GUYS! Just so you know, I have no Ill will towards fast or anyone associated with it! I think its a great site that is positive for the gw2 community. Even if its not a site we absolutely need I don't want it gone. The only issue I have with this is the way they have communicated and I made this video so they fix this and they continue, not so they get canceled or something along those lines.
I really like the monetization model that GW2Efficiency has, where you do have incentives to donate to support them, but the main functionalities are available for free. This generates a lot more goodwill from the community than a paywall, and there are people who are willing to pay more to support a quality service.
Exactly, big agree with this. Also about cost a wow sub cost less money in Turkey than the option to get the latest expansion data on fast farming site
Thanks to the way guild wars 2 efficiency works, they generated enough goodwill with me that I went and bought an expansion with their affiliate link. Twice.
So.... we can either buy access to FAST's Data for 5$ a month. Or we can buy gems for 5$ a month and use the gem exchange to turn it into gold. (Which is ~110g right now) I think Fast's data is worth less than 110g a month, as most good farms are known by now.
Exactly. Also, just play the damn agme and have fun. Gold comes on its own. We don't need a site that shows which item gives 3 more copper on the TP. By now we know what generates gold, we have all the data already inagme and there are also other sites that show a lot of infos. Fast has gotten kinda usless anyway over time and like you said, most farms are already known.
Like most people say in the coments..., why the f would I pay a subscription for a previously free website that tells me how to make gold when I can pay the exact amount directly to the game devs for gems and then convert... what a stupid move...
As a web developer - thinking it costs only a few dollars a month to host this site is very silly. This isn't a local business website or small streamer website that gets light traffic. It doesn't cost thousands though, but probably a few hundred for hosting alone for the bandwidth, but also the development time has to be considered. But why not slap some ads on the site to offset the cost or ask for donations, improve the reliability of the site. I do agree that the way they are monetizing it will be it's downfall.
Exactly this. Do not know where you got your resource here Darenfor estimating the running cost but i would guess fast has somewhat decent traffic so cost for the bandwidth is a thing. Probably still not that high to ask for a subscription tho... As everyone pointed out already an ads/subscription model would be better suited. Also asking for a subscription implies for a service being sold so this should be against ToS but I am not a lawyer...
@@unspeakable3064 There's also opportunity cost- what could they earn doing something different that does pay? Wanting to be paid fair value for your work is reasonable but this pay model is counterproductive and the presentation of the reasoning is a bit abrasive. Maybe the site just isn't viable as a free hobby. The product has to have value equal to the requested price and I'm not sure farming advice (make a little more gold per hour) is worth actual money when actual money buys gems -> gold. Gem purchase and conversion is faster than farming, so the pay model actually reduces the value of the site. I think in-app ads or donation requests would be better, and if that or similar doesn't cover the costs and provide enough compensation, then maybe the product isn't viable. I've been there. I've had a business failure in my past. It sucks to see your passion project or good idea fail. It sucks to have something you love to do just not be able to provide enough to cover the costs of running it and alternatives. But sometimes you have to realize that you just cannot provide the right value for what you're asking. Lots of products have gone off the market for these reasons.
I'm also a web developer and I totally agree with you @hayleemae. "Fast" should've slapped on ads then a optional sub to support the website and for those that sub gets the ads removed as thanks for supporting. Also depending on how many supporters, maybe have giveaways related to gw2 which will in turn make more people wanting to support for a chance of maybe winning something out of it while supporting. Though don't know if that last part would be against ToS since it should count as gifting imo.
Look I have a subscription to gw2 efficiency because it’s a fantastic resource I use all the time, and I think it’s good to support the maintainers for that. If they ever decide to lock things behind a paywall, I’d cancel that subscription and would just stop using the website. It’s frankly just a matter of principle. Fast is the exact same situation. Now I don’t use it nearly enough to be donating to it (I might just pull something up every few months to many some research notes or whatever), but if I need to pay to access that information and it’s not optional, then I’m just not using it.
It's not in their control to lock the website behind a paywall, paywalling a website that "runs" on top of GW2 API is against ANet ToS. We will see if ANet will bring the hammer on top of fast farming or if the site will implode before that.
I mostly stopped using fast because of the overinflated numbers, mostly just used for festival currency conversions or things like that. This paywall doesn't seem like the smartest move , but I hope the site doesn't end up dying because it can be useful.
greed creeps in, i went to read it and basically the argument was that without paying to access to latest expansions content its not possible to keep it going. I call bullshit, and i hate when people disguise their reason and give a reason based on pity to get it passed. That's known as dishonestly and misleading people and its just a big reason not to like or trust anymore. There are other ways to get the money, donations, bringing awareness, adds etc. This is done to get big income and thats it.
What this site runs can be served on a $5/mo vps. They dont cache pages, most of which can. Even just placing it behind clouflare will solve most of their problems
That sucks... I've actually been supporting them on Patreon since last year when I saw that they were struggling (since I use the site regularly and wanted to give back to the developer a bit because they were doing all of this for free), but now that they're paywalling the content, I'm going to stop. I don't think the data is worth the 5 euros a month, so the only reason to be part of the patreon is if you want to give back to the developer, but this is definitely burning up that goodwill.
This seems like a tactic to squeeze more money out of the community. Why not just be upfront with all the numbers and stats? If this is a genuine issue and he really does need the money, that’s unfortunate, and I'm sure those who use the site would be willing to help if they can. But that's the thing, make it optional, not something forced. That's what doesn't sit right with me. Maybe it's all a big misunderstanding, but he should've kept it free and simply asked for support, instead of all this shady behavior.
Highly doubt there will be many people paying, its not a good deal at all and its not a necessity at all, as darens said 5 dollars a month on gems is more worth it
excluding "only" the expansions is not a little change since new expansions are usually where busted metas are. Those 4 entries are probably some of the most profitable ones. Anyway, i hardly doubt Anet will accept this since it's clearly monetizing their content.
