like it's run by someone who really doesn't want to put time or money into his server to make it look nice? answer... very few, mostly friends probably.
Builders. Yes, again I run an RP server buddy, it's not a survival server where people build their own stuff. We have to have prebuilt cities, dungeons, points of interest and so much more to make the server look absolutely incredible. It's expected of an RP server. If the builds are ugly. No one will join. Again as you said you play on a tiny cheap survival server. It doesn't apply to that at all.
Plugin devs. Are needed, at this point in time, there's thousands of other minecraft servers! For your server to succeed you need to stand out from the crew. In a lot of cases carrying for your server, showing your potential players that you do indeed spend thousands of hours and dollars on it by graphics, webdesign and more takes you a long way. But you also need to provide something diferent or better. As any company or server in the world. People need a reason to join you over another server. If we fail to provide a unique experience there's no reason for players to choose our server over a server that has been there beforehand. This is why we need to pay plugin devs A LOT. Cause coding is hard work, it's expensive. And getting those plugins to make your server better and diferent from other does not come out of the thin air and is not found on bukkits pluginlist... Cause if it was, all other servers in the same category would be using them too....
Again you just seem to be playing on a small survival server with your friends so I don't expect you to understand anything about running an actual server that provides a good quality experience to more than 10 players
besides, donations are still allowed. only blatant selling of game altering favors isn't.
so, only people who were already breaking the eula have a problem with mojang suddenly starting to defend their property.
self entitled little kid, aren't you?
Trust me I'm definitely not implying the EULA doesn't apply to me. They've hidden it nicely on their site so far. But up until now. Helping servers out has been generally accepted amongst the community and a part of Mojang too.
Whether you like it or not, servers is what have made Minecraft stay popular for so many years. And I hope they will for years to come as well.
I'm sorry to say this, if I didn't know that you joined in 2011 I'd say you'd seem a bit new to the community here. But seeing that you are just playing with your friends I get it, I really do.
But you gotta remember, most players on minecraft play on actual servers with a community. And that community is now being threatened. Please take the time to actually read through the thread, perhaps my previous posts starting on page 20 to inform yourself on the issues this is posing for everyone. Well everyone except the rare exception like you. But well I don't judge people who don't care about anyone but themselves except when they condescenting comments about me and most importantly my server and my community.
and for that last comment you really don't deserve my time good sir. I usually wouldn't go out of my way, but if you'd have done some slight homework, I'm not self entitled, never made a profit of my server, not a single penny, I just care about my server and my players. I don't do this for money which you and so many others seem to mistakenly think. As for me being kid, no I'm not 31 or 40 with a stable job yet. I'm currenty studying for Economics and business administration with innovation and management. I'm 20 years old, so please keep your insults to yourself thank you.
I agree but good luck finding any legality in it hahaa, mojang is picking a very wrong battle
Yes thats what most of these issues are all about. I think in some way Mojang feels like its losing control of its creation and I do understand their side of it. It is their game but also if you are going to allow people to create 'mods' of your game then when does it become NOT your game anymore? But also if a server has to charge you money for items in a game that would give you an advantage over other players then i see their point also. I agree with another comment that its all about Power and Money.
Yes thats what most of these issues are all about. I think in some way Mojang feels like its losing control of its creation and I do understand their side of it. It is their game but also if you are going to allow people to create 'mods' of your game then when does it become NOT your game anymore? But also if a server has to charge you money for items in a game that would give you an advantage over other players then i see their point also. I agree with another comment that its all about Power and Money.
Every day mojang gets hundreds of complaints from parents who bought their kids in-game privileges and then the server closed, or they got banned, or mistreated by server mods. Mojang doesn't want to deal with that and can't be responsible for it.
For too long have server operators been taking advantage of people, and mojang has been held responsible, which is the real problem and why the EULA had to change. I think the new EULA is excellent. There are still ways to make plenty of money and keep your servers going. I really just hope that mojang can enforce the new agreement against big servers like Killion.
*Edit: I just want to apologize to some people who might be reading this. For those of you who treat others with respect, I will treat you with respect. But pointing fingers with a harsh bias, and calling server owners failures for the fact they don't shell out thousands of dollars out of pocket with a condescending attitude, and telling them to "grow up" is something I won't be berated for.
First, you don't need to be pretentious.
