Xenforo

[Toups]

Agree with you, you can own the codes, but you wont own the person who coded it. Maybe Vbulletin should of made a contract, where they cant invest or make any type of program similar to VB.

Probably should have done something of the sort, they might now in the future.

 

[Justin M]

Agree with you, you can own the codes, but you wont own the person who coded it. Maybe Vbulletin should of made a contract, where they cant invest or make any type of program similar to VB.

Probably should have done something of the sort, they might now in the future.

A no compete clause in their contract would probably take care of something like that.

 

[David]

Internet Brands and vB are not doing themselves a favour by continuing with this law suit. Their best option is to make a private deal with XenForo to get them out of the mess. vB customers are considering moving away, and many have, from all the debacle that has gone on, pointlessly. From my understanding, vB can't prove that the 3 developers gained any extra knowledge from working at vB. You can assume that, but that's a knowledge claim, hence they would need to provide the evidence to back that claim. Currently, they are merely assuming the 3 creators gained something from working there, and then using that on XF. I don't think there is solid evidence, and so assuming the case is determined "beyond all reasonable doubt", then XF is in the clear, hence the probable reason that they are continuing on. Again, above all, it's still a "claim", until proven, so since people are still going on about "claims", then clearly IB or vB have not proven anything.

Anyway, on topic, XF looks like a clean piece of coding. The appearance is clean and appealing so that has definitely caught my attention.

 

[DarkRaven]

Yes and no, you're entitled to your own opinion.

Let's give an example. If you worked at a company that was researching new leads in medicine. Let's say you and the company worked on a project researching for 5 years until something was figured out and created that was great, using others work not only your own to do so.

Then you left the company and made your own company researching the same thing. You would be far more advanced on the subject then anyone else because you had previously spent 5 years researching it already so you would be much farther along by using your experience with the original company.

Basically you create a new company and get to skip the time of having to figure things out because you had already done that or learned it from others' work at your original company.

Legal? Depends
Ethical? To some

If you spent years figuring something out with someone, they left you and used their experience/knowledge gained from you to finish or make the same "genre" of "item" would that be fair to you or others?

Personally, XF looks and feels a lot different from vBulletin, so I don't think that they took many ideas from vB. The problem with you're analogy is that researching medicine =/= writing a forum script. One involves discovering patentable information, the other largely involves adding features to an already existing idea.

Does vB have a patent on the idea of a forum? No. If so, why does IPB, MyBB, SMF and phpBB exist? So how the hell can Kier Darby get any advantage from working with vB? Apart from being experienced using PHP, and getting a good idea of what forum users want, I see no basis whatsoever for this. And remember, he must have been pretty damn good with PHP for vB to hire him in the first place.

I'm sorry, but if the law blocks you from being allowed to use skills you honed working with another company to start your own one, then the law is limiting competition - plain and simple. Unless Darby signed an agreement stating that he wasn't going to set up a rival company, then I've no clue what they are on about. Darby is a smart guy, and I doubt he would pour so much time and money into starting a company he's not allowed to start. It doesn't make sense.

 

[master412160]

I don't know its indeed more safe until Xenfero won or lost its case against InternetBrands

 

[Nathan]

Funny thing is, you can't sue someone for gaining knowledge, otherwise all our teachers could easily sue us, the law suit is a joke and as a respected forum software developer has said (Matt Mecham):

What is immediately obvious is that you cannot copyright a person’s coding style. With scripted languages such as PHP that force syntax and convention there is bound to be some overlap. Heck, even the new vBulletin code written by Internet Brand staffers follows common design patterns (bootstraps, MVC, etc).

This intent to sue is obviously designed to disrupt the sale of xenForo and distract from the buzz the product has generated.

However, I think in the long term this will be more damaging to Internet Brands as it will further polarise opinion within its own customer base. Those who were hanging hoping for things to improve will see this as nothing more than bullying and highlights the mindset of the management. If you can’t compete, then sue.

Why do I care so much? Well, I’ve been here before. I left Ikonboard with a view to starting up a new company and we were threatened by our previous employer. I won’t go into details but it was very nasty.

As Matt has said, he was in the same predicament and well, look where he is now, co owner of Invision Power Services and is the Lead Developer of one of the most widely known and IMO best forum software on the market today.

I feel for Kier and Mike. All they want to do is compete fairly and squarely and let the product speak for itself.

What will become of this latest drama? I suspect that it will fizzle out before the courts get involved. Copyright infringement is a very hard thing to prove and there’s an ocean between the accused and the accuser. The damage is done but I fear that in the long term it will backfire.