If its about maintaining the billing for website just screenshot those monthly bills on AWS / GCS. Choosing not to show those and asking for support to maintain the website is just greed.
Honestly, I've always kind thought the site sucked. As soon as something profitable gets posted there everyone copies and profits tank. We will be better off without it.
I am not using sites like fast, because I stopped caring about 'making gold' a long time ago. I am in the comfortable situation that I don't really need gold. I need mats and those pile up doing what I like. Which is not fractals, raids or farming.
100% agree with communicating properly. I think the price for what we get is the huge issue here. I wouldn’t be surprised if someone else will make something similar for free in the future
Seems like cornix only compile info for his daily life considering he implictedly says updating fast site to latest expansion is lots of work Can just ask others for helping and maintaining the site I say if project needs fund, fund required should be transparent and not being invisible to consumers
uhhh isnt it specifically against GW2 tos to pay wall a site like this ? I know for example in wow if you make a mod and then have a subscription to use said mod that's against tos, but I know you can "technically" get around it by making it under patron so its not "technically" a subscription but tis still on that line and should be punishable under the tos if anet did lawyer up also based on my knowledge of running websites and setting them up it shouldn't be that much if they run simple banner adds like all the other sites, this seems extremely sus for them to do this, and using patron to do it they are almost certainly trying to go for profit which IS very much against most ToS it almost 100% brakes parts 3 and 5 of the tos for api use, but they will argue that patron is "donating" to the running of the site
@@drakebane9527 yeah and if you report someone using them in game when it spams chat saying "I just levelled up in 5 mins using restedxp guides" the person will get a warning and can even get a ban
Hmmm... a subscription fee doesn't make sense imho. Really, you can just get the subscription for a month, screenshot everything you want, and bam, you don't need your subscription anymore... yes, the market fluctuates, but you could just as well invest that subscription fee into gems, and make up the difference... ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ A one time fee/donation would make more sense, and then I might even actually consider it... I really don't use the site much at all..
@@bazomic I don't mind helping either, but nobody likes to have their arm twisted. Also, I have donated to gw2efficiency - I really like what they've put together, it's insanely useful, and I use their site a lot - but this particular setup doesn't seem player friendly enough to me, especially since I use fastfarming way, way less than gw2efficiency... Like maaaaaaybe I'll check something on fastfarming every second week or so. For comparison, I use gw2efficiency every day. Speaking for myself, paying more for fastfarming over time than I've done in a one time donation to gw2efficiency is just not proportionate with my personal usage in mind, and it's not economical from a gaming point of view either - I won't make more gold from it than I would have if I bought gold with gems for the same amount of real money - so, all in all, there's really no incentive for me to get onboard. It doesn't make sense to me. What they could have done, is what gw2efficiency does - put ads on their site, and offer the site ad free if you donate, their auto entering into the lottery feature is a really nice feature too. With those methods to incentivize donating, no functionality is removed, only perks are added. Perks instead of "pay to see 'new' stuff" that were available for free before, is much nicer. Carrot instead of "stick". That would have created more goodwill too.
Also, subscribing to fastfarming's lowest subscription rate would cost me more in a year than the yearly mini expansions do... Like, what? Buying Janthir Wilds is actually cheaper... I simply cannot find any logic behind fastfarming's new monetization model...
Have never used this website once in my life. Have full leg gear, accessories, and 10 or so leg weapons. Honestly dont think this website helps in any way
I maybe get it? It costs money and time to develop a site. But nay, not paying for a site I check to squeeze out extra silvers from item conversions or farms.
Wasn't the site build with the community and with voluntary data gathering from various people? If so, the data should not be paywalled. Ads and donations is the way to go. I would have a different stance, if this was the sole work of a single person or closed group and with only their effort, then by all means, they should be entitled to monetize it as a service. Maybe i'm wrong with my assumption where the data came from tho, not really using that site.
They're struggling to afford to keep the site running. Asking for money might not work, but if they don't do anything the site is going to go away. It's a 'rock and a hard place' situation.
I mean.. The only use it has (or had) is to catch a quick glimpse of what's still up to date and what not for farms you have been doing for a long time anyways, or which of the newer farms are getting better or worse. But everything on there is widely known anyways and can be gotten just as easily by just looking up random gw2 youtube farm stuff that will give you the same result. + I've always had a problem with how they calculated the gold/hour for farms with unrealistic times for certain stuff, they overvalue some things and undervalue others which I've always suspected to be from the perspective of their personal gains to profit from flipping the undervalued stuff. This paywall stuff is just more fuel to that fire imo. It was a nice overview to take with a big grain of salt, but nothing more than that. There's enough alternative ways to not spend money on data that's available through other ways.
This is unacceptable, if it was a new project anyone would support it to be established without a paywall. But it's finished too long ago and mostly needs maintenance. A new project mostly has a one-time cost and there is a development cost and it is all more effort than money unless he hires someone to do it for him. Regardless, servers are cheap these days you can get 10TB monthly bandwidth for $50 a year including a 100GB SSD and multi-core CPUs, also maintaining the domain name costs $12 a year.
At the research note page it even says. Since most of you do not check anything else on this website, I will leave here as well a thank you note for all your donations and support! Please make sure to bookmark or check the main page once in a while for website updates. In return I have started to work on a Crafting Helper that calculates automatically the best option for every "intermediate" crafting step in this list. In the long run it will also be present on this website. So i doubt many people will donate to gain access to other stuff. You gave a good example with what you can buy with that 5euro it would not be worth it at all then i would prefer the gems.