Perhaps I am not educated enough to be your equal here, and I apologize for provoking you.
Wow Page 36 and going strong Since I left last night and come back this morning, some interesteing and thought provoking discussions certainly
Ok, so I'm going to throw a question out there to all your Server Owners. I think it would be very intereting to see what your thoughts are:
Fact: One of the main reasons for the now "enforced" EULA is that Mojang have seen a very steep rise in support complaints from parents/people/whoever complaining that their sone bought "xyz" from a server using their craditcard/paypal/whatever and are not happy. They did not authorise this and would like a refund and believe that Mojang are responsible - mainly due to the fact they do not understand the community structure and the fact that it is actually the Server Owners who have this money rather than Mojang.
Fact: Mojang believe (and rightly so) that this is causing a negative view on their "Brand" and that they need to do something to reign this in.
So as a Server Owner, do you agree, it is your responsibility to deal with a "bad sale" or possible claw back?
I ask this, mainly because I see a lot of people around various forums commenting saying that Mojang are doing this for the money, they are trying to make us use Realms, blah blah blah.
They are not. They are looking at how to deal with these complaints. Work it backwards.
Person very annoyed with Mojang - bad publicity/Brand negativity
Mojang tell person they are not responsible for the payment
Mojang get a complaint about a "mis sold"/"abused" payment on someones credit card.
Parent finds Minecraft is owned by Mojang
Kid tells person they bought a minecraft package on a server
Person finds an un-authorised payment on credit card
Server Owner Received $50
Kid takes paypal/credit card details
Kid wants package
Kids friend has new shiny dia sword and kit with money
Friend suggests kid joins server
Kids parents by them Minecraft, from Mojang
Kid hears about Minecraft from friends at school/You tube and wants it
Not exact, but a rough process flow from bottom to top.
So as we can see, the predominent purchases are not "because I want to join the Servers", or to go and play on a particular server, not in the majority of cases. The original purchase is 99% of the time due to a friend recommending it, outside of a server or game environment.
So, going back to the earlier question - Do you feel it is your responsibility to deal with the complaint.
If your answer is no, then you are the type of Server Owner Mojang are looking to eradicate.
You have taken money from someone for items (be they digital or physical). Therefore, if there is a problem with that, then you should deal with it.
Let me put it into another scenario for you. You join a server and you pay the $50 for your Kit. But, for some reason it isn't issued to you. What do you do? Well, you immediately alert an Administrator or Moderator and tell them. 99/100 times they Admin or Mod will check, see it's not been issued and therefore issue it to you. You are happy. This is customer service.
All Mojang want the Servers to do is offer the SAME service to the person/s who have had their card/paypal details used by "little johnny". This could be as simple as an email contact point. It could be as extravigant as having a dial in number for support *shrugs*
Bottom line is, Mojang are looking for a solution to stop them getting bad negativiety and a massive infux and cost of looking after support calls that are nothing to do with them.
Couldn't agree more Pezzle
Personally I've never gotten a single complaint or anyone coming to me asking for a refund, but personally costumor service is important to me. When anyone buys something from me, whether they got what they asked for or not I'd still provide them with a full refund.
As you said, anyone who doesn't do this, especially if there are stealing of credit cards involved, is the problem Mojang is having.
I actually to my suprise had quite a few smart parents of the younger population of my server come on and ask me personally about stuff like this. And after having a talk with them all of them actually gave their children a few dollars to spend on something like an extra home.
I wish Mojang would actually release some real information on how big the "kids stealing parents credit card" problem is. As I've personally never had anyone come to me about this. Then again my server is whitelisted and does take atleast decent english capabilities to get into. Especially when writing a character bio, so the younger children who I suppose are the ones mainly causing this Issue for Mojang, might not be playing on my server in particular.
Where I get a bit confused, and I'd actually like your opinion on this Pezzle <3.
when someone actually purchases a donation. On the credit card bill or Paypal transaction, it will say who the money is paid to right?
I guess if they use a direct credit it card it might just say paypal? Personally I'm not hiding my identity for anyone. I'm just thinking that I doubt any servers are putting "Mojang" or "Minecraft" on their Paypal account.
I guess a lot of parents just see their games playing minecraft and goes to them. But won't the majority actually look at the creditcard bill? How would they notice 30$ missing if they didn't? and if they do, they must see that it's not Mojang or Minecraft listed as the seller.
