Quadrupling the the price for LTT on Float plane. just to start!!!!

[Tieox]

Don't like it, vote with your wallet.  I know I will be. 

 

Quite often nothing else works. 

[Linus > Brandon]

12 hours ago, Kierax said:

Don't like it, vote with your wallet.  I know I will be. 

 

Quite often nothing else works. 

I truly don't want to use the nuclear option if I don't have to.  I'd rather they saw this, read it, understood it,  consider it and then finally just left well enough alone.  Then realize that the LMG channel in all its glory is what brings people to the site.  Dilute the product and in turn dilute the satisfaction to those of us happily supported a product from its infancy.  Remember what they say   "You dance with the one who brought you".  If you forget about treating your base well.  There is a good chance the house of cards may fall.  So I don't want to vote with my wallet if I don't have to.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                             

[RadiantZephyr]

The reality is I don't vote with my wallet because I want to, it's because I have to. As others have noted subscribing to multiple channels in one month can raise the price significantly. As for the "shuffle periodically" method, this is counter-intuitive to an easy experience for the user. When I subscribe to a channel, I don't want to have to remember to unsubscribe to them and/or subscribe to them again next month. To increase retention for users on a website, all major websites make paying a simple and forgettable process.

 

The "shuffle periodically" method could also be seen as gaming the system if the intent of the website developer was to keep you subscribed to those users, which means it might not be what they want either. If the goal is to retain users and keep them watching videos on FP, then why would they want a user to jump through financial hoops to support their creators AND be able to afford their service? It just seems counter-intuitive.

 

However, this is only my opinion based on my specific situation. Others may love the idea and support it, but only time will tell. And of course FP will adjust their strategy based on feedback. Until then, as Kierax stated, vote with your wallet.

[LinusTech]

So to be clear, $3 subs are being grandfathered. Dial back the anger because if you're already subscribed NOTHING has changed. 

 

At some point the plan IS for that to be for LTT only (including the bts and exclusive stuff) BUT I've left room to reverse that decision. We're just bumping the LMG price to $5 for now. 

 

The decision here was made to ensure that LMG doesn't create an unrealistic bar for other creators on Floatplane to meet. We will lose some subs, but at the end of the day LMG's loss could be the gain of another smaller creator (like eposvox, Kyle or tech deals) and I'm comfortable with that. 

 

Understand that fp is closer to a patreon-like model (supporting creators you like) than a Netflix model (paying to watch exclusive content). These changes are to ensure that a greater portion of the money being contributed is going to the creator vs the platform or payment processor. 

[Jarsky]

Personally I don't mind paying $5 per creator, but not $5 per channel. 

I would think if I was paying for a "LinusTechTips" sub, then I should get TechQuickie and Channel Superfun as part of that Sub. 

If I pay for BitWit, then If they were to make AwesomeHardware its own thing, I should get that as part of that Sub. 

 

Floatplane to me needs to expand in their content. If its for creators, then maybe try and get some of the car channel creators or more general tech channels or DIY channels on the platform to add diversity. 

When you have a number of creators it would be awesome to get like a Super Pass for say $30/month that gives you access to all creators, except maybe special content releases that you have to pay a supplementary for that creator. 

 

I think something like Channel Superfun could become Floatplane only to help get subs over there. 

Also some special production like Junkyard Wars could be a Floatplane only series again to get subs over there. Or give like an entire month before putting it on YouTube. 

 

 

[Spotty]

As nice as it would be for subscribers, I don't think the "Pay $XX and get access to all creators & content" payment method would work. Finding a fair way to divide the revenue up amongst the entire catalogue of creators would be next to impossible and end up in a far worse deal for everyone. Apparently that was a huge issue with how Vessel operated.

Way in the future, when Floatplane has 100+ creators on the platform, I wouldn't mind seeing something like a "Humble Monthly Bundle" type deal.

