Not being a hater or anything but the “In 2011” twitter campaign with free Unity Pro license have both gone to people who obviously already own Unity Pro. Neodrop and Palladin Studios no doubt are worthy of recognition for their prowess ability and the fact that they probably will produce some amazing products in 2011, but surely Unity Tech have to weigh up the fact that giving away a Pro license to a Pro licensee may not be the best marketing strategy?
Why?
We have a system of equality so all are entitled to win the license if they go by the same conditions.
Just cause it didn’t end on the $0 fraction does not mean that it is better for marketing there. If it were for marketing then freeriders rather commonly would be a bad marketing target cause you can’t work on serious teams with free and as such also not create products that can reasonably compete with work by such a team if the team have equal talents and time constraints so its clear which side you would want to push with PR if you had to choose one
lol
- Good point.
I do realise that Neodrop works in tandem with a team, so yes of course they could use another Pro license, same goes for Palladin Studios, but surely the fact that someone already owns a Pro license would factor into the decision to award weekly prize?
“Democratizing gaming” is what Unity is all about, the creed and motto, the founding ideal … but if the contest is going to ALSO factor in the perceived ability of twitter user to take the idea to completion - then it may be good long run marketing strategy for Unity, but the little guy, the dreamer, he who still holds fast to the principles of Unity and “democratizing” the game making experience, he who has a dream, tweets it and is given the same weight as the masterful Russian Super team and the successful Dutch wizards - if he has less chance of winning a Unity Pro license not based on his idea but on his Resume/CV, then by God we have sold out the ideals for the logical strength of prowess and technological might and the faint cries of “Democratize oh gamers near and far” that once echoed in the hallowed halls of the 2003 startup OTEE are but a distant memory and a lost ideal.
tongue in cheek tone
Couldn’t the winners also in turn, turn around a give away the free copies in their own unique way to promote community growth and development. I think that would be cool.
If I’m not mistaken, isn’t that exactly the point of the competition?
I’m sure UT and the studios did it for marketing reasons. Better to have some professional quality game win, than some amateur cr@p.
It’s still not what I call fair though.
We should get some bums off the street put them in boxing gloves and into the ring with Tyson - Now that’s competition! 
Rich people can play and win the lottery as well.
Personally, I think if someone already owned a pro license and couldn’t think of a reason to get another one, they wouldn’t have entered. I mean, what would be the point of it? Maybe if you have more than 2 pcs they needed another license to use it. Anyway… I don’t see the big deal. Sure it would be nicer to the indie/free users, but hey, fair is fair, and there is no reason that pro owners shouldn’t be allowed to get another license through a contest.
I was a little annoyed about people winning this who already have Unity Pro, it would’ve been good to restrict it to people who want Unity Pro because they don't have it, which seems to be the spirit of the competition, but I think also Unity is aiming to promote technologies in development that they think would make Unity look like a better platform also. It’s not that the winners aren’t deserving, but for someone to enter to win a second copy when many people can’t afford a first copy is a bit greedy. But whatever. It’s not really much about who wins it or why, but about Unity getting a) more twitter followers so that they look better, and b) more tweets about how much potential Unity has so it can attract more customers. It’s a way to drum up more attention from people NOT in the competition.
It would be interesting to have a public vote for the winner.
The question was “Tell us what you would do with Unity in 2011 for a chance to win Unity Pro.” The winning proposals are quite good and would definitely improve capabilities of Unity3d - plus prize encourage most active and capable members of community. And developers behind Antares Project(Neodrop), Shader Editor(Texel) etc do deserve to be awarded.
There are hundreds things that person could do with another Pro license even if he already have one. Like giving it to a friend. Or using it in project that require more then one Unity developer. Don’t worry - those licenses won’t be wasted.
- Except this is not a game of chance, it’s a competition… with judges.
No matter the arguments it just doesn’t feel right. People react with their guts and this doesn’t sit well thats all.
So where are the freerider proposals that are better than the winners?
BTH
Exactly. It’s not that Unity doesn’t like the free users. I think its just that those who already have enough devotion to their work that they have purchased Unity Pro have put together the best proposal and therefore won. Is it that surprising that those who have enough drive to scrape together the cost for a pro license also had enough drive to write a proposal to win something they wanted? Besides, I am sure the licenses are not going to go to waste. Why enter a contest for something you don’t need? I mean that would be a waste of your time to enter it if you absolutely didn’t need it.
Neodrop has stated in another thread, his surprise at winning. He stated that he already had Unity Pro and actually needed Unity Android license in order to test on - I hope he is able to swap out for a Unity Android license, an equal value product because, yeah, what’s he gonna do with another Unity Pro license but give it away?
In 140 charachters, on twitter you are limited to a few sentences outlining a proposal, so the argument that these proposals were just well written compared to other tweets is nonsense when you actually read the last few weeks of tweets. If you merely compared tweets without knowing who wrote what then I’m sure you’d get a truly unbiased competition.
There were no prerequisites for this competition. No need to prove a history of awesomeness - it is a competition for dreamers with a dream and it gives these dreamers a space to make known their dreams and it promises the brightest dreamer will be given a tool that will allow them to at least try to make that dream a reality.
Beauty is in the eye of the beholder so we can argue all we want, it is a Unity Tech competition and they get to choose who to give their products away to.
@BTH - Calling people who can’t afford or don’t own Unity Pro “freeriders” may come across to some as being somewhat elitist.
There are teachers, hobbyists, Unity iOS users who can’t yet upgrade to Unity Pro because that would entail adding a Unity iOS Pro license as well - a $3000 dollar hit not just a $1500 hit… there are those who purchased Unity Indie 61 days before it became a free product and you’re labeling all these people “freeriders” is painting alot of people in different situations with a broad paintbrush.
I agree freeriders isn’t the best choice of words, and would like to clarify that I do not agree with the wording as I may have led people to believe in my post that agrees with his. I would also like to clarify I was unaware of the details and the limitation of 140 characters for twitter and I apologies for not doing my research. However, I currently stand on this situation that there is no reason that previous pro owners should not be excluded from the contest because they have purchased pro before. That is all.
- I agree with you. I guess the reason I initiated this post was due to the fact that 100% of the recipients of the awards were already Unity Pro license holders. But I agree, it shouldn’t be biased either way - even towards Unity Basic users.