It's not unreasonable to want to be paid for your work (provided you aren't breaking an already-existing formal agreement), but the compensation has to make sense. I use Fast to boost my farming income by a percentage of what I would get on my own. If that increase can b e covered just by buying gems equal to the amount the sub costs, then Fast becomes slower that just hitting the gem store. Since there is a faster way to turn cash into gold than the subscription, this reduces- or even eliminates- the value of the site. And if I'm looking for the best farms, locking out several expacs also makes the free data no longer fit for most people's purpose. Asking for donations is a much better away to do this, IMMO. I know I'm more likely to make a donation as a thank you for hard work. If it's a transaction, I'm going to analyze that transaction and make the best choice for my wallet.
This definitely seems like a bad, but not malicious decision. You can only upkeep a project like this for free for so long without some serious opportunity cost . That being said, yeah, I personally wouldn't use it much afterwards. The money cost would not beat out the gems cost personally. Not even close.
Not really sure about that website, but I know one or two websites that do 10k requests to certain APIs every some hours, the data they pull is mostly weather data from all the providers so it's mostly numbers and some letters, meaning it's less than 100kb per requests, so with 80k/day it's 8GB traffic and also a lambda server + the frontend on AWS would be roughly 12 euro/month as far as I know But, in this websites case, since it only requests plain numbers for the prices, the traffic is even lower, and I would doubt the site would host 10k item prices so the 80k requests are also lower, I would assume the hosting is somewhere around 5 euro if not less, so your assumption from other people checks out Again, no clue about the inner working of the website, neither the provider it runs on, but at first sight it seems like a rather basic front-end website to some API data, and those especially with low volume of data cost rather nothing, this ofc changes if the website is run locally
Everyone wants everything to be free, but im totally fine with an elite nerdy website asking for compensation. This is a good thing, they are getting too much traffic on their site lol
For a game that does not have a subscription, having a website that you need to pay for to help you play said game, I don't think will sit well with people. GW2 is a causal game. They won't have many subs. A good number of people play the game for a bit, leave for a bit, and come back. They won't sub to something knowing this.
that site has/should have very little upkeep cost the amount of work to add to it is pretty minimal tbh. you just plug in new apis which change automatically. jsut need to add new for new conversions. they also do gold/hr stuff, which is not really needed for most players, but would be the most effort-based, but unneeded. they should keep it as is and just use on their coding resume saying "X number of users find my product use my product per month" as a talking point for better positions/salary. it more than pays itself off. either way, i dont care cuz i dont pay and only used it few times when new to get general idea. cheers from backend developer
In this day and age its not a surprise people are trying the paywall route , but people are alot more savvy and can see through the bull , people are always greatfull for help , but not snakey sneeky practices .JMO Keep up the great work with vids and calling out this type of behaviour .
@@Aragorn430 that makes no sense at all, as the data displayed on the website is dynamically loaded from their backend. the wayback machine of the internet archive just saves the finished loaded site. i.e. the prices will be static from the time it was saved. meaning, it is just about as useful as a screenshot.
I'm glad I don't need Fast or Efficiency to do what I do to make my gold. I just use Efficiency to track my value mostly to see how well I'm doing and how my TP's are doing. Great for those who need help with crafting. My head can crunch those numbers.
I'd be curious how much the website earns for them. Because something I've realised is that people take free things for granted (Wikipedia for example)
I don't begrudge the dev wanting some return on the time investment and personal cost they've put into a project like this, so understandable from that perspective. However, the backlash was always going to be inevitable when something used to be free. I think it probably will kill the site as someone else will likely develop something similar that is free to access, or enhance a current offering to meet demand.
They could then still better communicate it and set goals, instead of a fixed paywal. For example he could give us the server cost, the amount of time he puts into it on average for a new expansion and outside of it, and then tell us what his goal would be for being able to regularly put in this work.
@@DreiSchwerterZorro Same, it doesnt hurt to ask for help and or donations. Also it would do good for him i he could get another to work on the site other than himself
who cares we played gw2 before that site existed and we will continue so without data they collect/present and in many cases data is not correct anyway :)
People forget that time is also money. The website might only cost $50 a year, but the number of manhours trying to maintain it is why they want financial support.
@SiEO0702 I completely agree BUT that should have been expressed in the post, there are a lot of other websites that also put a lot of effort like this like snow crows and they aren't pay walled- If they asked my financial support because they needed our help and they told me they can't put as much effort without getting compensated I would 100% do this and I would do the same to fast.
$50 per year is too low. Some hosts start charging a lot if your site has a lot of traffic. But putting it behind a paywall is pretty much an underhanded tactic. If costs were getting a little high for them, then they could have just ask for donations as they cant afford to keep up with the costs. Or they can ask for donations if people want him to spend more time on on improving the site. Donations are not the same as telling people to pay for it, therefore doesnt violate Anet's terms.
I think it's perfectly reasonable to not share how much money it costs, probably because this is a situation where there is a small operational cost and a large effort cost and valuing one's own time and debating that value might not be something the owner wants to get into. Like if he says "I used $200 per hour" to value my own time, maybe people will rage, maybe not - but really if you don't like the cost of the service, you don't pay to use it - it's weird to complain about not having access to the financial books. You think taco bell costs too much, you don't ask to see their records, you just don't eat the tacos.