Each month a Floatplane curated bundle of creators is put together. Bundle costs $10 per month. A "Tech Bundle" could include LinusTechTips, Bitwit, TechDeals, and UFDTech. Floatplane takes their cut, let's say $3. The remaining $7 is divided up between the creators which will need to be negotiated with between Floatplane and the creators themselves, with the larger more popular channels getting a larger slice of the pie. By the time Floatplane has 100+ creators on board they should have a pretty good idea of the 'value' of each creator, judging by their normal subscriber count and their normal subscription cost.
The individual channels might be taking slightly less revenue per subscription than if people were to subscribe directly to that channel, but because they're packaged in with other creators it should increase the number of people subscribing. Floatplane might take less as well, but it's a single larger payment so less of their cut is ate by processing fees.

For example you could split the revenue up like this (obviously I don't know what sort of cut is taken or what is required to remain economically viable, this is just an example of how revenue share could work)

• Floatplane: $3
• LinusTechTips: $3
• Bitwit: $2
• UFDTech: $1
• TechDeals: $1

 

Whoever buys the bundle gets access to those channels content for the month. People who are interested in multiple channels will be getting a better deal, and might discover new creators they like and will continue to subscribe to.

If someone is already a subscriber to any of those channels then they just get a month access added on to their existing subscription. Maybe at the end of the month you can offer a discount code to anyone who wants to continue the subscription to the channel, say 10% discount off the next months subscription in order to entice people to continue subscribing to the channels after the bundle period ends.

Then next months bundle deal could be a "Science Bundle" with some science channels. The month after could be a Car Bundle, then a Gaming Bundle, a Cooking channel bundle, and so on.

Obviously not a practical idea until there is a large catalogue of creators to work from, which is a long way off. The biggest issue I see would be negotiating with the channels to determine who gets what slice of pie, but I imagine it would be workable, and if one channel isn't interested just put a different creator in their place.

 

I honestly have no idea if this is something that could work, it was just a random shower thought I had after seeing all this recent discussion about Floatplane pricing & subscription models.

[minibois]

14 minutes ago, Spotty said:

For example you could split the revenue up like this (obviously I don't know what sort of cut is taken or what is required to remain economically viable, this is just an example of how revenue share could work)

• Floatplane: $3
• LinusTechTips: $3
• Bitwit: $2
• UFDTech: $1
• TechDeals: $1

The way YouTube Premium (YouTube Red previously) dealt with this is split up the money amongst watch time.

Say you watch one channel 75% of the time and another 25%, these channels would get 75% and 25% of the YouTube premium cost (after fees and such) respectively.

 

This is probably not a super fair way to work with it though.. but that's the whole 2014 - present algorithm talk all over again (how 2 minutes of high effort content is beaten by a 20 minute 'easy to make' gaming video).

 

But I don't think it's a good idea to start comparing to YouTube, it not being a very profitable service for Google + YouTube premium not adding much revenue to YouTubers.

[harryk]

4 hours ago, LinusTech said:

Understand that fp is closer to a patreon-like model (supporting creators you like) than a Netflix model (paying to watch exclusive content). These changes are to ensure that a greater portion of the money being contributed is going to the creator vs the platform or payment processor.

Thanks! This was the info I was looking for. I think this could be clearer from the front; correct or not FP appears to be positioning itself as a Youtube competitor/replacement.

[MarvinKMooney]

Just tossing out an idea for who ever wants it, but why not charge a min of 3 dollars for acces but have an option for others who would be happy to pay more kind of like bandcamp. Pay as much as you want or a defined min amount

[RadiantZephyr]

The reality is that regardless of what ideas we propose, LMG is more than competent enough to adapt to the situation, and experimentation is inevitable to expand revenue. And it's my belief that Linus and his team, being part of fairly successful business, are making the best decision as regards to revenue in this situation. As Linus has said, he's even left room to reverse the decision in case of any adverse effects. They seem fully prepared to adapt and innovate upon this idea and I say carpe diem, nobody has perfected anything without creativity.

 

As for me, I will continue to support the tech community as much as affordably possible and adapt alongside them.

