Thirty Bees Future Announcement

[AndyC]

45 minutes ago, the.rampage.rado said:

New owner, new spam bot... 😄

lol ..Yeah was reporting them as soon as they were posted lol

 

[Smile]

Thanks for all the nice wishes. Thirty bees is a strategic investment for me. We love the system and like to keep it out there. I will manage it beside my ecommerce store. This makes it challenging and exciting time wise. So my main objective is to keep it up to date (PHP versions, security ect.) and add nice features to it on the road. I hope we get more and more people becoming backers so we can hire a extra person to get more money in and run the company budget neutral. That would be a great achievement.

[wakabayashi]

Hey all

First of all Happy New Year! 🥳 Yesterday a deal has been achieved and so a new age is starting for TB. I will take this opportunity to step back. As most of you know, I am a merchant like majority here. My business has had a very good year due to Covid, but also due to continuing improving our shop processes. This also lead to some kind of overworking and I have to make some cuts.

I felt in the last weeks, that with my way of thinking as a merchant/dev, I am kind of exposed. My ideas, plans and problems aren’t shared by many other merchants. I could come up with dozens of examples (krona, elasticsearch and so on) but the three examples, which hurt me the most, are the following:

1. Carrier order editing. I implemented this feature in our store and it works flawlessly for us. The PR wasn’t accepted for some good reasons, which I planned to fix. But as nobody at all cared about this feature in the community, I haven’t done it.
2. Advanced Stock Management. Stock management is one of the most crucial and complex things, big merchants have to handle. The default version is broken/unusable. Since years! Multiple merchant’s leave the platform because of it. I have invested hundreds of hours to make this to a big strength of our company (chaotic storage, using barcode scanners, creating picking lists and a lot more). But even if I would, I couldn’t share this with the community. It is so far away from the core base and the needs from small merchants.
3. The “50$ VIP Club”. I always believed in the idea, that big merchant’s would have similar pain points like speed, search/filter functionality, order handling, stock handling, customer service and so on. That’s why I thought, it would be clever to unite these big merchant’s. For most of us it would be too expensive to hire a full time dev, who would code this all. So why not collect monthly 3000$, hire a dev and push this project together forward. The payers decide, what will be done, but also the little merchants can use the new stuff for free. It wouldn’t have been a donation at all. Just a strategic investment to share expenses. I know, that I haven’t come up with any concrete offer… I thank the few people, that were open to such an idea, but we were clearly too little and the interest in general is small. I am also a bit shocked, that 50$/month is such a huge expense for many merchants. But most may be really small and at the starting point of their business (ten years ago it would been the same here), others will have difficult economic situation with covid and some just prefer the freeriding.

I hoped, that a new fork or owner could bring some perspective back to me. But unfortunately the announcement yesterday didn’t. After all this months of waiting, I was expecting a well written official post with a clear roadmap and plan. That’s why I came to the obvious conclusion, that it’s much easier for me to go ego way. I asked @Smile to delete me as a moderator (which will also be a chance for somebody else, to get more involved in the project).

To not give any wrong impressions: I don’t switch the software!! I stay with this codebase, but will cherry pick new commits from thirty bees, prestashop and any thinkable fork in the best way. The rest will be modified/developped internally by myself and maybe I will hire a full dev in 1-2 years. If I am allowed to give you all a last honest advice: don't fool yourself. If you don't have a big budget, this is still one of the best codebase around and probably better than any hastily switch to woocommerce, shopify or whatever...

Here and there I will look around and check, what I am all missing 😄 I wish you all good luck! 🙏

PS: Sorry this post was supposed to be short…

Regards
Emanuel

[veganline]

Thanks to Emmanual for free moderation all this time

Does anyone know some online deliberation software that helps two people with similar needs to agree priorities before sharing payment?
Like:
A invests $200 for 200 votes,
B invests $100 for 100 votes, but the main thing is that A&B agree a brief for a developer with orders of priority, otherwise B walks away, so there is a lot of "this is important to me" "this might depend on that" "that's difficult" "that's too general / specific" "that's easy".
If a decision-aid exists like that, it might help get a module funded, for example to integrate with some stock control systems for big merchants or online markets for all of us.
I am sure that I saw something like this years ago on a site now defunct...