Create your own website and find out. Costs more than what you think it does. Technically, Anet can't stop any outside website from demanding a subscription however, they can stop the use of the API. IMHO, outside sites using my game API is questionable at best, I don't use this site that much to understand it and can be a bit confusing. Now, placing a pricing for the different xpacs, I don't see any issue with that however, again, using my API makes no sense at all. Efficiency does and that site makes sense to use it this one, no. I do understand the "asking" for money to use the site but, where's the explanation to do so? This is why sites like this use "Ads" to offset any cost. Yea, not a smart move IMHO, doubtful it will be a downfall to the site since too many use it. But, it will hurt them
the amount of salt in the comments is pretty high. people invest a lot of time to make these sites, if they want to introduce some subscription model, then so be it
1-When I open a website related to the game, Steam warns me about this and does not open the game.2-According to the game rules, it is forbidden to use any addon that will give you an advantage over other players in the game, but you are constantly advertising various addons. Those who make these addons also make cheats for the game. You call these things that make life easier.3-I know all the websites and platforms related to gaming. There is no need for any of them. None of them are reliable. When you follow the founders of the site, you can see that all your information is confidential and you can never reach them if you have a question. If they really did this for gaming, all their information would be accessible, this is the case on all serious sites.5-Leave the game, I don't want someone like you who advertises cheats and addons in the game. If you come to EU, I will constantly report you.
Afaik a gold advantage is not considered an advantage over other players by Arenanet. Founders of which site? Cornix at least is reachable on the fastfarming discord and is often responding to w😊ebsite feedback, bugs and stuff
i dunno, this is a bad take on your end tbh. if the guy has been hosting it for free for this long, trying to monetize it somewhat isn't unreasonable. He shouldn't need to ask people's permission on the delivery method of his own work
Neh, bad take on YOUR part for not listening clearly to what Daren said. He made it very clear in what situations it would be completely understandable to look for compensation for his time. Daren's issue, and most of ours, is that they were purposefully vague and misleading about information to support their claims. It leads most sensible people to conclude that it's simply greed.
I agree in principle, but a sub model is a terrible choice. The value of Fast and things like it is that it adds value to the efficiency of hours played: gold earned. More specifically, if you were to farm on your own you would make X gold, with the site you make X + some value. The value of the service is hat extra value. Despite the name, speed is not an added value. Buying gems is much faster, but more expensive. So, in the end, Fast gains you cash (for the excess gem cost) at the cost of time (farming) and entertainment value (not playing the content you like most in favor of content that gets more gold). If you make me pay a fee in cash to use the service, you reduce the value of the service to me by the very method of payment. If the value I get from the site is less that 110g or so, I actually lose time and money by subscribing, and if I make more, that amount of value is diminished. being compensated for your work is reasonable. Being compensated in excess- or in contradiction to- the value you are providing is not. Fast may just not be a viable web site.
@@DreiSchwerterZorro and that their proposed payment model actively degrades the value of the service they provide, since gems can be bought with cash and converted to gold. In addition, consumer commentary on product value is a vital component of a free market. "Just don't buy it" is a foolish response to criticism, because the person advocating that idea is actively advising making decisions with less insight into the proposed value.
I pay Efficiency to support them, I don't think I would pay if it was not volunteer. I have paid some cups of tea too, my favorite was the portal distance. It's so useful to me that I had to thank the person that made it possible. But I think, if I would have had to pay for the portal distance, I wouldn't buy it.
GUYS! Just so you know, I have no Ill will towards fast or anyone associated with it! I think its a great site that is positive for the gw2 community.
Even if its not a site we absolutely need I don't want it gone.
The only issue I have with this is the way they have communicated and I made this video so they fix this and they continue, not so they get canceled or something along those lines.
I really like the monetization model that GW2Efficiency has, where you do have incentives to donate to support them, but the main functionalities are available for free. This generates a lot more goodwill from the community than a paywall, and there are people who are willing to pay more to support a quality service.
Exactly, big agree with this. Also about cost a wow sub cost less money in Turkey than the option to get the latest expansion data on fast farming site
Yep. I bought the expansion(s) via Effiency's link just to help them a little
Aren't they also Anet partners?
@@hanneskarlbom6644 yes
Thanks to the way guild wars 2 efficiency works, they generated enough goodwill with me that I went and bought an expansion with their affiliate link.
Twice.
So.... we can either buy access to FAST's Data for 5$ a month.
Or we can buy gems for 5$ a month and use the gem exchange to turn it into gold. (Which is ~110g right now)
I think Fast's data is worth less than 110g a month, as most good farms are known by now.
Exactly. Also, just play the damn agme and have fun. Gold comes on its own. We don't need a site that shows which item gives 3 more copper on the TP. By now we know what generates gold, we have all the data already inagme and there are also other sites that show a lot of infos. Fast has gotten kinda usless anyway over time and like you said, most farms are already known.
thats pretty stupid lol, i would rather buy gems to gold than subscribe to fast farming and put extra effort on crafting/selling to tp with tax
Like most people say in the coments..., why the f would I pay a subscription for a previously free website that tells me how to make gold when I can pay the exact amount directly to the game devs for gems and then convert... what a stupid move...
Well after it falls on it's face, they will revert, or it will work and that's how it goes.
As a web developer - thinking it costs only a few dollars a month to host this site is very silly. This isn't a local business website or small streamer website that gets light traffic. It doesn't cost thousands though, but probably a few hundred for hosting alone for the bandwidth, but also the development time has to be considered.
But why not slap some ads on the site to offset the cost or ask for donations, improve the reliability of the site. I do agree that the way they are monetizing it will be it's downfall.
As a web developer, you may know that hetzner VPS's are insanely cheap and are coming with unlimited bandwidth.
Exactly this.
Do not know where you got your resource here Darenfor estimating the running cost but i would guess fast has somewhat decent traffic so cost for the bandwidth is a thing. Probably still not that high to ask for a subscription tho...
As everyone pointed out already an ads/subscription model would be better suited. Also asking for a subscription implies for a service being sold so this should be against ToS but I am not a lawyer...
@@unspeakable3064 There's also opportunity cost- what could they earn doing something different that does pay? Wanting to be paid fair value for your work is reasonable but this pay model is counterproductive and the presentation of the reasoning is a bit abrasive. Maybe the site just isn't viable as a free hobby. The product has to have value equal to the requested price and I'm not sure farming advice (make a little more gold per hour) is worth actual money when actual money buys gems -> gold. Gem purchase and conversion is faster than farming, so the pay model actually reduces the value of the site. I think in-app ads or donation requests would be better, and if that or similar doesn't cover the costs and provide enough compensation, then maybe the product isn't viable.