[Reece Frost]

Eh, I don't really watch TQ or TL on FP so that doesn't bother me at all, if anything it means not getting a notification and being underwhelmed when the video turns out to be a tech quickie instead of a mainline LTT video.

 

Price is whatever, 3 dollars to 5 dollars a month is not much for me, especially when I don't pay for any other monthly subscriptions. Like honestly the extra 2 dollars could go into a savings account but I already but enough into that damn thing. I do hope that when CSF is revived then it will be on the LTT floatplane subscription because having a separate FP channel for a creator that only uploads every few weeks / months feels a bit disingenuous. With TQ and TL which upload multiple times a week I can understand them getting their own FP channel.

 

Will definitely "subscribe" to GN if they ever come over to floatplane though, effectively doubling my subscription price.

 

edit: what I will say that upsets me about Floatplane is the very inconsistant upload times. for the one LTT video a day I am sometimes getting that video way into the next day (Europe) where as other times I can get them at maybe 1am or 2am.

[Linus > Brandon]

15 hours ago, LinusTech said:

So to be clear, $3 subs are being grandfathered. Dial back the anger because if you're already subscribed NOTHING has changed. 

 

At some point the plan IS for that to be for LTT only (including the bts and exclusive stuff) BUT I've left room to reverse that decision. We're just bumping the LMG price to $5 for now. 

 

The decision here was made to ensure that LMG doesn't create an unrealistic bar for other creators on Floatplane to meet. We will lose some subs, but at the end of the day LMG's loss could be the gain of another smaller creator (like eposvox, Kyle or tech deals) and I'm comfortable with that. 

 

Understand that fp is closer to a patreon-like model (supporting creators you like) than a Netflix model (paying to watch exclusive content). These changes are to ensure that a greater portion of the money being contributed is going to the creator vs the platform or payment processor. 

Hey Linus,  Glad you had a successful LTX2019.  It looked amazing and all the  videos from all the other creators youtube pages were amazing.  It was super cool to see that it wasn't all about milking the fans but rather giving back.    Offering the people an opportunity to cross the boundary from Computer world to real world.  So props to you.

 

I'm sure you are getting the point I was making but I'm not sure you are seeing what it is we are actually disenchanted with.  I'm pretty sure no one would care if you raised the price of LTT to 5 bucks.  The grandfathering doesn't even register on my radar.  It's the realization that the eventual product here will be split into 4 channels.  When you were shaking hands with kids who were 12 or 13 or 14 who went to LTX.  These kids look at you like a god.  A short squeaky voiced god. but a god no less.  How do you expect someone like that will be able to see all your videos.  Those are the people that matter.  5 bucks a month I am sure they will find a way.  It's reasonable.  20 bucks a month, month after month.  That's a fair bit of money to come up with for a 10 year old or a 11 year old.  They will eventually be left by the wayside when it comes to the "ëxclusive" content.   Nothing makes people feel like they are part of the community than not being able to access some behind the scenes videos because they aren't fiscally able to.  It's those behind the scenes videos where the fans feel like they know you guys.  Those videos are the important ones when it comes to growing loyalty in the fan base.  It's the reason for the turn out at the convention center.  It's the reason people were lined up around the block trying to get into a building in Van on a Saturday morning in the middle of summer.

 

If you are ever in the Neighborhood and you feel like a Beer or a smoothie some Sushi or anything else shoot me a message.  Oh the neighbourhood is Guildford area and it's the good side of the Guildford area Next to the Guildford Station pub.

[LinusTech]

4 hours ago, Linus > Brandon said:

Hey Linus,  Glad you had a successful LTX2019.  It looked amazing and all the  videos from all the other creators youtube pages were amazing.  It was super cool to see that it wasn't all about milking the fans but rather giving back.    Offering the people an opportunity to cross the boundary from Computer world to real world.  So props to you.