No one likes to see the little guy getting a kicking from a faceless corporate giant. I already see more rallying posts for xenForo than support for Internet Brands. Furthermore it just pushes their brutish mentality into the spotlight.

When the meteor came crashing to Earth, I bet the dinosaurs were roaring at it in the hope of scaring it away. That didn’t work out so well for them.

Yeah well look where the dinosaurs are now 🙂

Ive bolded some statements which I find to be very true and added in my own quotes in response to what Matt has said.

Source of Matt's quote.

 

[Nebulous]

I havent really looked at it but I did notice this annoucement on the vb support forums: http://www.vbulletin.com/forum/showthre ... st-Xenforo

 

[el canadiano]

Yes and no, you're entitled to your own opinion.

Let's give an example. If you worked at a company that was researching new leads in medicine. Let's say you and the company worked on a project researching for 5 years until something was figured out and created that was great, using others work not only your own to do so.

Then you left the company and made your own company researching the same thing. You would be far more advanced on the subject then anyone else because you had previously spent 5 years researching it already so you would be much farther along by using your experience with the original company.

Basically you create a new company and get to skip the time of having to figure things out because you had already done that or learned it from others' work at your original company.

Legal? Depends
Ethical? To some

If you spent years figuring something out with someone, they left you and used their experience/knowledge gained from you to finish or make the same "genre" of "item" would that be fair to you or others?

Personally, XF looks and feels a lot different from vBulletin, so I don't think that they took many ideas from vB. The problem with you're analogy is that researching medicine =/= writing a forum script. One involves discovering patentable information, the other largely involves adding features to an already existing idea.

Does vB have a patent on the idea of a forum? No. If so, why does IPB, MyBB, SMF and phpBB exist? So how the hell can Kier Darby get any advantage from working with vB? Apart from being experienced using PHP, and getting a good idea of what forum users want, I see no basis whatsoever for this. And remember, he must have been pretty damn good with PHP for vB to hire him in the first place.

I'm sorry, but if the law blocks you from being allowed to use skills you honed working with another company to start your own one, then the law is limiting competition - plain and simple. Unless Darby signed an agreement stating that he wasn't going to set up a rival company, then I've no clue what they are on about. Darby is a smart guy, and I doubt he would pour so much time and money into starting a company he's not allowed to start. It doesn't make sense.

More importantly, I'm sure their lawyers took a look to make sure that in case of a lawsuit, they know that they're at least innocent on certain aspects.

 

[Anonymous]

It looks very impressive... I personally wouldn't buy a license though until it is a bit more established. It is still quite new.

Um. Just because xenforo isn't established, doesn't mean that you shouldn't put faith in a start-up like xenforo. Mostly because xenforo is founded by the VERY same people who have led vB3.0 over the years.

That said, I bought 3 licenses because its the same developers that we know and love.

Oh, and the technology is MILES ahead of vBulletin. No, cities away. :great:

 

[DarkRaven]

It looks very impressive... I personally wouldn't buy a license though until it is a bit more established. It is still quite new.

Um. Just because xenforo isn't established, doesn't mean that you shouldn't put faith in a start-up like xenforo. Mostly because xenforo is founded by the VERY same people who have led vB3.0 over the years.

That said, I bought 3 licenses because its the same developers that we know and love.

Oh, and the technology is MILES ahead of vBulletin. No, cities away. :great:

With a court case hanging over their heads, I don't think it would be wise to buy their software just yet. Yes, I know that that is exactly what vB want, but still. And no matter how good their developers are, projects like this can flop due to poor business management. If you've got money to burn, then sure - go ahead.

I'd like to see a few minor releases from them, before I consider buying, and even then, I've already got an IPB license.

 

[Fergal]

Given that I'm a customer of Internet Brands and I'm not a customer of XenForo, my natural bias should be in favour of IB, yet I hope that the legal action is not successful and that XenForo come out on top. A lot of vBulletin customers feel this way.

It's a sad reflection of how IB treat their customers. I'd prefer to see them putting their time, effort and resource into developing software that beats the competition, rather than trying to strangle them in the courts.

IMO legal actions like this are contrary to the values of what the Internet is about. I remember reading about how the inventors behind the technology that created the Internet were advised that they could make a lot of money by patenting their technology. They chose to refuse that advice because they wanted the Internet to be available to everyone. Sadly this type of spirit is lost on IB.

 

[el canadiano]

Given that I'm a customer of Internet Brands and I'm not a customer of XenForo, my natural bias should be in favour of IB, yet I hope that the legal action is not successful and that XenForo come out on top. A lot of vBulletin customers feel this way.

