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Firstly there are currenly 24669 user on the forum if eveyone pays £2 this works out at £592,056.00 if only half of them pay that still a lot.
Secondly i have noticed place like Maplin and other giveing away the Speed camera for free with there GPS system. If we have to start paying for it, will PGPSW start pay place like Maplin to encorae people to buy there database.
Joined: Aug 31, 2005 Posts: 15311 Location: Bradford, West Yorkshire
Posted: Tue Dec 20, 2005 11:30 am Post subject:
shrubies wrote:
Secondly i have noticed place like Maplin and other giveing away the Speed camera for free with there GPS system. If we have to start paying for it, will PGPSW start pay place like Maplin to encorae people to buy there database.
it's been mentioned before that a deal was struck with maplin giving them the right to use the PGPSW database with their products. PGPSW were approached by the retailers wanting to add value to their product. i presume there was a financial incentive so basically the equivalent of maplin buying the database for each customer.
To address the issue of costs incurred in running and maintaining the site, the following alternative options should be investigated:
Increase the income from advertisers on the site. eg an advert splash screen immediately before downloading the database.
Offer the database to a third party who would be willing to maintain it as it is.
Seek sponsorship of the database from a GPS hardware supplier or similar.
Set up a "church appeal" trust fund for us to donate to. Once the "agreed" amount has been reached for the year; run the appeal the following year.
At the end of the day, this is a conflict between the goodwill of the owners of this site and the goodwill of the contributors. Not an easy thing to balance.
I suspect I am not in the minority when I admit that I regularly use the camera database, without ever contributing to it.
I've always been incredibly impressed with it's usability and accuracy, and as such I have no problem with paying £2 everytime it is updated.
I don't personally have a problem with PayPal, I've used it for years and never had an issue with it.
The only part of this that has surprised me is your statement that this site is to go 'professional'. Due to the breadth and quality of the articles I had always assumed this site WAS professional.
Keep up the good work, and you can have my £2 with pleasure.
Living in rural Wales, I have found that many camera locations in my area are preceded by ?
I have submitted to Richard ‘Oldie’ the true reading [mph] for my local camera locations.
I have also submitted ‘new’ camera locations on the A40 [the main road to Rosslare and Ireland]
It is refreshing to know that the ‘salaried’ database staff will be visiting my area and checking on all these camera locations before they start charging for downloading the database! After all how do they know that details supplied by me are ‘honest’.
‘Oldie’ has posted a request from some member for the removal of a notorious Mobile unit!
Are all details supplied by members accurate?
Can a charge be made for a database with false details?
Using the most recent [November] download, I have just returned from driving along the M4, M25, M2, M20 and visiting the New Forest, London[Royal Albert Hall] and was surprised to find how in-accurate the database is!!
Temporary cameras removed from the M25 and M4, and my ‘Snooper’ indicating new/unmarked [not shown in the database] camera locations.
My list of the changes I found and prepared for ‘Oldie’ is available at a ‘minimal charge’.
What is the future of the POI overlay by WIRED?
Can he still produce his ‘overlay’ without charges?
I operate a Garmin iQue 3600 and find the database is not really ‘Garmin friendly’.
The .gpx database file I use is already 4437KB and is difficult to open in Mapsource.
The available .csv and .ov2 files require too much ‘fiddling about’ with POI conversion!
To pay an annual charge for a ‘Garmin unfriendly’ database for occasional visits out of my local area is not an option!
Thanks to Richard ‘Oldie’ the database exists!
How does he feel about his voluntary work being replaced by a ‘salaried’ worker?
Was he offered a salary to keep doing it?
Can he produce his database on another website?
How do the ‘few’ attending the infamous ‘meet’ feel about their contribution to the database charge?
Joined: Nov 06, 2005 Posts: 48 Location: Shropshire
Posted: Tue Dec 20, 2005 12:05 pm Post subject:
I agree with the extra splash donation screen between the site and the download. How much is already donated? Surely a half way house would be to 'guilt' users into donating (how is another issue - see above).