 

I'm sure you are getting the point I was making but I'm not sure you are seeing what it is we are actually disenchanted with.  I'm pretty sure no one would care if you raised the price of LTT to 5 bucks.  The grandfathering doesn't even register on my radar.  It's the realization that the eventual product here will be split into 4 channels.  When you were shaking hands with kids who were 12 or 13 or 14 who went to LTX.  These kids look at you like a god.  A short squeaky voiced god. but a god no less.  How do you expect someone like that will be able to see all your videos.  Those are the people that matter.  5 bucks a month I am sure they will find a way.  It's reasonable.  20 bucks a month, month after month.  That's a fair bit of money to come up with for a 10 year old or a 11 year old.  They will eventually be left by the wayside when it comes to the "ëxclusive" content.   Nothing makes people feel like they are part of the community than not being able to access some behind the scenes videos because they aren't fiscally able to.  It's those behind the scenes videos where the fans feel like they know you guys.  Those videos are the important ones when it comes to growing loyalty in the fan base.  It's the reason for the turn out at the convention center.  It's the reason people were lined up around the block trying to get into a building in Van on a Saturday morning in the middle of summer.

 

If you are ever in the Neighborhood and you feel like a Beer or a smoothie some Sushi or anything else shoot me a message.  Oh the neighbourhood is Guildford area and it's the good side of the Guildford area Next to the Guildford Station pub.

Right now we have no plans for exclusive content on the TQ or TL channels on Floatplane, so anyone who ends up being grandfathered in on LTT is gonna be in great shape

[Linus > Brandon]

25 minutes ago, LinusTech said:

Right now we have no plans for exclusive content on the TQ or TL channels on Floatplane, so anyone who ends up being grandfathered in on LTT is gonna be in great shape

That's good to hear.   No Gamer left behind is a good LMG motto.

[Ryzza5]

Quote

22 hours ago, LinusTech said:
<<<< These changes are to ensure that a greater portion of the money being contributed is going to the creator vs the platform or payment processor. >>>>

So does that mean annual subscriptions will come back soon?

I must also say I'm a bit uncomfortable with removing TL and TQ from FP - purely for convenience reasons.  I didn't join FP straight away because of the inconvenience of splitting up my YouTube view time from one website to now two (YT and FP)  I eventually did to support LMG for the hours of entertainment I get per month, while remembering to watch WAN show on YouTube (and occasionally checking the Android app for bts Story videos which don't show up on PC for some reason???)

 

If I had to go through my YouTube subscriptions with thumbnails of Linus' face on them and work out if I've seen them on FP before or if it's a new TQ video that could get annoying and I would be tempted to just cancel my FP sub for sake of convenience. 

Besides the recent LTX videos, there hasn't been any exciting BTS stuff this year - honestly, the bts news in WAN shows is more interesting to me.  Not complaining or anything, just sharing [hopefully valuable] insights with Linus. 
 

[LinusTech]

1 hour ago, Ryzza5 said:

So does that mean annual subscriptions will come back soon?

I must also say I'm a bit uncomfortable with removing TL and TQ from FP - purely for convenience reasons.  I didn't join FP straight away because of the inconvenience of splitting up my YouTube view time from one website to now two (YT and FP)  I eventually did to support LMG for the hours of entertainment I get per month, while remembering to watch WAN show on YouTube (and occasionally checking the Android app for bts Story videos which don't show up on PC for some reason???)

 

If I had to go through my YouTube subscriptions with thumbnails of Linus' face on them and work out if I've seen them on FP before or if it's a new TQ video that could get annoying and I would be tempted to just cancel my FP sub for sake of convenience. 

Besides the recent LTX videos, there hasn't been any exciting BTS stuff this year - honestly, the bts news in WAN shows is more interesting to me.  Not complaining or anything, just sharing [hopefully valuable] insights with Linus. 
 

That's a fair point. Duly noted.

