Let's talk about MONEY! Oh yeah, we're going there...

Money?

Money! Gimme! *makes grabby hands*	33.6%	[ 130 ]
Money is evil! *makes warding off evil hand gesture*	17.6%	[ 68 ]
Monkeys? I like monkeys! Oh wait, you said money...	27.6%	[ 107 ]
Eh, doesn't affect me, but I love poll gold!	21.2%	[ 82 ]
Total Votes:			[ 387 ]

[Ridley Starsmore]

Platonix

Ridley Starsmore

I'll just say this: I'm a member of Verge, but honestly, I don't get much from it. I got in because I buy MCs and EIs. The current costs of items in there is just way too high for me. Especially with so few poses.

I know there are some who rather enjoy the items, but the cost and lack of poses is just a detriment to me. And there are a lot of Gaians in that guild under that umbrella.

I'd like to see exclusive EIs, MAYBE a second UNIQUE MC envelope, at standard prices. Remember, exclusive does not have to mean expensive.

Just to play devil's advocate for a moment...let me try to make a point that Lanzer has tried, and rather badly failed, to make in the past.

Suppose Club Verge does start coming out with exclusive Club Verge Thank-You letters that cost 250 GC like the normal versions, but can only be bought by Club Verge members. ...which naturally means the supply would be lower...which means they're more valuable and would be worth more Gold in the marketplace. People who earned Club Verge access by buying things with Cash and selling them for Gold would obviously be inclined to use those for their gold-making transactions, and at least a few such people will have the resources to move Club Verge MCs in fairly large numbers. In fact, those are exactly the people who most easily got into Club Verge in the first place, so maybe a fairly large fraction of Club Verge's MC buyers would be trading in bulk.

We've all seen this story play out with all kinds of items on Gaia. They start out expensive, gold-wise, because they're still new and thus still rare, but as more people hop on the profit train, the supply goes up to the point where it starts meeting the demand. The price starts going down. This is a shame for the people looking to make a profit, but more importantly, the whole point of a Club Verge item has been lost. The term "exclusive" no longer applies to this item in any meaningful way.

That's why Lanzer has gotten into the mindset of expensive = exclusive. It may be annoying to people who just want to own the item, but it sure does keep away the problem of market saturation. If you have any idea how else that problem could be avoided, other than soulbinding of course, maybe you can convince Gaia Staff to stop using super-high prices as their go-to method.

Oh, I get the reasoning, and I understand it to an extent.

But the reason I suggested exclusive EIs and Mcs is because those wouldn't STAY in the shop, so it would still limit the amount in the MP, much like the current cash shop does now. And the limit of only members being able to buy them will make the items still have a value. We're not talking 25 dollar EIs or 10 dollar MCs. Just regular priced ones, but limited time Club Verge exclusives, so the supply will stay lower than the potential demand. After all, lower cost MCs and EIs haven't hurt the shop.

If the venders who are buying in bulk do get them, how is it any different if they do it there or the cash shop? This way gives members an incentive to use the Verge shop regularly instead of once in a blue moon.

[chaos butterfly]

I'm sorry to see that many users are claiming there is a huge divide between users who are members of Club Verge, and users who aren't. And that so far quite a few users have taken this thread as an opportunity not to give Gaia feedback, but to complain about the other side. sad

But I'd like to ask: what about those users in the middle?

The ones who may have joined Gaia years ago, supported Gaia by buying MCs on a monthly basis, could very well have contributed more than $100 in total, but aren't invited to the club because their spending is less than $100 in the last year. What about users who only buy one 499 GC item per month, they aren't invited because they didn't meet Gaia's minimum cash purchase. What about users who may have supported Gaia last year, or the year before, but due to RL financial issues had to cut this years spending.

By fixing an arbitrary limit I feel Gaia is basically saying 'you didn't give us enough money to be worth a reward, or a birthday gift.' I think those are the users that Gaia should give consideration to. Not just because it's kind of unfair to exclude those members, but because Gaia won't benefit as a company if potential customers are put off from paying more money for pixels in the future.