By raising the profile of the importance of donations would see everyone winning. i.e. you get cash, we keep the feeling that its a COMMUNITY not a BUSINESS and of course the database. On the issue of visiting locations who better small number of 'paid' surveyors or 100's of punters who'll do it for free.
it's been mentioned before that a deal was struck with maplin giving them the right to use the PGPSW database with their products. PGPSW were approached by the retailers wanting to add value to their product. i presume there was a financial incentive so basically the equivalent of maplin buying the database for each customer.
MaFt
If this is true did PGPSW get permissions from the contributors before selling it for commercial gain?
I'm not too bothered about having to pay the £2, although I'd prefer a £20 annual charge as it'd be less hassle for everyone.
What does bother me is the commercialisation of user submitted data that was collected and submitted in good faith at the time when we all believed that the database will "ALWAYS remain free".
Perhaps a sensible compromise would be to offer a year's complimentary membership to anyone who's ever submitted any data. The submissions happen by email so you have peoples' email addresses.
Taking the same idea further, how about some sort of "submit 5 camera locations and get a month's free download" scheme? This would encourage people to submit and perhaps stave off the withering of the database quality which will surely happen otherwise.
These two guestures would go some way to rewarding people for their work and make the fact that PGW is going to be profiting from it's users' contributions.
Posted: Tue Dec 20, 2005 12:11 pm Post subject: copyright?
Reposted - originally posted in wrong forum (sorry)
I own the intellectual rights to all information posted by me, whether or not it bears my current username.
Any and all information I make available is provided free for everybody but may not be used for resale.
Any database that is provided for monetary gain may not contain any information that infringes my intellectual rights, and therefore my copyright.
Where would you be if everyone else applied this philosophy? _________________ Regards
... how many times have you clicked on an advert and actually bought something leading to the site getting some cash? online ads have moved from being paid per show, to being paid per click to, in many cases now, being paid per purchase through the link.
Indeed. Look at the site http://buy.at/CheshamHigh. It's one of my kid's schools. The retailers pay comission for purchases as a result of click throughs. No extra charge to the user. So in principle would any of the advertisers I see on the right here pay, say, a few percent on purchases through this site? If so that could be promoted here. Especially if it costs the purchaser nothing. Other "reward" sites are similar in concept - e.g. http://www.greasypalm.co.uk/ This may not fund a full time person, but would certainly help with costs.
I too am very disappointed that the decision has been made to charge for what has been a free service based on members of the community giving their free time and wanting to help others.
Why could you not have a Premium service for a monthly update and a free service (database 2 or 3 months old) for those who do not travel 000's of miles a month and who do not require a database 100% uptodate.
As a new user, I visited many websites before making my GPS purchase, many of these , for example MaFt's have links to the database. If they are paying for the download every two months then what stops them posting onto their website as a free download as ionce they have paid, t is technically their's to do what they want with it.
It is refreshing to know that the ‘salaried’ database staff will be visiting my area and checking on all these camera locations before they start charging for downloading the database! After all how do they know that details supplied by me are ‘honest’.
...
Using the most recent [November] download, I have just returned from driving along the M4, M25, M2, M20 and visiting the New Forest, London[Royal Albert Hall] and was surprised to find how in-accurate the database is!!
Temporary cameras removed from the M25 and M4, and my ‘Snooper’ indicating new/unmarked [not shown in the database] camera locations.
......
The fact is that a voluntarily updated database is open to abuse. How many traffic police officers or council revenue personnel submit deletions to the database in order to have cameras removed from the database? How would you know if they were doing this? While the database is free, all users are (or should be) aware that the information may not be entirely accurate.
If charging in future, how do you verify locations (both additions and removals)? I would imagine that in law, you would be liable for errors of omission that occurred prior to the date of the latest release.