 

RE: annual subscriptions, we will bring them back at our earliest opportunity. Dev time has been focused on other features up until this point

[RasmusDC]

personally i look at it as "content" vs " "price" it seems steep. i like that LTT has some money to play with, also to buy equipment like RED, that really does not matter in youtube production, or expensive shop equipment. (close to netflix cost, which gives you so much more in form of cost of production)

 

but for me the reason i watch it, is that it is simply a "non" cost, i´ve really liked Linus content, but i must also admit, that i think it is getting at bit bloated, look at the video on the "multiple editors, one machine part" how many parts that video is, an when he ran his conclusion, it was´nt really a conclusion, it was just finalization of the build, then the testing phase came later..

 

saw a science studio video yesterday, with a watercool build, and i got this thought.

 

Science studio - one video - full build, 20 minutes of my time, were i felt that 20 minutes well spendt

LTT video - 10 parts - 200 minutes of video, 40 minutes of interesting elements, rest waste, actually more wastefull that watching commercials.

if Jayztwocents had done the video - 4 parts, 2 parts where everything goes wrong, and LOTS of waiting time inbetween.

 

that for me is the main problem, the bloatiness, i do understand that when you throw 20xxx of dollors into a build, you will need some kind of payback, and i do like seeing the hunt for a solution... for me the best video was actually the server breakdown, and the hunt for recovery, but that was also a 1 part video with a conclusion..

 

and as an engineer (and also a toolmaker), i really do like Alex´s struggle to show that he has some sort of mechanical skill.

[Dubious]

Many LTT videos are outdated by the time they get to Youtube and I have gotten those news from other channels 

[aridhol]

After attending LTX I was interested in subscribing to a couple channels on floatplane but I was mistaken on the pricing.

I think $5 is too much to ask for the content regardless of whether it's LTT or UFD etc..

2 or 3 channels of tech videos, even with the exclusives, is a netflix subscription and with all respect to the creators they are not nearly equivalent.

 

I'd subscribe at the $2-$3 level (and had actually, since cancelled), but not more than that.

 

That's just my two cents and I understand the value proposition will be different for different people.

[SkaterDudeBro41]

I'm going to apologize for the following effortpost in advance. tl;dr at bottom.

I'll have to be honest here and say that I don't get the pushback from raising the rate to $5. Splitting the LMG videos into three separate Floatplane subscriptions, yeah I'm not a fan of that, but I'll get into that in a few.

 

The way I see it, is that $5/mo brings it up to the same as a Twitch subscription. Neither a Twitch nor Floatplane sub will offer even a fraction as much as paying for Netflix, but I don't think either is trying to compete with them to begin with.

 

An FP sub gets you:

• non-time-sensitive videos a week early
• Sponsorship-free videos
• Higher bitrate
• Video download
• FP exclusive behind-the-scenes videos

All of those are nice-to-have's, but regardless if you pay or don't, you get access to all the main content. The FP exclusive videos are just unscripted iphone-shot videos that come out about once a month.

 

I hate being the guy that dismisses criticism with "if you don't like it, don't pay for it". I really do think this is more of a supporter donation, since nothing important is being withheld. Regarding that hypothetical "kid that can't afford that every month": they're really not missing anything good by just sticking to youtube. Participating in the forums will probably net you more behind-the-scenes content than the FP exclusives would anyways.

 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

Now, regarding splitting the FP Creators into LTT, TechLinked, and Techquickie? I think it's justified from the standpoint that, yeah, they each do output enough videos to justify being separate. Heck, they're entirely different Youtube channels for that same reason.

 

What I personally don't like is that there the little benefits I get with my LTT sub aren't as enticing for either of those channels.

 

TechLinked videos aren't released early, they don't do FP exclusives, and (IMO since it's mostly just the caster speaking and news article snippets) don't really benefit from the bitrate bump IMO.

 

Techquickie also doesn't do FP exclusives and is probably the least...... interesting channel for die-hard fans. Not to disrespect the work that goes into the videos or imply that there's anything wrong. However, I feel that the target audience for Techquickie videos are often as reference material for people who search something like "Why have CRT tvs died off".