I'm asking cause I've never actually donated myself, as it's a choice. We aren't forced to and never have been, besides I've never seen a server that I liked enough to support. Hence why I have made my own.
I've asked quite a few members of Mojang how big of an issue it actually is, asking for some numbers out of curiosity. But sadly none have replied but I'm sure they are incredibly busy these days as well. I mean as they said themselves 20% (although I hope it's more) of their community aren't exactly happy on how this is going to hurt most servers 1 way or another.
notch has issued some sort of statement about Mojang's End User License Agreement, but I have more questions than answers now, so here's my reply.
notch Writes About EULA n Servers
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My YouTube channel: http://www.youtube.c...er/GrannyGamer1 There's no wrong way to play MineCraft. Here, we'll discuss tactics, strategies, making the game accessible to people with disabilities.
If they wish to pay for the hardware to play Minecraft on then they get to make the rules.
Otherwise they can stuff the EULA where the sun doesn't shine.
No, they don't. Minecraft is the property of Mojang, so they make the rules. Owning a server doesn't change this in the slightest. How many times does this have to be said?
As far as I can tell, the EULA update is just about opening up a way to monetize their servers, and the blog post is just clarifying what's still not allowed. Anyone who charges for special (gameplay) content within their servers is and always has been a poots.
And now that there's a legal way to make a buck off of your servers, it seems like pay-to-win models are even less defensible.
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"Some scientists claim that hydrogen, because it is so plentiful, is the basic building block of the universe. I dispute that. I say that there is more stupidity than hydrogen, and that is the basic building block of the universe." -Frank Zappa
Vox Populi and Hypixel are exempt from this policy even though they offer enchanted gear and ranks with exclusive features. We've just sailed into murky waters.
Exactly.
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Hey, please check these links out if you're looking for a unique Minecraft server:
Okay, so before I even bother with the actual "void for vagueness" issue, Mojang is not an American company. They're a Swedish company, and Swedish law goes.
If you order, say, some candy from China, and said food has something in it that is banned from use in candy here, you can't do anything, so long as the substance isn't an illegal one.
It's a similar situation here. If you knowingly buy a Swedish product, the United States constitution no longer protects you.
that part wasn't aimed at you, see the author of the quote. it was the guy with bender avatar.
i really don't know why would you confuse that, unless you read my post after quoting it, which strips nested quotes.
i'm not in the habit to double post, so i simply replied to few people in one post.
Oh I believe I owe you an apology. I was mistaken when I thought that comment was directed towards me. My apologies. I'm afraid I did read your 2 first comments then decide to do a quote reply. It seemed fluent when I was reading it in the actual text editor
Pretty much. But also yet again, stressing the point that this whole thing is being driven from the complaints they are receiving. Effectively meaning, server owners shrugging off their responsibilities to respond to complaints and dealing with chargebacks or granting them.
Wonderdude - In asnwer to your question, yes, it is shown that a payment has been made. If it's done through Paypal - then harder to track where the money has gone. That being said, in theory, the parent can inform Paypal and get the money charged back.I think there are 2 additional things we can take from all of this.
I suspect there should or would or could be more pressure on someone like Buycraft to sort out the payment gateway and chargeback or to at least look at ways where they can protect people more. Ultimately, though, it's not really their issue.
The other, of course, is that the Servers should be more open and have contact details and/or pages explaining to potential Parents what to do in that instance.
But then, they wouldn't do that, because it means they could just get chargebacks from parents left and right.I've dealt with chargebacks before both with paypal directly and with the parents.
Like you said, most are ok if they have done due diligence and are inquiring. Others ... well, they are just rude and threaten you. I've been there. I've dealt with them. I know what the support teams in Mojang are going through and it's not nice and also VERY time consuming and quite stressful.
yeah it's not Buycraft's fault or issue to deal with, nor do I think they can fix it. Paypal is simply the best way to go for this kind of service at the moment. It's known, trusted and easy to do chargebacks or refunds
I see what you mean, I've never had to experience it myself. (and I've been running servers for 2-3 years now) so I was just wondering, being threatened if you don't have any intentions of not giving them a refund sounds quite.. Annoying. You would think parents would atleast be able to have a civil conversation about it.
but yeah, once we open our modified store that doesn't conflict with the EULA, I'll definitely be sure to have information both in the FAQ and easier contact methods. Whether or not these (for the majority) bad changes takes place or not. Donations will still be a thing and I couldn't agree more when you say that Mojang shouldn't be responsible to deal with angry parents. That's 100% on the server owners.