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
added  after several posts, reaction and a reply below 2021.01.02 11.48
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http://www.negotiationtool.com/ is the thing I'd seen. It doesn't seem worth a new post until I understand what it is. Sister site Votefair.org has its code and developers' name on Github; the Fullranking domain is abandoned and Negotiationtool looks like a hobby-commercial kind of thing. linked to a book on Solutionscreative.com

 

Edited January 4, 2021 by veganline
http://www.negotiationtool.com/

[30knees]

I am sorry to see you go, @wakabayashi, but I understand disappointment with the announcement post lacking a plan etc. You have been a pillar in the community and it's a pity your ideas and suggestions weren't appreciated more. I hope the “50$ VIP Club” will be picked up. I think it's a good idea to get to have a say in the development of the platform. Either way: Thank you for all you've done and all the best for your shop!

 

[Messenger Bee]

We had a lot of pressure to wrap up and make an announcement before the end of the year. If we did not make the announcement in time many of you would've left in droves. 

A lack of a roadmap does not mean that there aren't any plans to address the issues voiced in the community and that there would not be a roadmap shortly. It is merely a case of time constraints. 

Thirty Bees is alive again, after a tumultuous and uncertain period. Purchased by someone who genuinely cares about the project and the community. For us all it should be a sigh of relief. Leaving now is jumping the gun, imo. Give us a chance and time to settle in and prepare everything for the future and for your involvement. 

@wakabayashi Your contributions and your role as a moderator has been invaluable and is appreciated. Your voice is being heard. Your continued support and involvement will make a difference. Stepping away now does not help. Please stay and continue being involved - your contribution will help us all make TB 'great again'. We need all hands on deck if we're going to make this new endeavour succeed. 

 

[Mark]

I'm with @wakabayashi
his detailed and considered thoughts and views are important here. It sounds to me like a really nice and slightly gullible guy has bought thirtybees, but far too casual, not innovative or driven or hard out and professional and determined.

It's probable that once the money has gone to Datakick and the shine worn off for Smile we will back in the same situation as now.

This doesn't yet sound like a good environment for others to invest money to make it big winning formula, just something to throw loose change at to mitigate loss for Smile.

It sounds naive so far, but it's possible Datakick could pull a rabbit out of the hat and save Smile's butt as he did with Lesley and build something more awesome as long as Smile just keeps out of the way and let's Datakick do stuff we users want done.

Edited January 1, 2021 by Mark

[Smile]

3 hours ago, veganline said:

Thanks to Emmanual for free moderation all this time

Does anyone know some online deliberation software that helps two people with similar needs to agree priorities before sharing payment?
Like:
A invests $200 for 200 votes,
B invests $100 for 100 votes, but the main thing is that A&B agree a brief for a developer with orders of priority, otherwise B walks away, so there is a lot of "this is important to me" "this might depend on that" "that's difficult" "that's too general / specific" "that's easy".
If a decision-aid exists like that, it might help get a module funded, for example to integrate with some stock control systems for big merchants or online markets for all of us.
I am sure that I saw something like this years ago on a site now defunct...

 

We need such a thing here as well. It's a bit like kickstarter and comparable tools. I am still searching for such a thing but maybe kickstarter is the best for now. But feels as overkill.

[Smile]

@Mark Thanks for your feedback, there were two choices, make a fork for my own ecommerce company like @wakabayashi or try to do something for the community. I did choose the later and hope we will succeed together.

[rubben1985]

@Smile I can understand the feeling of @wakabayashi and I suppose some others. What we hope for (i talk only for me but I have the intuition is the same for some others), was not only to tell us if you would continue with TB name or another one new, but what was going to change and what we could we expect from this new path.

People has been waiting for these news a lot of months. Now a communicate to tell, TB is going to continue but wait again up to 2 month more to know the details.... The feeling is: ok...

I know plans take time, but the plan I suppose (i hope) has been developedduring this time. I suppose, most of the changes and roadmap were not going to be alterate because of the name... why not to communicate them to the people?

What is going to be the revenue business model? What is the draft of the roadmap (even if it changes)? is the new image/website has been prepared? when is going to be released?, What about people concerns about 1.6 limited in time compatibility?....