[Azavezel]

Let's not forget as soon as items appear in the shop, marketplace listings are made. There's also a thread that tells you exactly what's in it, what the pricing is, and where to find them on the marketplace.

It's about as "exclusive" as a panel in a convention.

[Naladi]

chaos butterfly

I'm sorry to see that many users are claiming there is a huge divide between users who are members of Club Verge, and users who aren't. And that so far quite a few users have taken this thread as an opportunity not to give Gaia feedback, but to complain about the other side. sad

But I'd like to ask: what about those users in the middle?

The ones who may have joined Gaia years ago, supported Gaia by buying MCs on a monthly basis, could very well have contributed more than $100 in total, but aren't invited to the club because their spending is less than $100 in the last year. What about users who only buy one 499 GC item per month, they aren't invited because they didn't meet Gaia's minimum cash purchase. What about users who may have supported Gaia last year, or the year before, but due to RL financial issues had to cut this years spending.

By fixing an arbitrary limit I feel Gaia is basically saying 'you didn't give us enough money to be worth a reward, or a birthday gift.' I think those are the users that Gaia should give consideration to. Not just because it's kind of unfair to exclude those members, but because Gaia won't benefit as a company if potential customers are put off from paying more money for pixels in the future.

I believe in her first post Sisky said that they were working on rewards for users who contributed financially to the site, but do not spend quite enough to qualify for Club Verge as well as for users who don't spend money but contribute exceptionally to the site in other ways. Being one of those users though, I understand how you feel. I was a bit disappointed when Club Verge was released but I ended up sliding under the bar and not being qualified for the program.

[Voat]

The obvious: If people are complaining about prices it's because you also invited a demographic to the club who shop on budgets. And if you do sell an item that is wildly popular in sales in Verge, that item probably would have performed even better outside of Verge, in La Victorie instead, where you have a larger paying demographic than just those isolated to Verge. Gaia has created a new distinction between Verge members and non-Verge members, this is something you're going to have to deal with in the future, and accept that you're going to get complaints about it. People are going to feel excluded and I think Gaia should acknowledge this exclusion. Saying "oh but we're going to have loyalty rewards for everyone" is not going to take away from the fact that people feel excluded from a feature, that is Verge- one of Gaia's only two cash shops.

Suggestions: Open Verge to the public but keep it so that only guild members get special discounts and sales from the shop, and access to the guild. Possibly even first-hour/day dibs on items before they are released to everyone else. If someone is a member of Verge, give them a Y% off on all items worth over X-GC amount.
If it's not too late, change the concept of Club Verge to something more homey/welcoming, and less exclusionary/snobbish. Instead of a dog club bouncer, use a relevant NPC like NPC Nicolae Johnny Ray and give the shop design a secret black market feeling.
It's even possible that you scrap the whole Club Verge and put all the special Verge items in a special area of Bifrost, since Crescento and Nicolae were originally the NPCs who had it in mind to sell backwings for large amounts of cash. Story-wise and world-wise it would make sense that Crescento/Nicolae are the ones selling things like backwings from a secret part of their shop given their manga backstory of wanting to make bank off of angelic wings.

Unrelated but from something i was reading a couple days ago that you might find informative.

This is not to say these are good reflections of what has gone on at Gaia Online but when you take a look at designing non-cash loyalty rewards I would keep in mind the special value of volunteerism that goes around on Gaia. The Q&A forum, Guides and Resources Forum, and Community Projects forum could do with a little appreciation of their existence and efforts.


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[Deletris]

I don't mind the occasional expensive item.
However, releasing verge almost right after summer sale is... well a bit intimating.

Seeing the drama of an item with a 1k price tag halo. It's natural that the users
would be really upset with verge, after all it's another 1k price tag item.

(And it's not even an angelic halo)

___________


Summer/Black Friday sales are nice, however I'm not really a fan of verge. I prefer when items are
re-released (to help users questing them) as oppose to new items for really expensive prices.

[chaos butterfly]

The second issue that I really feel is unaddressed so far, is continuing to make monthly announcements on the 15th that monthly collectibles are only available during that month, when one of the first threads that Club Verge members made was to discuss which past MCs they'd like Gaia to sell to them for cash in their new store.