If you do not like servers with kits do not play there.
Mojang is trying to cater the game to all the 7 year olds who play the game online and prevent stupid kids from stealing mommy and daddys CC in order to donate.
I've seen it happen before the kid was like 11 he took his parents CC and donated for like 20 people giving them the $100 donor kit.
It was hysterical.
For such a litigeous country, I'm surprised no parent has formally sued a Server yet. If there are multiple transactions like that, I'm sure there would be some kind of legal responsibility from the server to stop it.
General Thought:
I wonder where this will leave the hosts. Whether they will be asked to enforce a level of the EULA from a Server perspective. If they are knowingly allowing people to break the EULA.....then could Mojang hold them responsible?
Well anyway there is no way this is going to get passed or be regulated.
In the story I described the server owners had to give the money back, and they shut down like a week later.If mojang get's to regulate what people can donate for, it will be the death of multiplayer.
In my opinion, it won't. You can still monetise. It's just a question of how.
Let me just point this out as well. I have no issue about people monetising servers. The old way, charge for everything and the kitchen sink or just donations....I don't mind either. I've donated $100 to a server before and spent 6 mths there. I chose to do it,
However....that being said, the EULA is now being enforced - or likely to be - So like human nature it's time to change, adapt and overcome. Personally, I think the problem most people have is they don't know how to monetise it
Well there are always gunna be those groups of people on servers who complain even the slightest thing is an advantage to donors.
It is very unclear what is an advantage or not. I understand items like over powered diamond or tools is. But some servers give away spawners, individual diamonds and such.
Commands via bukkit plugins prob are immune to the EULA cause they are not made by mojang.
May I just quickly ask what server do you >like< to play on? if any. If you don't I understand how you might feel this way. I'd like to see if it's popular, if it has donations and if it does I'd like to ask the Owner if he never got any donations if the server would still be alive.
The issue with your post is that not all servers are started for business, or have become about the money. those that do fail, if a server owner only cares about the money, the community leaves. Simple fact in a lot of cases (not all) but a lot.
Personally I've never made a profit with my server. I can tell you I make just about 1300 a month (as a student with a crappy job). My rent is $1815.44. Now luckily I have a roommate to pay half of that, Which makes my rent $907.72 a month.
Leaving me with: 392,58$ for everything.
now lets say a server is 305$
website is 30 + a bit extra for domains and whatnot
This leaves me with about $57 for groceries and everything in a month. That or a bunch of loans.
And this is before potentially paying webdevs, staff, graphic designers, builders and plugin devs.
Needless to say, without any support from our players I would not be able to provide the quality I do if any server at all.
and trust me I don't make a profit for my server, I never have and I don't deliver any gameplay breaking donations. In fact I've closed my donations for time being.
so please don't tell me that we should just magically be able to afford paying for the server without any help. Maybe a few can, but you have to realize it's a minecraft community. We're not all 40 with a finished education and a stable job.
I'll bet you that most server owners aren't even 18 yet. And most importantly. MOST servers are not about the money, it's about the game and community. Like mine, Whether you think I'm stupid or not. I would not be running minecraft servers for over 2 years without making a penny if I did it for the money... So please, stop assuming everyone "does it for the money" or the wrong reasons or whatever you call it. Some do. Yes, but those that do don't survive very long. Mojang is hurting all of us. Not just those that do. Don't forget that.
And for the record. I don't think any of us would have anything against paying a license to host a server. Personally I'm for the idea, it'll shove out a lot of bad servers, those who cares about the community paying for license or not will get it. Mojang will make money off us which they seem to love. And we can all be happy. So yeah, make us pay a license to use the game as the game engine it has become... Not this.
And yes, we might not be able to compete with the servers that has the players to actually create jobs around this amazing franchise. But we can still provide a quality service if Mojang lets us. and not everyone wants to play on the top 10 servers. While they have amazing content cause they have to money it takes to pay for it. We have a community. I have the ability to care for every single one of my players. Cause there's not 10.000 of them on at one time. Some people appreciate that. So please stop thinking about money and think about quality of the game.
