xenforo license

sayUncle

Member
my forum is dead and I am not happy that I paid $140 and can't even use it on 2 or 3 sites. PLUS I have to pay every year $40 to get any security updates. I don't even know how I ever talked myself into such a horrible license contract. Unless Xenforo grants me free security updates and lets me use the software on 2-3 sites I will DUMPT IT ASAP. What is so special about it that I have to put up with such a strict license. The latest version of phpbb is responsive and there are some nice styles out for it. I can make 100 forums and get free updates every year. Remember that the more people use your product the more people will see that little "by xenforo" at the bottom of the screen. If you chase off your customers with unreasonable greedy licensing stipulations you lose. Here is an idea... how about charging your customers for forums that go above a certain member count activity range. I will most certainly NOT be paying $40/year for a site that has no traffic.
 
Last edited:
The $40 / year is not compulsory, you only need to pay it to receive updates.

And you will not be granted an exception to run the software on multiple sites. If found, your license could be revoked completely.
 
why would I bother trying to steal your little xenforo when there are excellent FREE open source forums like phpbb. You guys are pricing your product like there are no alternatives out there.
 
Every software, free or paid, is useless if a forum has no traffic or is dead.
Has nothing to do with the price of software.

Looks someone is disappointed that his project don't work like he expected.
Now looking for reasons to blame something else.

The license rules are stated clearly before someone decide to buy.
There was always the choice between this software here and free software.
 
Why jump in to use a paid software when you don't even understand the complete benefits? And are you seriously comparing Xenforo with Phpbb? Just look at the large number of big boards using Xenforo, its enough proof of the quality of the product.

You cannot blame Xenforo for your incompetence.
 
Indeed why bother posting rather than spending time building your free phpbb forum. Please go ahead.

I don't know who you are ichpen. My remarks are for the owners of Xenforo. Many companies like to get feedback from customers that decide not to use their products anymore. This can give them some ideas on how to achieve better customer retention. Apparently this is not a priority for Xenforo.
 
Why jump in to use a paid software when you don't even understand the complete benefits? And are you seriously comparing Xenforo with Phpbb? Just look at the large number of big boards using Xenforo, its enough proof of the quality of the product.

You cannot blame Xenforo for your incompetence.
I am not incompetent. You can see my forum at www.vegasvillagevoices.com Is it is a very nice looking forum with a nice customized skin from xenfocus. With some time and a little bit more promotion, it could take off. If security updates were free and I was allowed to use it on 2-3 sites I would keep it.
 
VegasVillageVoices.com is a private forum discussion website made exclusively for residents of Ashley Ridge Community. The primary function is to allow our residents to discuss and vote on HOA matters, without having to go to meetings. Now you can vote and discuss matters at your own convenience. It doesn't get any easier.

Look s like you started your forum on Apr 5, 2015. Now, I don't mean to offend, but I think if you haven't been able to get your neighbors to participate in your forum by now, your not likely to. What you can do if you want is move your license to a different domain and try with a new forum topic. that maybe is a little more likely to become successful.

Xenforo has a licensing plan that is very similar to all the other paid forum licenses I have seen. All this was pretty much explained when you bought the license. I don't understand why your upset about it now.
 
Security updates always include a patch in the announcement, if possible. You do not need to have an active license to download those patches.

As stated, you will not be permitted to run XenForo on multiple sites without multiple licenses.

XenForo is priced competitively in the premium forum software market. We know there are both free and paid forum software out there. The price allows the developers to sustain a living, pay the bills, and devote their time to the development of this software.

By purchasing a premium forum software, you have professional coding, code standards, security updates, premium and professional support, and various other benefits.

We hope people choose XenForo for their forum projects, but encourage owners to test all their options and choose software that fits their needs and budget. If you feel PhpBB is the best fit for you, we wish you luck with your project. If you ever wish to use XenForo in the future, there is an importer available.

With that said, XenForo is a UK based company that maintains a 9am - 5pm M-F business day. You posted this at 2:25am, UK time. Surely, you cannot expect a response from the owners at that time?
 
Last edited:
All I can suggest is put the effort in to your site to get traffic. Traffic is easy to get when you are posting valuable content. If the end-user has nothing to gain, they are not going to promote your site or post on it.

Google is a smart search engine. They know even the little guy can have valuable content.

If it's a personal site, that's one thing. If you are going for ecommerce/adsense revenue then make a site that is actually valuable and you will see real time results.

Don't blame it on the developers. There is a reason people buy this software. And maybe that reason is good enough for them to charge $40 simply for updated versions. It's not a big deal. Your license is still active and you still have the entire forum besides updated versions even if you don't pay it.
 
Regarding the site in question, it's only been in existence for 4 months. I don't know what advertising you have done to get the site noticed by residence but that could be a factor in it not taking off yet. Websites do take time to establish themselves, especially if they are targeted at a limited audience like yours is. There's also not much content on the site - you need to regularly add content that will attract and engage members. It's hard work but it needs to be done to make a site successful.

If you feel that this site isn't worth the XenForo licence then change the forum software for this to phpBB. Then use your XenForo licence for something else (I presume you have other ideas as you mentioned running 2-3 forums). Use it for something that will have broad appeal and a wider audience and see how you get on. Hopefully you will succeed with this and you'll have a good comparison in running forums on both free and paid software and can then better decide in the future what you prefer to use.

Good luck. :)
 
I don't know who you are ichpen. My remarks are for the owners of Xenforo. Many companies like to get feedback from customers that decide not to use their products anymore. This can give them some ideas on how to achieve better customer retention. Apparently this is not a priority for Xenforo.

Right but when you lace your remarks with angst and bitterness and some sort of ultimatum then few will consider them seriously. Lashing out at the cost of your forum platform which you presumably purchased knowing the costs and license terms is kind of like lashing out at your bank on the cost of borrowing after you borrow. Drawing comparisons between free opensource software and premium software is not constructive criticism. They both have their place in the forum landscape.

If you have valid constructive criticism I suggest you create it under a new thread. Hey how about volume/traffic based licensing or a lite tier is a valid suggestion. Hey my forum hasn't taken off I should get a refund is not constructive nor reasonable.
 
Last edited:
I don't know who you are ichpen. My remarks are for the owners of Xenforo. .

If that is the case, why not just contact them instead of posting on a forum. if you don't want other people to discuss what you say, I would advise you keep it your suggestions between you and the xenforo development team.
 
I have to agree with @Mr Lucky. Just a few minutes of looking at it was causing my eyes to have trouble focusing on the text.... and yes, I'm an old fart and there are a LOT of us out there. ;)
 
why would I bother trying to steal your little xenforo when there are excellent FREE open source forums like phpbb. You guys are pricing your product like there are no alternatives out there.
This guy is right, if you don't lower your prices, people will just be using nulled versions.
 
Back
Top Bottom