[nickon]

edit

Edited January 2, 2021 by nickon

[nickon]

Hi all, 

Fist of all I wish all a happy and healty new year. 

I followed this whole story and waited to see what will happen in the end, since we also have a PS 1.6 store that will eventually need to be upgraded to something else. 

I have two feelings about the future of TB 

1. I am glad that TB is not dead and someone is taking over.

2. I think TB has a small change to survive.

This seems to be season 2 of TB fork from PS. But this time with much less passion from the community (@wakabayashi is a good example). When TB was started by @lesleyand micheal, we had the same senario as we have now with @Smile and @datakick , one on the bussiness site and one great dev. Soon micheal stopped working on TB I guess due to the lack of money.  Wrong decissions where made (see elastix search) and with the health issues @lesley had, TB runned on autopilot by the community until now.

But I think that biggest mistake was that @lesley and micheal where too much focused on the users they could migrade from the PS 1.6 eshops. They failed to understand that the platform alone does not mean much. The biggest issue are the modules and themes the merchands are using. So hours where wasted on fixing other ppl;s modules and themes instead of developing TB.  Keep in mind that back then the whole 1.6 vs 1.7 was in a great debate, now I don't think that it is that much.  Big ecommerce sites that need to be updated regullary have switched and small sites like ours are just waiting until something fails to migrade. Thing is you can't expect much donation money from small sites. So you are basiclly on the same path to failure. 

What makes things worse is that although the TB transission to the new owners is in the works for months. I was hoping that @Smile would already have a roadmap ready, since (from my understanding) there where two options, buy TB or fork. I sadly didn't see this. 

My 2c :

1. Find a way of raising money. Depending on donations won't cut it.

2. Find a way to bring more devs on the project. Give reasons to activate members that have contributed on the project already. 

2. Stop depending on PS 1.6 users. Make TB it's own. Like any NEW platform give a basic working version and let other's worry about the themes and modules . If they need a basic module fixed either do it for free if it would not take more than 30min or charge a amount (smallest amount possible )

3. Don't try to make everyone happy. You can't 

 

P.S. Sorry for the long post

[x97wehner]

Looking forward to seeing where you guys can take this platform @Smile & @datakick!

[AndyC]

First off Happy New Year Everyone

When I first joined I was doing very well on my previous site (although very well is different to every merchant) and was happy to donate in the beginning.. Sadly choices I made were not great and sales plummeted to zero, so I had to stop.. It's been a 2 year long process of getting my website up and running to a decent status, where orders are now being taken. I am only a drop shipper and don't get a lot of orders at the best of times being in the gift arena, but I do it for the love of Pewter.. .. If things start improving I may be able to start donating again. But prestashop modules don't always work as well as they should.. My biggest shock came when I had to start adding attributes  and there was no way to add a cost to them, that should be the core and any platform.

It would also be nice if there was a option for someone to charge a reasonable fee to fix issues a merchant has.When ever I have asked in the past there has never been any help so end up having to use or 1 of the hiring sites to get things done and that in itself has issues too

[the.rampage.rado]

If I was you boys I would now sit down and try to bring @Traumflug onboard and three of you get on the task to make a clear roadmap for this project because as of now you're the glue holding it together.

If @Traumflug is gone nothing good shall come to this idea. Please bury the hatchet and bring your best ideas to the table making sure you are honest about your intentions but also make sure that the other two are happy with the way ahead. The future of many of our shops depends of you three guys and I'm sorry but if you had worked so hard for this idea for so long time I believe that funding will have to wait.

If you really bring the proj back on track (with clear and user-oriented roadmap, clear and open communication with us, timely bugfixes and code maintenance) I believe that the investment of money and time you made will pay back. And then you will have the community behind you as it was behind the founding members.

If now the proj get a forge it's all gone - the money to be/have been invested, your time and energy. Forget about our shops, fuck it, the people that make money will migrate, the ones like me that do it like a hobby will simply close down when time comes.

The idea of better, open source, working and user-oriented ecommerce platform will be gone...