I really hope that they notice this and change; the server is otherwise good.
Definitely look forward to not seeing a ton of "pay us X and get free items daily and the ability to fly!" servers around.
It's too bad though that nothing can be done about servers that give in-game rewards for voting for the server on server ranking sites. That completely breaks the whole point of ranking servers with voting by turning "best server has more votes" into "server that can award the best stuff has more votes".
Simple fix, don't join a server that sells gamebreaking mechanics for money >_<
e.g. A simple survival server should never sell items for money, this works cause simple servers doesn't require a 300$ server to run
if they do, they have a massive playerbase where the few donations they would get from cosmetic stuff would be enough to cover the costs.
The issue is not survival servers, just don't join them if you don't like what they offer.
The issue is the other servers that require a ridicolously expensive server to run smoothly for a rather small amount of people. Due to plugins. And where it gets really expensive is that servers that aren't just vanilla, are a lot more popular. So they need even more expensive hardware to both being able to handle the plugins but also a lot of players from all over the world.
I've seen plenty of survival servers out there with no donations, like I said. It works for them, not for others. I just wish Mojang would see that as well.
Simple rule to follow - just don't join a server that does it for money >_< it's never a good experience. If you're playing on a server where fly gives you an advantage. Don't play on a server that sells /fly for money... Not that hard
If you want a minecraft server to last there must be some money revenue to keep the team that works behind to maintain the server alive. Among the lot's of servers you can find also lots of good servers, i think that if the server owners won't get anything like some revenue from their servers we will have a lot few servers online, if there is some money interest there will be lot's of servers online some bad some good, i think the bad servers are also fun because you can go and have a lot of fun abusing bugs that will make the server owner ask what's happening?!
Good servers always survive, but to keep them online years there must be some kind of revenue, or else you will just get tired and the server shut's down. So i don't thing that we should kill everybody that makes money from their server everybody is free to play on what server they like and pay if they want.
Minecraft is all about diversity.
some like small servers, it's just up to everybody
For example:
Server A is advertised as a "Griefer's paradise", but requires a $10 payment to sign in. After paying the $10, you get in and are dropped into the void over and over again, while the automatic chat posts links to a video Rickrolling you.
Server B keeps vanilla items available to everyone. They have an in-game currency which can be earned, or bought with real money. They have a rank system, but everyone can progress through the rank system in game. Alternatively, people wanting to short cut the grinding can pay for a rank. They have their own custom plug-ins, with some options for those plug-ins only being available to those who buy them.
Server A is the crap server that no one wants to be on, but is still firmly inside the EULA. Server B is trying to be balanced for it's players, and is looking out for it's community, but is breaking a few points of the EULA. Should Server B really get punished while Server A stays up?
Ahh that explains your little misunderstaing of the situation
hosting a small time server for friends 10 - 15 people is easy and cheap no reason whoever hosts that needs any help to support his server.
So I don't blame you for this not affecting you at all
I actually completely agree on this one. Before I decided to give up finding a good server and make my own I was specifically looking for a server with between 10 - 50 people online, I wanted to be a part of a small community. Not a city of people I'm completely with you on that one, and that is also why I today provide that exact enviroment
Here I'm gonna have to disagree with you.
Just because I don't run a huge server doesn't mean I don't have to compete for players.
There's lots of other servers out there, there needs to be a reason players want to play on my server instead of theirs (besides just the good support and staff we have - which they won't see before they join)
What they do see before choosing to join a server is all of what you mentioned is not needed.
Webdev - It's essential to any slightly successful server to have atleast a moderately good looking website. And those don't come free unless you happen to have a highly talented webdev as a part of your staff.
Personally no, we don't need to pay them. But I'd sure as hell be proud doing it. How good doesn't it feel to get some extra support in the community and be able to actually pay your staff for doing such an amazing job for so long, for free. My staff isn't made up of immarturity or powermungers, they actually do an amazing job. They honestly deserve a hell of a lot more than a thanks even though they never asked for it. That's just part of being a good owner for those that actually make more money than they need to pay for the server. Sadly I never did, I've never made a profit of Minecraft nor should I. Every penny I ever got was put directly back into the server. This sadly also means I havn't been able to pay my staff as much as I'd like to. (Cause they honestly deserve it) and yes there is still lots of work for them to do in our community even though we do have an amazing playerbase. I havn't seen griefing in months! O.o but we do run a whitelisted roleplay server with loooong biographies, rp that needs monitoring sometimes and so much more.