 

Linus has stated he doing this because he wants to "...ensure that LMG doesn't create an unrealistic bar for other creators on Floatplane to meet". Which, I guess fair enough, even though LTT alone will still massively outpace many other creators. Regardless, I feel like most current FP supporters won't opt for a Techquickie or TechLinked sub.

 

tl;dr

• No starving child that has to mow 50 lawns to earn a buck will be missing out on LTT content, regardless of FP pricing
• I don't think splitting up LMG FP videos into three different services makes much sense from the subscriber's side, unless they're just being generous

 

[Cerberus044]

Honestly it feels like the problem really just comes down to overcoming the payment processing charges and I feel like it could be solved with subscription grouping.  You can either do it for an all access single higher price split by watch time (granted that comes with it's issues) or something like a credit system.  You could pay say $15/mo and end up with 100 credits to sprinkle around.  Want to watch some LTT videos that month spend 25 credits and get access.  Want to watch another channel spend 10 or whatever they set their price at.  Next month you could chose different creators if you wish or keep contributing by default to the previous selection until changed.  This would encourage creators to put some effort into floatplane to attract that audience each month.  If all you or any other creator offers is early access it's an easy sale for serious fans at $3 but the value proposition goes way way down when you start chopping off channels and aren't really offering much in the way of exclusive content.  It's the same problem you brought up in the piracy video recently that's plaguing Netflix, you're going to have trouble selling less content and hiking the price.  Most processing fees I've encountered carry a percentage portion and a fixed portion and you can eat least reduce the impact of the fixed portion by burying it in a larger pooled subscription.  Just my 2 rubles.  Thanks for the entertainment.

[AngryBeaver]

Here is my opinion. Imo I don't care about linus or his videos. I just enjoy the forums which is a good place to communicate with other techies. Now if linus goes nuts there are a few others I can return to or *gasp* create my own.

 

Yes some of the benchmarks and reviews are nice, but there are plenty of other great reviewers (I personally prefer jays2cents anyways for my source of reviews).

 

So it comes down to what does linus offer that puts him ahead of the others... and honestly I don't see anything. He does have a huge team, but that doesn't increase quality just his overhead. Anyways I wouldn't pay for it... he will need to continue to rely on monetary gain via ads for me.

[DaiGurenMK42]

On 8/6/2019 at 4:10 AM, LinusTech said:

So to be clear, $3 subs are being grandfathered. Dial back the anger because if you're already subscribed NOTHING has changed. 

 

At some point the plan IS for that to be for LTT only (including the bts and exclusive stuff) BUT I've left room to reverse that decision. We're just bumping the LMG price to $5 for now. 

 

The decision here was made to ensure that LMG doesn't create an unrealistic bar for other creators on Floatplane to meet. We will lose some subs, but at the end of the day LMG's loss could be the gain of another smaller creator (like eposvox, Kyle or tech deals) and I'm comfortable with that. 

 

Understand that fp is closer to a patreon-like model (supporting creators you like) than a Netflix model (paying to watch exclusive content). These changes are to ensure that a greater portion of the money being contributed is going to the creator vs the platform or payment processor. 

I understand the difficulties with the multiple channels LMG has. But I do not want to feel like I am missing LMG content just because I didn't subscribe to all of them.

 

Will all FP exclusives be available on all channels so anyone subscribed to one be able to be involved? Or can we get an LMG Bundle for less than $10?

[LinusTech]

45 minutes ago, DaiGurenMK42 said:

I understand the difficulties with the multiple channels LMG has. But I do not want to feel like I am missing LMG content just because I didn't subscribe to all of them.

 

Will all FP exclusives be available on all channels so anyone subscribed to one be able to be involved? Or can we get an LMG Bundle for less than $10?

Bundled subscriptions is an idea that we are aware of but not something that we have made a solid decision on yet

[Donut417]

On 8/3/2019 at 1:15 AM, Crunchy Dragon said:

Ad-free videos,

Youtube was ad free. Because I use an Ad Blocker. At $8 a month Ill have to pass.