As mentioned before, I am not against charging in principle, but some things need to be thought through. _________________ - - - - - - - - -
TomTom XL Europe
Apple iPhone 3GS
I'm happy to pay the price of a pint per month for the database if I have confidence in it, but still feel slightly miffed, and couldn't work out why. I think it's because, perhaps naively, I thought of this site as a community rather than an enterprise.
Having said that, with any voluntary venture there is always far more work going on behind the scenes than people appreciate, and it can get out of hand. If I were to join any club or society, I would expect to pay a subscription, but because this is on the net, somehow expect it to be free.
Another alternative to charging would be to stop doing the work which is proving onerous and costly, and carry on with the rest. Would it be the end of the world if the speed camera database was either withdrawn, or sold to a third party? People visit for far more than just speed cameras. _________________ HP rx5935, 2GB SD Card, TTN 6.1, GPSDash
Joined: 19/08/2002 15:39:36 Posts: 172 Location: United Kingdom
Posted: Tue Dec 20, 2005 12:29 pm Post subject:
MaFt wrote:
TheBoyGroucho wrote:
I would note that the camera location data that I provided (free of charge) in the early part of this project is automatically covered by copyright and I expressly refuse its use on any commercial pay per download basis without my express permission and adequate compensation.
it's a speed camera. it's inanimate, it won't move. how will you know if the co-ordinates provided were from person x or person y? surely they would be the same whoever submitted them?
MaFt
Under UK law, copyright material sent over the Internet is protected in the same way as material in other media. So anyone wishing to distribute such material should ensure that they have the permission of the owners of the rights to distribute it. In this case ALL the third party data contributed to the database is protected by copyright.
While you may fairly claim that material emailed to you was provided with the understanding that it was for the purpose of being FREELY redistributed, it is likely not to be the case should you similarly claim to have copyright permission to RESELL the copyright material....especially as you wish to sell the copyright material back to the person who provided it!!!!
I strongly suspect that you will have to seek the individual permission from each and every contributer to the database for his/her permission to use their material in any commercial use of the database to avoid the possiblity of a class action lawsuit being taken against you, which given the projected earning of this venture easily being in excess of £100,000/annum is not entirely improbable.
Could you not charge a little extra for adverts on the site? Insert a delay to get users to think about a friendly contribution? Request a contribution from the Police who insist on putting these feckin' things on our roads?! etc
As (small or large) contributers to the forum, we tend to share our knowledge for free (some more than others obviously - I'm not after any awards/agressive retorts/etc!). The database is a big draw, but the main reason I and many others visit the site, is for advice, assistance, and often to find competitive shops to buy our gear from.
I've only recently taken the plunge to buy sat nav, and having found this site, I asked advice, clicked thru adverts, researched my subject matter with this fantastic site as the core of my research. This site is invaluable! I eventually bought from one of the advertised sites, and whenever I had problems read/posted on the forums. Answers were always polite, friendly, and I always felt happy returning here with my questions/advice.
Knowing there was no profit involved means this remains a friendly forum, the hint of financial gain has pushed it in a new direction. I understand some of the issues, but thought posting my thoughts may help you guage opinion.
I will continue to visit the site. I will pass thru the adverts when looking for a new mounting system in the new year. I will recommend the site to friends. I will also continue to search out great free POI files on t'internet. I'm not sure as yet, whether I will be prepared to pay for the database tho.
Thanks for your time and effort guys. This site is the number one for GPS on the net. Maybe that could help you leverage a little cash from the profit makers (the police, the shops, etc), and encourage the community (the knowledge givers) to stick together.
Posted: Today Post subject: Pocket GPS Advertising
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Hi! We see you’re using an ad-blocker. We’re fine with that and won’t stop you visiting the site.
But as we’re losing ad-revenue from this then why not make a donation towards website running costs?. Or you could disable your ad-blocker for this site. We think you’ll find our adverts are not overbearing!
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Increase the income from advertisers on the site. eg an advert splash screen immediately before downloading the database.
