IPB No Longer is Free!

[Jonathan]

I can't believe it! I went to download a copy of IPB, as I never bother
to keep a copy of the ZIP on my computer, and no free options!

Lucky I managed to find a 1.3Final, unzipped, on my external
backup drive, but man! This suckx! Can we still use old copies
for free? Or must we now bow down and pay for even older vers. (to use)?

it suckx! *edit: was chatting with James, says licences for these no change.
Still for some this is confusing! For a sec I thought I'd have to take down my IPB forums*

[Frank Hagan]

The older version is still good under whatever the license says. If it says the use is free, that copy is free forever. If it says that they can, in the future, charge for it, then they can charge for it.

phpBB is still free, and if version 2.2 ever comes out, it promises to be pretty good.

[Grunfeld]

IPB changed from "free" to pay almost a year ago I would guess. I was running other software and really liked and still like IPB. Like all good things I guess we must pay sooner or later ......

[aqi]

yes, the license changed quite a while a go to a trial license by where if you intend on using it permanently you should pay for it.
You may continu to use previously downloaded versions for free but you will not get any updates.
This will only lead to IPB being even better

[Jonathan]

Still, I am very disappointed; this only leaves us with others whom
are relatively unknown, or do not have quality AdminCPs, etc.

PS: I remember downloading IPB several times up til just maybe
two months ago; I was certain the "free" download was same as
paid, just its "unregistered" and doesn't have the support...

[Frank Hagan]

I'm not sure I would agree that going to paid software will make IPB better; often the profit model results in less updates, etc., as the product's sales do not justify the investment of updating. Or they move to paid updates for "major revisions" and stop updating the prior version, so you're left with either paying the upgrade price or going without updates.

Still, if you like the product, you decide if its worth the price. With the open source community, though, you'll see plenty of competitors who are following the open source model.

Jonathan, check out phpBB. Its pretty good, and still free. There are others that don't have as much overhead as either.

[Jonathan]

phpBB is OK; alot easier to skin, but I dunno;
I never exactly got along with it

On another note, I found an pretty good
looking one called 'MyBB' ~ seems pretty good.

[ChrisTech]

I'm pretty upset about this as well. Followed some of the threads on WHT and invisionfree as well. This is a serious blow to the IPB community.

When you have a free product out there with optional paid services, it makes people want to contribute to it. If its paid, getting new users, as well as overall mods and such a bit more hard. The CEO had quoted a while back that it would be free. Haha...looks like they got greedy to me. They were already charging quite a bit for webhosting, now they want more.

As a user of IPB I see the change from free to paid (while the CEO quoted before that it would remain free) as him being dishonest. I, myself am afraid to even bother to buy a license from them, since they could change their minds about their policy at anytime to whatever they pleased. They could change the "enterprise license" to only good for verion 2.x and charge for the next upgrade.

I'm still running an older version of IPB (1.2 Final) on my website, and did manage to download 2.0 Final before they changed it. I hadn't upgraded yet, but now Im more seriously looking towards vBulletin when I do choose to upgrade (funds are lacking currently).

[Jonathan]

The CEO had quoted a while back that it would be free.

Im more seriously looking towards vBulletin when I do choose to upgrade (funds are lacking currently).

Got a link to that? (if it was posted on like WHT)
vB is looking nice to me as well; but funds lacking, and seeing as I sold
my only "well off" site, I see no reason to lay out cash on a forum.

[ChrisTech]

Here

http://www.webhostingtalk.com/showth...hreadid=326813

From what Ive read, if you have an older copy of IPB, you can still use it, just can't get the new ones. I need to find my 1.3 Final, and upgrade my board to that, and just stay there for a whiles.

[justme]

I don't have any experience with it, but I've heard a few good things about SMF (Simple Machines).

justme

[Lucas]

As said you can use just to v1.3.1 for free. If you get any future version without a license or being a customer it would be consider illegal. I'm an IPB Customer.

[Jonathan]

What then, again 2.0.0 PF2? I talked to a friend and he said
he downloaded it when it came out; so is that still free?

And as far as I'm concerned, I doubt I will be
buying anything from IPB anytime soon; as the WHT thread
pointed out, the CEO of the company lied. I do not buy from liars.

I'll be happy with the free til I can find a replacment,
and BTW that SMF looks pretty cool Justme.

[Klaassh]

Yeah I got the 2.0 one day from the download page of IPB, read about it not being free on another board and went back to the download page and it was gone. I have looked and can find no requirements in the zip file of this being a trial version or disabled in anyway.
So if any dathornians want a copy of this, feel free to ask
Personally I will just leave my board at 1.3

[Jonathan]

So if any dathornians want a copy of this, feel free to ask
Personally I will just leave my board at 1.3

After asking a few Webmasters, I managed to get their
copies of IPB (they, unlike me, didn't delete the ZIPs) ~ so
I got basicly everything from 1.1.1 to 2.0.0 PF2; just ask if thy desires.