Movable Type Prices Themselves Out of the Market

I’ve been running four weblogs with a total of nine authors on my current copy of MT (I interpreted this as being legal, since I don’t charge for it and I don’t offer a service; all the weblogs are run from a single instance of MT on a single server).  Movable Type just announced a new license model for MT 3.0.  From what I can see of their new license model, my current usage would require the purchase of “Movable Type 3.0 Personal Edition Volume License II” at a cost of $149.95.  They also offer a free version, but it is limited to no more than four weblogs with one author, so that isn’t an option.

Before I put down $150 for weblogging software, I’m going to investigate the alternatives.  Of course, the hassle of migrating to new software might make it worth the cost, but that remains to be seen.  MT 3.0 had better have improved a lot of things significantly if they want to charge those kinds of prices.

More at Slashdot

Update:  I really like some of the features I see in pMachine’s Expression Engine.  For the same price as the “personal” MT 3.0 version I could get Expression Engine for noncommercial use and have unlimited authors and weblogs.  I may give it a try one of these days.  But for now, as long as MT 2.661 does the job I’m going to leave well enough alone.

4 Comments

  1. Phelps says:

    I’m hosting two authors (me and Mexi), so if I have to pay for that, I won’t be upgrading—at least not to MT3.

  2. Jeff Medcalf says:

    Yeah, but the pMachine guys make comments like this:

    “ExpressionEngine was written in PHP, the most popular scripting language on the planet. Why? Because PHP enables a level of power, speed, and flexibility that is unmatched by other languages, particularly those that rely on CGI, like Perl. It’s no accident that PHP has become the de-facto scripting language on the internet, putting CGI into fast retreat. There is simply no better choice to build your web community with.”

    And even though I know it’s marketing guys, it still makes me cringe and wonder about their product.  Just to take two particular exceptions, CGI is not a language and PHP is not the most popular scripting language (there are far more perl apps deployed).

  3. Phelps,

    If each of the blogs you host only has one author, then it may be possible to install two instances of the free version, although I could be wrong (I didn’t read the full license for the free version).  It’d be a pain in the ass, though.

    Jeff,

    I noticed that, but I dismissed it as marketing hype or the ravings of a PHP bigot.  I know that it is possible to use CGI and Perl to handle large amounts of traffic (Slashdot is a good example).  But I’m not as interested in what language the software is implemented in as its capabilities and performance.  I’ve grown increasingly unhappy with the performance of MT as the database has grown (currently at 3654 posts with 6609 comments across all four blogs, with the majority of that being at The Bitch Girls).  Something that didn’t require a rebuild for every comment and new post would be nice.  It’d also be nice to have comment spam protection features.  I’m willing to pay for all of those things, but from what I’m hearing about MT 3.0 it doesn’t deliver.

Trackbacks / Pingbacks

  1. : Caerdroia