I've been there. I've had a business failure in my past. It sucks to see your passion project or good idea fail. It sucks to have something you love to do just not be able to provide enough to cover the costs of running it and alternatives. But sometimes you have to realize that you just cannot provide the right value for what you're asking. Lots of products have gone off the market for these reasons.
It's most likely greed at this point.
I'm also a web developer and I totally agree with you @hayleemae. "Fast" should've slapped on ads then a optional sub to support the website and for those that sub gets the ads removed as thanks for supporting. Also depending on how many supporters, maybe have giveaways related to gw2 which will in turn make more people wanting to support for a chance of maybe winning something out of it while supporting. Though don't know if that last part would be against ToS since it should count as gifting imo.
Look I have a subscription to gw2 efficiency because it’s a fantastic resource I use all the time, and I think it’s good to support the maintainers for that. If they ever decide to lock things behind a paywall, I’d cancel that subscription and would just stop using the website. It’s frankly just a matter of principle.
Fast is the exact same situation. Now I don’t use it nearly enough to be donating to it (I might just pull something up every few months to many some research notes or whatever), but if I need to pay to access that information and it’s not optional, then I’m just not using it.
solid take
It's not in their control to lock the website behind a paywall, paywalling a website that "runs" on top of GW2 API is against ANet ToS. We will see if ANet will bring the hammer on top of fast farming or if the site will implode before that.
Paying real money to see where to get more virtual money? Haha nope.
If you buy gem codes (2000 gems ~ 20€) you can convert the gems to get ~590g every 4 months, or ~147 per month for the same price as their sub.
I mostly stopped using fast because of the overinflated numbers, mostly just used for festival currency conversions or things like that. This paywall doesn't seem like the smartest move , but I hope the site doesn't end up dying because it can be useful.
i legit dont understand how people can get any real value on this site
the site was pretty useless imo, and performance is AWFUL
Yeah no, not gonna pay for someone else to use a free api 😂
Or, just patreon lock the latest expansion every time a new one drops. You're killing your site.
This guy wants guild wars 2 players to pay a sub fee? I don’t think he knows the playerbase well.
greed creeps in, i went to read it and basically the argument was that without paying to access to latest expansions content its not possible to keep it going. I call bullshit, and i hate when people disguise their reason and give a reason based on pity to get it passed. That's known as dishonestly and misleading people and its just a big reason not to like or trust anymore. There are other ways to get the money, donations, bringing awareness, adds etc. This is done to get big income and thats it.
GW2Efficiency has the perfect way to push people to want to donate more
He can't do this according to ANet ToS, the moment he put a paywall on the website he is charging for a service related to the game.
What this site runs can be served on a $5/mo vps. They dont cache pages, most of which can. Even just placing it behind clouflare will solve most of their problems
That sucks... I've actually been supporting them on Patreon since last year when I saw that they were struggling (since I use the site regularly and wanted to give back to the developer a bit because they were doing all of this for free), but now that they're paywalling the content, I'm going to stop. I don't think the data is worth the 5 euros a month, so the only reason to be part of the patreon is if you want to give back to the developer, but this is definitely burning up that goodwill.
So by putting a paywall on the site, the person who made it is actually gonna loose the money you were donating to him.
Irony in its finest!
This seems like a tactic to squeeze more money out of the community. Why not just be upfront with all the numbers and stats? If this is a genuine issue and he really does need the money, that’s unfortunate, and I'm sure those who use the site would be willing to help if they can. But that's the thing, make it optional, not something forced. That's what doesn't sit right with me. Maybe it's all a big misunderstanding, but he should've kept it free and simply asked for support, instead of all this shady behavior.
The performance of that site is among the worst I've seen. Depending what they do with the money, will it actually improve?
Agree, the performance are awful
Right, cant even access it most of the time. Probably the paywall will gatekeep most of the users and allow the site to be useable
Highly doubt there will be many people paying, its not a good deal at all and its not a necessity at all, as darens said 5 dollars a month on gems is more worth it
I will just not use it then that's it. Also someone will leak it anyway.
excluding "only" the expansions is not a little change since new expansions are usually where busted metas are. Those 4 entries are probably some of the most profitable ones. Anyway, i hardly doubt Anet will accept this since it's clearly monetizing their content.
If its about maintaining the billing for website just screenshot those monthly bills on AWS / GCS. Choosing not to show those and asking for support to maintain the website is just greed.
TBF , the info the website gives aren't even accurate
Yeah this video fake and clickbait that's it ain't accurate madeup video don't believe everything on UA-cam
This is my first time hearing about this website, thanks for the heads up, definitely won’t be caring about it’s existence.
they always looked like beggers or something strange "since most of you don't look anywhere in the website"
Honestly, I've always kind thought the site sucked. As soon as something profitable gets posted there everyone copies and profits tank. We will be better off without it.
I am not using sites like fast, because I stopped caring about 'making gold' a long time ago. I am in the comfortable situation that I don't really need gold. I need mats and those pile up doing what I like. Which is not fractals, raids or farming.
100% agree with communicating properly. I think the price for what we get is the huge issue here. I wouldn’t be surprised if someone else will make something similar for free in the future
Seems like cornix only compile info for his daily life considering he implictedly says updating fast site to latest expansion is lots of work
Can just ask others for helping and maintaining the site
I say if project needs fund, fund required should be transparent and not being invisible to consumers
uhhh isnt it specifically against GW2 tos to pay wall a site like this ?