It's a sad reflection of how IB treat their customers. I'd prefer to see them putting their time, effort and resource into developing software that beats the competition, rather than trying to strangle them in the courts.

But why be an Internet Brands customer?

 

[David]

Given that I'm a customer of Internet Brands and I'm not a customer of XenForo, my natural bias should be in favour of IB, yet I hope that the legal action is not successful and that XenForo come out on top. A lot of vBulletin customers feel this way.

It's a sad reflection of how IB treat their customers. I'd prefer to see them putting their time, effort and resource into developing software that beats the competition, rather than trying to strangle them in the courts.

But why be an Internet Brands customer?

Because Internet Brands owns vBulletin. 😕

 

[el canadiano]

I mean you could easily just say you've had enough, convert, and then maybe sell your license if you want. A lot of people have been doing it.

 

[David]

I mean you could easily just say you've had enough, convert, and then maybe sell your license if you want. A lot of people have been doing it.

There really isn't any need to be "rebel" about it or change because you have a sudden "hate" towards IB. At the end of the day, it's what's best for the community, and converting may result in a loss of the community, which I don't think is a risk worth taking.

Plus, I really don't think there is that many people converting. Blogs, news, articles only really dense their information on people who have changed, giving the illusion that there have been so many people changing, but it could most likely be very different in reality.

 

[Lucas2]

I currently own two XenForo licenses and I'm loving them. They are both hispanic sites, but the software quality is great, and the translation system works out pretty well to offer a forum in a language other than english too. 🙂

 

[Medora]

I mean you could easily just say you've had enough, convert, and then maybe sell your license if you want. A lot of people have been doing it.

There really isn't any need to be "rebel" about it or change because you have a sudden "hate" towards IB. At the end of the day, it's what's best for the community, and converting may result in a loss of the community, which I don't think is a risk worth taking.

Plus, I really don't think there is that many people converting. Blogs, news, articles only really dense their information on people who have changed, giving the illusion that there have been so many people changing, but it could most likely be very different in reality.

Also, it is my understanding that Fergal is using vBulletin3, and that software has been getting a lot of praise and good publicity before Internet Brands started hogging the spotlight with its very unflattering decision making and the less than universally admired vBulletin4. In addition, popular minds behind that product could not hope to have such a following early on (i.e., before the beta was ever released) in the development of xenForo if they weren't so admired for their work for vBulletin3.

In other words, vBulletin3 is still a respectful product, even if it is a dead end for those who do not care for vBulletin4, and a lot of forum administrators still use it. To end, I think Fergal feels most comfortable under the vBulletin3 product, and though the ability to update is there he chooses to stay with that product for now.

 

[Anonymous]

Given that I'm a customer of Internet Brands and I'm not a customer of XenForo, my natural bias should be in favour of IB, yet I hope that the legal action is not successful and that XenForo come out on top. A lot of vBulletin customers feel this way.

I understand your sentiment. I used to be VERY, rather obsessed about the power of vB. I used to think that vB was the only software with the kind of flexibility I want. Now I just don't care about vBulletin as much anymore. Yet, I bought VBSuite, and Forum classic.

Then this lawsuit came forward. I lost any respect left for the new vBulletin. Its bad enough that they lost most of the key developers that made vBulletin the forum software to have. It was cheap. It was powerful. It was a software that returned your investment by bringing "Instant Community." Now xenForo has all of that. That's what happens when you ditch the same people who led the product into profitability.

And yes, I feel the same way most of the vBulletin customers feel; that this lawsuit isn't successful. Because if it is. Internet Brands would NOT learn that customers want something new, something with "quality" written all over it. Competition breeds both quality, and innovation. If iB was smart, they'd see this.

It's a sad reflection of how IB treat their customers. I'd prefer to see them putting their time, effort and resource into developing software that beats the competition, rather than trying to strangle them in the courts.

I agree. Its not about jumping ship, or hating the parent company. Its about how the company treats its customers.

 

[el canadiano]

Kier even said it himself in a 2005 TAZ interview when he was with the vBulletin team.

the moment that we stop providing superior support, excellent customer relations and an innovative product the market is ever-ready to move to someone who will.

Source: TAZ 2010 Interview - http://www.theadminzone.com/forums/show ... post530402

 

[Nebulous]

I just joined their support forum and have been posting in the off topic area. Seems like an alright software but I dont really like the look & feel of it. Perhaps its one of those things you'd have to get used to.