It's obvious that there are users who want to pay for 'exclusive' access to valuable '03 Donation items (like minis, bear hats, OMGs etc), and if it is Gaia's intention to oblige these users, I think you should change the monthly announcement, and other MC promotional pages to indicate the change in status of these items.

[Tansee]

I don't care about Club Verge one way or the other, but was wondering why people who were laid off from Gaia or quit never come back and participate in the site again? It's like they disappear down a black hole. I think some people would like to hear how they are doing.

[MistressMinako]

I hate the expensive = exclusive = worthwhile mindset that things have shifted to in the last few years.

My problem with Verge is not that it's a special sale to supporters, but that it is indicative of a larger problem. This is reflected most notably in Alchemy with its many design flaws intended to keep new items rare and vacuum up excesses of still more items, creating a forced rarity and thus: worth; in pixels which have absolutely no intrinsic value.

Expense and rarity don't ensure good items. I wish that idea would stop being such a core tenet of this site.

[Sane Silence]

Thank you for taking the time to talk about this with us, your tone is absolutely friendly and refreshing; I'm looking forward to the benefits for people who contribute to Gaia non-financially biggrin Hopefully this will help stop people from yelling at Gaia for being a business >>;


I skimmed everyone's posts, so I may have missed it if someone else said it, but the main difference I find between cash shop and gold shop items is the restriction in the gold shops of the types of items that users seem to like the most. For example, wigs are totally awesome and are rarely released in the gold shops. This thread makes a startling comparison of the number of wigs in the shops versus those in cash items. You could say the same thing about eye/body mods (I can't think of any in the gold shops, but I might just be having a forgetful moment). It makes sense to make the cash items more desirable/exclusive than what are essentially free items, but some of the things that are made exclusive seem kind of silly. Simple makeup, for instance, would be sooo nice to have in the gold shops. It's easy to obtain in real life, so it doesn't make a lot of sense compared to, say, wings, which we can understand being difficult to obtain. I think we love these kinds of items because they allow us a greater range of personality than the default poses and expressions and have trouble accepting that not all users get access to them. I own masquerade, but I still feel that the poses I use most (eyeshadow/lipstick/blush) should have some gold-shop equivalent because they are so absolutely basic.

TL;DR version: Some items are highly desirable because they are basic, such as simple hairstyles (not counting the salon because people don't use it much) and makeup. People will buy these for high prices, but they shouldn't have to. It makes more sense to make items like wings/special effects/halos exclusive.



I don't mean to complain, I absolutely love the gold shops. It's a lot of fun to go in there with 10k and see what random little things I can get that I never noticed before 3nodding

As a complete side-note, I find Gaia to be generous with what goes into the gold shops compared to TinierMe, haha. Fellow former TMers, you with me? ; P Their version of a gold shop was absolutely desolate/never updated/filled with purposefully less well-drawn things--no, really, this isn't a conspiracy on my part, the free items were literally drawn with a different style.

[Sweet Angel Mary]

I know the feedback that money spent on zomg items should go to zomg has gotten old. I was never one of those believers but i am frustrated by how money is wasted by gaia. I don't know if you've read the glassdoor reviews of gaia but one said that the management doesn't care about whether a feature is fun to play. Gaia has spent thousands on games and stuff that get abandoned or removed. i don't even want to think about the time a developer spent on putting meebo, backyard monsters and summer springs when the partner companies didn’t let gaia keep the games. Then there’s games like zomg, HoC, soul crash and rumplekitten that seem like they’ll be abandoned forever. Why is gaia spending so much on games that gaia has no intention of sticking with and updating. We all know that games aren’t instantly successful and need constant glitch fixes and updates to draw people in. I’ve even seen people say on the forums that they won’t get into a new game by gaia b/c gaia keeps abandoning them. It’s really hurting gaia’s reputation and I think part of the focus on money is that we see all these features that aren’t maintained. We also get broken promises, i will say the promise broken of a quest assessible to everyone. That’s something that could be found in ask the admin threads before alchemy. One of the things we were told about why alchemy is the way it is is b/c there are items that staff wanted to be rare. It’s also the reason given on why items are so expensive and why the CI pets don’t drop in larger quantities. I think this is part of why gaia has a money hungry reputation, is that instead of letting the users dictate marketplace prices, the gaia staff have already decided certain items will be rare. If you spend lots of money then you’d obviously have more chances at rare items. Instead of making items accessible to everyone, it seems like spending cash is the quickest route to obtain the most desirable items.
I think if gaia hadn’t spent so much times and money on social games and given us a new inventory arranger and features for the site, we wouldn’t feel so disconnected. It’s like there is no one at the top management positions that know how to make fun things for gaia. The updates for alchemy and games keep getting pushed back, etc but yet the company of gaia interactive was spending money on socialy games up until a few months ago. It’d be nice if we knew the people in charge is going to focus on the site instead of creating a new division in order to develop some other product etc that is separate from gaia online.
I think that’s all I have to say now.