I know for example in wow if you make a mod and then have a subscription to use said mod that's against tos, but I know you can "technically" get around it by making it under patron so its not "technically" a subscription but tis still on that line and should be punishable under the tos if anet did lawyer up
also based on my knowledge of running websites and setting them up it shouldn't be that much if they run simple banner adds like all the other sites, this seems extremely sus for them to do this, and using patron to do it they are almost certainly trying to go for profit which IS very much against most ToS
it almost 100% brakes parts 3 and 5 of the tos for api use, but they will argue that patron is "donating" to the running of the site
RESTEDXP Guides would like to say hello
@@drakebane9527 rested exp guide buyers deserve to be ripped off
@@drakebane9527
yeah and if you report someone using them in game when it spams chat saying "I just levelled up in 5 mins using restedxp guides" the person will get a warning and can even get a ban
@@Snowshill That's the biggest joke of a statement I've ever seen 😂
I could be wrong.. but .. MMO software companies (ANet) do not like third parties monetizing of their copywrite content.
They are trying to find a legal loophole by using patreon this way they can try and hide behind the word "donation"
You mean like every streamer on youtube?
they don't especially if you gate the information through a paywall.
theres tons of copy websites like fast for free, lot of low key ones, people will just use those
Can you name some? I’d like to know
Hmmm... a subscription fee doesn't make sense imho. Really, you can just get the subscription for a month, screenshot everything you want, and bam, you don't need your subscription anymore... yes, the market fluctuates, but you could just as well invest that subscription fee into gems, and make up the difference... ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
A one time fee/donation would make more sense, and then I might even actually consider it... I really don't use the site much at all..
I personally like this idea. I don't mind helping...but a sub for GW2 does not make sense. A one time fee...I can get behind.
@@bazomic I don't mind helping either, but nobody likes to have their arm twisted. Also, I have donated to gw2efficiency - I really like what they've put together, it's insanely useful, and I use their site a lot - but this particular setup doesn't seem player friendly enough to me, especially since I use fastfarming way, way less than gw2efficiency... Like maaaaaaybe I'll check something on fastfarming every second week or so. For comparison, I use gw2efficiency every day. Speaking for myself, paying more for fastfarming over time than I've done in a one time donation to gw2efficiency is just not proportionate with my personal usage in mind, and it's not economical from a gaming point of view either - I won't make more gold from it than I would have if I bought gold with gems for the same amount of real money - so, all in all, there's really no incentive for me to get onboard. It doesn't make sense to me.
What they could have done, is what gw2efficiency does - put ads on their site, and offer the site ad free if you donate, their auto entering into the lottery feature is a really nice feature too. With those methods to incentivize donating, no functionality is removed, only perks are added. Perks instead of "pay to see 'new' stuff" that were available for free before, is much nicer. Carrot instead of "stick". That would have created more goodwill too.
Also, subscribing to fastfarming's lowest subscription rate would cost me more in a year than the yearly mini expansions do... Like, what? Buying Janthir Wilds is actually cheaper... I simply cannot find any logic behind fastfarming's new monetization model...
12:29 if you're a baron you probably dont even need to use this site because excel exists XD
Thats ok, I just downloaded their entire website and will set it back up as free soon...lol suckers
Have never used this website once in my life. Have full leg gear, accessories, and 10 or so leg weapons. Honestly dont think this website helps in any way
can we finally ditch this dumb site?
pretty much
I maybe get it? It costs money and time to develop a site. But nay, not paying for a site I check to squeeze out extra silvers from item conversions or farms.
This move made me regret that donation at 5:06 tbh. I donated because there was a plea for help on the research notes page.
Wasn't the site build with the community and with voluntary data gathering from various people? If so, the data should not be paywalled. Ads and donations is the way to go. I would have a different stance, if this was the sole work of a single person or closed group and with only their effort, then by all means, they should be entitled to monetize it as a service.
Maybe i'm wrong with my assumption where the data came from tho, not really using that site.
They're struggling to afford to keep the site running. Asking for money might not work, but if they don't do anything the site is going to go away.
It's a 'rock and a hard place' situation.
tbh it's not that useful.
I mean.. The only use it has (or had) is to catch a quick glimpse of what's still up to date and what not for farms you have been doing for a long time anyways, or which of the newer farms are getting better or worse. But everything on there is widely known anyways and can be gotten just as easily by just looking up random gw2 youtube farm stuff that will give you the same result. + I've always had a problem with how they calculated the gold/hour for farms with unrealistic times for certain stuff, they overvalue some things and undervalue others which I've always suspected to be from the perspective of their personal gains to profit from flipping the undervalued stuff. This paywall stuff is just more fuel to that fire imo.
It was a nice overview to take with a big grain of salt, but nothing more than that. There's enough alternative ways to not spend money on data that's available through other ways.
This is unacceptable, if it was a new project anyone would support it to be established without a paywall. But it's finished too long ago and mostly needs maintenance.
A new project mostly has a one-time cost and there is a development cost and it is all more effort than money unless he hires someone to do it for him. Regardless, servers are cheap these days you can get 10TB monthly bandwidth for $50 a year including a 100GB SSD and multi-core CPUs, also maintaining the domain name costs $12 a year.
At the research note page it even says. Since most of you do not check anything else on this website, I will leave here as well a thank you note for all your donations and support!
Please make sure to bookmark or check the main page once in a while for website updates.
In return I have started to work on a Crafting Helper that calculates automatically the best option for every "intermediate" crafting step in this list. In the long run it will also be present on this website. So i doubt many people will donate to gain access to other stuff. You gave a good example with what you can buy with that 5euro it would not be worth it at all then i would prefer the gems.