Same with graphics. To get players you need to look professional. Who wants to join a server that looks like it's run by someone who really doesn't want to put time or money into his server to make it look nice? answer... very few, mostly friends probably.
Builders. Yes, again I run an RP server buddy, it's not a survival server where people build their own stuff. We have to have prebuilt cities, dungeons, points of interest and so much more to make the server look absolutely incredible. It's expected of an RP server. If the builds are ugly. No one will join. Again as you said you play on a tiny cheap survival server. It doesn't apply to that at all.
Plugin devs. Are needed, at this point in time, there's thousands of other minecraft servers! For your server to succeed you need to stand out from the crew. In a lot of cases carrying for your server, showing your potential players that you do indeed spend thousands of hours and dollars on it by graphics, webdesign and more takes you a long way. But you also need to provide something diferent or better. As any company or server in the world. People need a reason to join you over another server. If we fail to provide a unique experience there's no reason for players to choose our server over a server that has been there beforehand. This is why we need to pay plugin devs A LOT. Cause coding is hard work, it's expensive. And getting those plugins to make your server better and diferent from other does not come out of the thin air and is not found on bukkits pluginlist... Cause if it was, all other servers in the same category would be using them too....
Again you just seem to be playing on a small survival server with your friends so I don't expect you to understand anything about running an actual server that provides a good quality experience to more than 10 players
Trust me I'm definitely not implying the EULA doesn't apply to me. They've hidden it nicely on their site so far. But up until now. Helping servers out has been generally accepted amongst the community and a part of Mojang too.
Whether you like it or not, servers is what have made Minecraft stay popular for so many years. And I hope they will for years to come as well.
I'm sorry to say this, if I didn't know that you joined in 2011 I'd say you'd seem a bit new to the community here. But seeing that you are just playing with your friends I get it, I really do.
But you gotta remember, most players on minecraft play on actual servers with a community. And that community is now being threatened. Please take the time to actually read through the thread, perhaps my previous posts starting on page 20 to inform yourself on the issues this is posing for everyone. Well everyone except the rare exception like you. But well I don't judge people who don't care about anyone but themselves except when they condescenting comments about me and most importantly my server and my community.
and for that last comment you really don't deserve my time good sir. I usually wouldn't go out of my way, but if you'd have done some slight homework, I'm not self entitled, never made a profit of my server, not a single penny, I just care about my server and my players. I don't do this for money which you and so many others seem to mistakenly think. As for me being kid, no I'm not 31 or 40 with a stable job yet. I'm currenty studying for Economics and business administration with innovation and management. I'm 20 years old, so please keep your insults to yourself thank you.
Yes thats what most of these issues are all about. I think in some way Mojang feels like its losing control of its creation and I do understand their side of it. It is their game but also if you are going to allow people to create 'mods' of your game then when does it become NOT your game anymore? But also if a server has to charge you money for items in a game that would give you an advantage over other players then i see their point also. I agree with another comment that its all about Power and Money.
Every day mojang gets hundreds of complaints from parents who bought their kids in-game privileges and then the server closed, or they got banned, or mistreated by server mods. Mojang doesn't want to deal with that and can't be responsible for it.
For too long have server operators been taking advantage of people, and mojang has been held responsible, which is the real problem and why the EULA had to change. I think the new EULA is excellent. There are still ways to make plenty of money and keep your servers going. I really just hope that mojang can enforce the new agreement against big servers like Killion.
Perhaps I am not educated enough to be your equal here, and I apologize for provoking you.
Thank you, for your response.
Couldn't agree more Pezzle
Personally I've never gotten a single complaint or anyone coming to me asking for a refund, but personally costumor service is important to me. When anyone buys something from me, whether they got what they asked for or not I'd still provide them with a full refund.
As you said, anyone who doesn't do this, especially if there are stealing of credit cards involved, is the problem Mojang is having.
I actually to my suprise had quite a few smart parents of the younger population of my server come on and ask me personally about stuff like this. And after having a talk with them all of them actually gave their children a few dollars to spend on something like an extra home.