[babiafi]

When Club Verge opened there was thread after thread complaining that Gaia ought to be concentrating on gold shop items. Then there's a GS update and there's a bunch of threads whinging that they don't like the items. To be honest, it feels like most people are only happy if they're complaining about something. (Then again, I'm sure that's not a surprise to anyone who has ever had to work in a public-facing role!)

Personally I think the reward scheme (Club Verge and the upcoming loyalty rewards) is a great idea - it is always nice to be recognised as a good customer, whether you spend a lot, or help to keep the brand afloat in other ways. Perhaps some of the hate is coming from a genuine lack of understanding of business practice, or maybe just a reluctance to accept that Gaia is a corporate concern? At the end of the day, Gaia is not a public service; it has to make money or it will cease to exist. End of.

As for this idea that people who spend money on virtual items are losers... Let he who is without sin cast the first stone and all that. If people were really so concerned at the idea of 'wasting' money on virtual items, they wouldn't be 'wasting' time on a virtual world when they could be doing something far more productive...

[Imperial Shockies]

siskataya

I have been here since go-gaia, and I am still active, I love spending my money on Gaia, I guess my point is maybe having all the cash stuff happen all at the same time just made it look like Gaia was so money hungry.

I don't mind spending my money on Gaia because I have made so many amazing friends here and it has thought me so many things in my life. I don't think I could ever repay Gaia, so I spend my money on Gaia hoping and praying that Gaia pays me back again with amazing events and items and all of that. crying

I feel like a pageant queen.

[Ariel Yardena Davidson]

The Undead Suitor

is it weird that you guys have spent more time explaining yourselves than anything else lately

If only because of people making absolutely crackpot theories and the amount of gullible people not only willing to believe THOSE but the notion that pronouncing "gullible" slowly enough will lead to someone saying "oranges."

Sisky, i'd like to applaud the idea, but i'm starting to agree with everyone else who HAS said the following:
This was an idea with good intentions, but a very rocky start.

A site-wide announcement explaining a possible plan for rewarding user loyalty would have been good to make first.

Is it really that difficult to say "We're planning a few more loyalty programs for users who support this site the best they can, as we have several in place, and we're preparing to launch a perk for those who regularly save up or purchase Gaia Cash," or would that have spoiled the plan?

[Aldo Simoncini]

Personally I don't care about Club Verge, for me it's just another feature I'm not interested in.

In 2008/2009 I used to spend about $50-100/month on GCash but a while ago I decided to stop supporting this site with real money. Mainly because of zOMG but also for other reasons. I simply got disappointed by Gaia too many times.

I know every company wants to make profit - and a good company should, but I also think a company who wants to make profit should treat their customers with respect (happy customers = more profit). But personally I often had the feeling, Gaia does care more about money than anything else. We got misleading announcements, the odds of getting someting decent in RIGs got worse and worse, more and more things had chance/gambling involved, etc. Also things I spent a shitload of cash for in the past were suddenly available for free as Overseer rewards (Fluff box contents) or Daily chance (Aquarium decorations).

Maybe I'd still buy GCash if I'd have the feeling it's worth my money... but unfortunately it's not. sad

Anyways, kudos to you Sisky for making this thread. 3nodding