Have the paysite debates changed your mind?

[tIIsuggas]

Have you changed your mind about how you feel toward the paysite issue?

All voters may stay anonymous.

Just another of my curious ponderings,  I wonder how many have switched their way of thinking, one way or another.

[Plum]

I've always felt paysites are a slap in the face.

[BlueSoup]

I moved this topic so lurkers could see it.

For the record, I'm against paysites, and always have been.

[tIIsuggas]

I moved this topic so lurkers could see it.

For the record, I'm against paysites, and always have been.

Well I never, I wouldn't have guessed.

[BlueSoup]

What is wrong with your avi anyway?  All I see is a broken jpeg.

[flyonthewall]

I was kind of neutral to begin with. I've always disliked paysites but I used to just avoid them. I heard about this site and came here and my first thought was, "Yay! Free stuff!"

Later I came to the forum and read about issues with paysites such as: sharing personal info of their subscribers, supporting themselves off their sites, converting meshes for TS2 and claiming they made it from scratch, selling crappy content because you can't tell the quality of what you're buying, arrogant attitudes, calling their business transactions "donations", banning people who still have subscribtion time left so they don't get what they already paid for, and other crap. Plus the fact that other gaming communities don't have the mentality of "I made this and it took forever, so I deserve money!"

So reading about the debates has only solidified my opinion.

[Anachronism]

At first, [being the naive, impressionable little girl i was] i thought paysites were fine, and when people said stuff about PMBD, i thought they should go rot somewhere [and i said so.] But then i took the time to read through the EULA, and my viewpoints shifted completely. Then i pillaged to my hearts content.  

[rome_raven]

At first I thought...
"Oooh!  That looks pretty!   I want it but I can't pay for it."  
That was Sims 1 and  part of Sims 2 days.  I buckled and got a subscription and thought
"Oooh!  Exclusivity and it looks so pretty!"  
I really started to think about it after I subscribed to a site that really had nothing on it and thought  
"Oooh!  That was a waste of money!"  :?
It was Peggy that really started to get me thinking...
"Why the hell would I want 6 MONTHS for $40?" :x

Then I decided...okay, let me just do this every once in a while...and then I started looking at the money in my bank account and decided that donating to a bunch of sites was a waste of my time and money and that I should really just look for quality things for free and donate to smaller sites that could actually use the money to keep the ACTUAL site running.

[BlueSoup]

There are plenty of GOOD valid reasons for criticizing pay sites, at least some of them. But making fun of someone's race or ethnicity, posting personal information and nasty gossip about people is just not very nice. I really wish people could stick to the actual unethical and possibly illegal use of material rather than personally attacking individuals. I suppose though, this is human nature and I certainly can't stop you. So carry on if you wish. Just as I don't have to pay for a paysite I don't like, I also don't have to open the forums and read the comments.

I absolutely, totally, agree with you.  Which is why I don't get involved in silly threads like that.  But, we're about free speech here, so I don't delete too many things.

Then I decided...okay, let me just do this every once in a while...and then I started looking at the money in my bank account and decided that donating to a bunch of sites was a waste of my time and money and that I should really just look for quality things for free and donate to smaller sites that could actually use the money to keep the ACTUAL site running.

Yes, send your money to me so I can keep buying booty to share with all of you.

[rome_raven]

Yes, send your money to me so I can keep buying booty to share with all of you.

Let's see if we can work out a plan  :lol:

[frivolous]

i'm not really for or against. even if maxis never claimed ownership over custom content, i'd still grab all the free shit i could get my hands on heyy. but i'm also the kind of person who downloads music and bootlegs movies, so that comes as no surprise.

[toomanyguppys]

I never gave it that much thought as to "wrong" or "right" until quite recently.  I played Sims 1 from almost the beginning, have every expansion pack, read forums frequently, and watched the beginnings of this thing develop. When I came into Sims2, kind of late, I was shocked at how widespread the paysite thing had become--and how much of THEIR content was either directly stolen or derivative--from poser meshes used without credit, to brand names used without permission.

Lately I've given it a lot of thought, and occasionally the balance would tilt toward something like "I can't blame people for trying to make some money but I want the free stuff, so screw 'em," but after giving it more thought, and considering alot of the issues people have brought to the discussions, I've reached my final conclusion.

Paysites must, indeed, be destroyed.

[Super_Pirate_Dude]

Always hated paysites and always will

But hating paysites was my hobby, so the sxpression "Can't live with them, can't live without" fits here.

[WonderRik]

I used to not mind paysites and I even subscribed to some.  But since I've read up on the debate and actually began playing the game with my pay hairs instead of just making and seeing the problems with them, I've come to realise that paysites just aren't worth the money.

[Got_Nerd]

I used to be neutral-negative.  I disliked paysites heartily, and thought charging was stupid, but I was of the opinion that they had a right to exist.

This was before I read the EULA section on the main site.

Now I think they should burn.

Especially Simfreaks and WDS, because they started this whole thing in TS1.  Then TSR followed suit.  And then everything became shitty.

And, did you know, right at the beginning of the TS2 community, Peggy was free?