I wish Mojang would actually release some real information on how big the "kids stealing parents credit card" problem is. As I've personally never had anyone come to me about this. Then again my server is whitelisted and does take atleast decent english capabilities to get into. Especially when writing a character bio, so the younger children who I suppose are the ones mainly causing this Issue for Mojang, might not be playing on my server in particular.
Where I get a bit confused, and I'd actually like your opinion on this Pezzle <3.
when someone actually purchases a donation. On the credit card bill or Paypal transaction, it will say who the money is paid to right?
I guess if they use a direct credit it card it might just say paypal? Personally I'm not hiding my identity for anyone. I'm just thinking that I doubt any servers are putting "Mojang" or "Minecraft" on their Paypal account.
I guess a lot of parents just see their games playing minecraft and goes to them. But won't the majority actually look at the creditcard bill? How would they notice 30$ missing if they didn't? and if they do, they must see that it's not Mojang or Minecraft listed as the seller.
I'm asking cause I've never actually donated myself, as it's a choice. We aren't forced to and never have been, besides I've never seen a server that I liked enough to support. Hence why I have made my own.
I've asked quite a few members of Mojang how big of an issue it actually is, asking for some numbers out of curiosity. But sadly none have replied but I'm sure they are incredibly busy these days as well. I mean as they said themselves 20% (although I hope it's more) of their community aren't exactly happy on how this is going to hurt most servers 1 way or another.
notch Writes About EULA n Servers
No, they don't. Minecraft is the property of Mojang, so they make the rules. Owning a server doesn't change this in the slightest. How many times does this have to be said?
And now that there's a legal way to make a buck off of your servers, it seems like pay-to-win models are even less defensible.
Exactly.
Hey, please check these links out if you're looking for a unique Minecraft server:
Infinite-MC Website
Infinite-MC (Minecraft Forum)
Okay, so before I even bother with the actual "void for vagueness" issue, Mojang is not an American company. They're a Swedish company, and Swedish law goes.
If you order, say, some candy from China, and said food has something in it that is banned from use in candy here, you can't do anything, so long as the substance isn't an illegal one.
It's a similar situation here. If you knowingly buy a Swedish product, the United States constitution no longer protects you.
That aside, let's humor the vagueness issue.
What part of this:
https://account.moja.../minecraft_eula
is too vague to be upheld in a court?
...but that's just like, my opinion, man.
Oh I believe I owe you an apology. I was mistaken when I thought that comment was directed towards me. My apologies. I'm afraid I did read your 2 first comments then decide to do a quote reply. It seemed fluent when I was reading it in the actual text editor
yeah it's not Buycraft's fault or issue to deal with, nor do I think they can fix it. Paypal is simply the best way to go for this kind of service at the moment. It's known, trusted and easy to do chargebacks or refunds
I see what you mean, I've never had to experience it myself. (and I've been running servers for 2-3 years now) so I was just wondering, being threatened if you don't have any intentions of not giving them a refund sounds quite.. Annoying. You would think parents would atleast be able to have a civil conversation about it.
but yeah, once we open our modified store that doesn't conflict with the EULA, I'll definitely be sure to have information both in the FAQ and easier contact methods. Whether or not these (for the majority) bad changes takes place or not. Donations will still be a thing and I couldn't agree more when you say that Mojang shouldn't be responsible to deal with angry parents. That's 100% on the server owners.
Hopefully others will follow suit
If you do not like servers with kits do not play there.
Mojang is trying to cater the game to all the 7 year olds who play the game online and prevent stupid kids from stealing mommy and daddys CC in order to donate.
I've seen it happen before the kid was like 11 he took his parents CC and donated for like 20 people giving them the $100 donor kit.
It was hysterical.
Well anyway there is no way this is going to get passed or be regulated.
In the story I described the server owners had to give the money back, and they shut down like a week later.If mojang get's to regulate what people can donate for, it will be the death of multiplayer.
Well there are always gunna be those groups of people on servers who complain even the slightest thing is an advantage to donors.
It is very unclear what is an advantage or not. I understand items like over powered diamond or tools is. But some servers give away spawners, individual diamonds and such.
Commands via bukkit plugins prob are immune to the EULA cause they are not made by mojang.