It's not unreasonable to want to be paid for your work (provided you aren't breaking an already-existing formal agreement), but the compensation has to make sense. I use Fast to boost my farming income by a percentage of what I would get on my own. If that increase can b e covered just by buying gems equal to the amount the sub costs, then Fast becomes slower that just hitting the gem store. Since there is a faster way to turn cash into gold than the subscription, this reduces- or even eliminates- the value of the site. And if I'm looking for the best farms, locking out several expacs also makes the free data no longer fit for most people's purpose.
Asking for donations is a much better away to do this, IMMO. I know I'm more likely to make a donation as a thank you for hard work. If it's a transaction, I'm going to analyze that transaction and make the best choice for my wallet.
This definitely seems like a bad, but not malicious decision. You can only upkeep a project like this for free for so long without some serious opportunity cost . That being said, yeah, I personally wouldn't use it much afterwards. The money cost would not beat out the gems cost personally. Not even close.
Not really sure about that website, but I know one or two websites that do 10k requests to certain APIs every some hours, the data they pull is mostly weather data from all the providers so it's mostly numbers and some letters, meaning it's less than 100kb per requests, so with 80k/day it's 8GB traffic and also a lambda server + the frontend on AWS would be roughly 12 euro/month as far as I know
But, in this websites case, since it only requests plain numbers for the prices, the traffic is even lower, and I would doubt the site would host 10k item prices so the 80k requests are also lower, I would assume the hosting is somewhere around 5 euro if not less, so your assumption from other people checks out
Again, no clue about the inner working of the website, neither the provider it runs on, but at first sight it seems like a rather basic front-end website to some API data, and those especially with low volume of data cost rather nothing, this ofc changes if the website is run locally
Everyone wants everything to be free, but im totally fine with an elite nerdy website asking for compensation. This is a good thing, they are getting too much traffic on their site lol
For a game that does not have a subscription, having a website that you need to pay for to help you play said game, I don't think will sit well with people. GW2 is a causal game. They won't have many subs. A good number of people play the game for a bit, leave for a bit, and come back. They won't sub to something knowing this.
that site has/should have very little upkeep cost
the amount of work to add to it is pretty minimal tbh. you just plug in new apis which change automatically. jsut need to add new for new conversions.
they also do gold/hr stuff, which is not really needed for most players, but would be the most effort-based, but unneeded.
they should keep it as is and just use on their coding resume saying "X number of users find my product use my product per month" as a talking point for better positions/salary. it more than pays itself off. either way, i dont care cuz i dont pay and only used it few times when new to get general idea. cheers from backend developer
In this day and age its not a surprise people are trying the paywall route , but people are alot more savvy and can see through the bull ,
people are always greatfull for help , but not snakey sneeky practices .JMO
Keep up the great work with vids and calling out this type of behaviour .
I doubt it will die. As far as I know, no other site does what it does, at least not without extra effort from the user.
There is, peuresearchcenter version 2.0 will release in September
@@Aragorn430 Did you not name the site on purpose? xD
@@Jmvars cornix also forgot one thing, web archive exist, so we can see how things was before it was paywalled
@@DreiSchwerterZorro youtube deleded my comment weirdly, but pretty sure you can see the message in the notification tab
@@Aragorn430 that makes no sense at all, as the data displayed on the website is dynamically loaded from their backend. the wayback machine of the internet archive just saves the finished loaded site. i.e. the prices will be static from the time it was saved. meaning, it is just about as useful as a screenshot.
Maybe when everyone stops using his site (with innacurate numbers) he can finally appreciate it?
Id rather pay Daren’s for the work he puts into the meta train
I'm glad I don't need Fast or Efficiency to do what I do to make my gold. I just use Efficiency to track my value mostly to see how well I'm doing and how my TP's are doing. Great for those who need help with crafting. My head can crunch those numbers.
Imagine having to be inefficient with your real money in order to be efficient with your ingame money.
That's very sad, I don't have free money, even buy 1 new expansion per year it's hard for me. 😢
they should be highlighting ROI. I wouldnt put money where I am not getting returns
if i want to spend money to get more gold, guess what im gonna do lol.
Never used that website but now for sure I’m never going to use it.
I'd be curious how much the website earns for them. Because something I've realised is that people take free things for granted (Wikipedia for example)
Wiki is for ppl by ppl
Sometimes i look something up
Sometimes i post my new found knowledge
We all help.
I don't begrudge the dev wanting some return on the time investment and personal cost they've put into a project like this, so understandable from that perspective. However, the backlash was always going to be inevitable when something used to be free. I think it probably will kill the site as someone else will likely develop something similar that is free to access, or enhance a current offering to meet demand.
They could then still better communicate it and set goals, instead of a fixed paywal.
For example he could give us the server cost, the amount of time he puts into it on average for a new expansion and outside of it, and then tell us what his goal would be for being able to regularly put in this work.
They definitly asked sometimes for donations, but they never listed how much running the website actually costs if I remember correctly
It wasn't clear enough, and he never made an post on reddit about it. Last reddit post cornix did was that he added astral acclaim to the site
@@Aragorn430 Indeed. I'm really glad Cornix reversed the changes now and finds a better way to compensate the maintenance in the future
@@DreiSchwerterZorro Same, it doesnt hurt to ask for help and or donations. Also it would do good for him i he could get another to work on the site other than himself
The website of a partially F2P game is P2W?!
./facepalm
A huge fail x)
who cares we played gw2 before that site existed and we will continue so without data they collect/present and in many cases data is not correct anyway :)
People forget that time is also money. The website might only cost $50 a year, but the number of manhours trying to maintain it is why they want financial support.
@SiEO0702 I completely agree BUT that should have been expressed in the post, there are a lot of other websites that also put a lot of effort like this like snow crows and they aren't pay walled-
If they asked my financial support because they needed our help and they told me they can't put as much effort without getting compensated I would 100% do this and I would do the same to fast.
just go elswhere, they dont have a monopoly
if they go through with it someone else will take its place don't see much of a reason to worry
Its like putting gw2 wiki behind a paywall.if it isnt already
Ppl will make another site with no paywall😂
$50 per year is too low.