[Mark]

On 1/2/2021 at 11:23 AM, Smile said:

@Mark Thanks for your feedback, there were two choices, make a fork for my own ecommerce company like @wakabayashi or try to do something for the community. I did choose the later and hope we will succeed together.

Im not giving up yet Smile, but its a tough business this and you have to go in with eyes wide open and be prepared to fight to win and do things bold and smart.

Because of Datakick Im still backing thirtybees for now, but there's a lot to be done to "succeed" and make a good return for yourself. It'll be unlikely I'll be putting money in until I see you are playing to win and the idea of spending months and months languishing about waiting for lawyers to cross t's and dot i's and during that time having no concrete business plans is something you swear to god you will never do again.

I hope it was well noted what @wakabayashiwas saying and there's a serious plan soon in terms of product and business model.

 

[Briljander]

I agree with @Mark. With no serious business plan or roadmap I will not put in any money into this project. 

The project and future is too fragile to rely a serious business on.

[zen]

I have hope that TB will Rise again, you can count on me for helping when you guys will be ready to work while having clear roadmap.

My first contribution : ElasticSearch module finished at around 98%  ( it just needs to be checked and fix small back office glitches, and translatations updates), works with last version of elasticsearch, and index products with multifeatures as well as colors attributes and show them ordered default by interest)

My second contribution : I want to make a simple theme for TB and a module that can customize it easily, making the use of all different configuration/cutomisation modules not necessary anymore, all in one place should be less confusing and strait to the point. I already make a theme custom module for Niara but coulnd't finish it due to no time enough and TB internals managing problems as we know them, also I make a slider module that use vegas show script in full screen mode and/or background mode.

My third contribution : Cleaning module should be up to date, including images clean, and products variations clean, as when you delete a variation many things are not deleted in the DB as it should.

 

 

 

[Messenger Bee]

Thanks for the support and contributios @zen

Looking forward to an exciting future together 😀

[DKO]

Hi guys,

I'm a merchant from Poland, running TB from the first versions. I'm also an IT pro with an additional developer on board. I'm planning to use our experience into a small e-commerce business this year, and I'm thinking about supporting TB in some way, as it's been good for us :)

We can help with some dev, infrastructure, maybe some marketing.

Shoot me with a PM if there's any way I can be of an assistance.

All the best!

Daniel

[Kashir2000]

Keeping thumbs up all the time 🙂

[musicmaster]

I am glad there is a solution for the business side of Thirty Bees. Good to see that people want to help.

As for the future I would like to give the participants the following considerations/ideas:

 - start with the easy stuff that can make TB more popular. Migration modules from Prestashop 1.7 and WooCommerce are easy targets - as is support for PHP 8. Note that the next major version of Prestashop will be 1.8/8.0 and if they handle it as badly as the upgrade to 1.7 Thirty Bees could once again become a desirable alternative. Functionally PS 1.7 is hardly different from 1.6 and TB.

 - starting with the easy stuff will give you time to work out ideas for further development.

 - I would love to see TB once again starting to use version numbers. 

 - As Prestashop told it, one of the reasons they didn't go forward with ASM was that every webshop company they talked to wanted something different. There may be no easy solutions here.

 

 

[veganline]

1 hour ago, musicmaster said:

easy

Apart from what Musicmaster said, he wrote the mainly-free Prestools program.
A built-in-by-default module to install Prestools would make this software easier to learn, I think, for new shopkeepers. Most of us find it in the end but it would be easier to have it there at the start.

Edited January 5, 2021 by veganline

[Messenger Bee]

2 hours ago, veganline said:

Apart from what Musicmaster said, he wrote the mainly-free Prestools program.
A built-in-by-default module to install Prestools would make this software easier to learn, I think, for new shopkeepers. Most of us find it in the end but it would be easier to have it there at the start.

Good idea. And thanks to @musicmaster  of course for Prestools and for your contributions and input throughout the years. Although imo, it's more for advanced users rather than casual or new shopkeepers. 

However, if it is decided to do this, then it will have to be modulised, styled, tidied up and afterwards maintained, and obviously permission from musicmaster. And you know, with limited resources...

But good idea nonetheless, imo

[dantall]

@Smile / @datakick good luck!

I'm a developer who runs a TB shop for my wife. Happy to help shoot down some bugs.