Some hosts start charging a lot if your site has a lot of traffic.
But putting it behind a paywall is pretty much an underhanded tactic.
If costs were getting a little high for them, then they could have just ask for donations as they cant afford to keep up with the costs.
Or they can ask for donations if people want him to spend more time on on improving the site.
Donations are not the same as telling people to pay for it, therefore doesnt violate Anet's terms.
Support the devs 🙏
Never -_- I will never pay for shit that most likely won't generate anything back long-term. He can't demand money for developing a fan site.
someone tell them to put ads on the site, pay to remove ads
That sucks, however I gues that we will see more GW2 Farm/Conversion videos from UA-camrs, so...
haha, Euro 3-10 per month, Anet wishes they would host the same service instead of developing the game instead.
Is the data for JW more expansive than for SoTo/EoD? If its just to maintaine the side it should be at least transparent.
I doubt that.
I think it's perfectly reasonable to not share how much money it costs, probably because this is a situation where there is a small operational cost and a large effort cost and valuing one's own time and debating that value might not be something the owner wants to get into. Like if he says "I used $200 per hour" to value my own time, maybe people will rage, maybe not - but really if you don't like the cost of the service, you don't pay to use it - it's weird to complain about not having access to the financial books. You think taco bell costs too much, you don't ask to see their records, you just don't eat the tacos.
I literally started using it yesterday and then I see this lmao
gw2wiki and gw2efficiency is the only thing you need. x)
Good for them hope it works for them
Bye fast, you won't be missed
Pay up
wow
Create your own website and find out. Costs more than what you think it does. Technically, Anet can't stop any outside website from demanding a subscription however, they can stop the use of the API. IMHO, outside sites using my game API is questionable at best, I don't use this site that much to understand it and can be a bit confusing. Now, placing a pricing for the different xpacs, I don't see any issue with that however, again, using my API makes no sense at all. Efficiency does and that site makes sense to use it this one, no. I do understand the "asking" for money to use the site but, where's the explanation to do so? This is why sites like this use "Ads" to offset any cost. Yea, not a smart move IMHO, doubtful it will be a downfall to the site since too many use it. But, it will hurt them
the amount of salt in the comments is pretty high. people invest a lot of time to make these sites, if they want to introduce some subscription model, then so be it
alright cornix we get it
yeah but pushing some kind of monetary gain to keep it up then you might as well close it. I'm fine with donations but monthly subs ain't cool.
1-When I open a website related to the game, Steam warns me about this and does not open the game.2-According to the game rules, it is forbidden to use any addon that will give you an advantage over other players in the game, but you are constantly advertising various addons. Those who make these addons also make cheats for the game. You call these things that make life easier.3-I know all the websites and platforms related to gaming. There is no need for any of them. None of them are reliable. When you follow the founders of the site, you can see that all your information is confidential and you can never reach them if you have a question. If they really did this for gaming, all their information would be accessible, this is the case on all serious sites.5-Leave the game, I don't want someone like you who advertises cheats and addons in the game. If you come to EU, I will constantly report you.
Afaik a gold advantage is not considered an advantage over other players by Arenanet.
Founders of which site? Cornix at least is reachable on the fastfarming discord and is often responding to w😊ebsite feedback, bugs and stuff
i dunno, this is a bad take on your end tbh. if the guy has been hosting it for free for this long, trying to monetize it somewhat isn't unreasonable. He shouldn't need to ask people's permission on the delivery method of his own work
Neh, bad take on YOUR part for not listening clearly to what Daren said. He made it very clear in what situations it would be completely understandable to look for compensation for his time. Daren's issue, and most of ours, is that they were purposefully vague and misleading about information to support their claims. It leads most sensible people to conclude that it's simply greed.
I agree in principle, but a sub model is a terrible choice. The value of Fast and things like it is that it adds value to the efficiency of hours played: gold earned. More specifically, if you were to farm on your own you would make X gold, with the site you make X + some value. The value of the service is hat extra value. Despite the name, speed is not an added value. Buying gems is much faster, but more expensive. So, in the end, Fast gains you cash (for the excess gem cost) at the cost of time (farming) and entertainment value (not playing the content you like most in favor of content that gets more gold). If you make me pay a fee in cash to use the service, you reduce the value of the service to me by the very method of payment. If the value I get from the site is less that 110g or so, I actually lose time and money by subscribing, and if I make more, that amount of value is diminished.
being compensated for your work is reasonable. Being compensated in excess- or in contradiction to- the value you are providing is not. Fast may just not be a viable web site.
@@CenterLeftAtheist It's a private business, of course it's greed. It's greed that ppl dont want to play the sub to get the info.
well, that's life. time to pay
I think most people won't
yeah, for gems to gold
for the future expansions yes and other games
Its there websid how cars if they want mony. Stop using it if there is a nother on or pay it if you raely want it. Totaly usless video
Found the website owner lol
@@TheMormonatorChannelI doubt it
@jeanFickel It's not that easy as in this case they don't own the parts to build the car
@@DreiSchwerterZorro and that their proposed payment model actively degrades the value of the service they provide, since gems can be bought with cash and converted to gold. In addition, consumer commentary on product value is a vital component of a free market. "Just don't buy it" is a foolish response to criticism, because the person advocating that idea is actively advising making decisions with less insight into the proposed value.
I pay Efficiency to support them, I don't think I would pay if it was not volunteer. I have paid some cups of tea too, my favorite was the portal distance. It's so useful to me that I had to thank the person that made it possible. But I think, if I would have had to pay for the portal distance, I wouldn't buy it.
@darensgw2 you can literally see how many subs he has by clicking on his name.... atm it's 97