Donate vs Buy

[Etaew]

There has been commotion lately regarding my decision to suspend Dominvim from the server list because of their donation policy. They have accepted what we have told them and have been restored to the list. Whilst the team is preparing an official document regarding what is accepted and what isn't I would like to take the opportunity to provide some background regarding this.

If you donate something, there is no legal basis for the accusation that you are making money from Mythic's game. If you buy something on a DOL server, you ARE making money off Mythics game and have no defence.

Etaew

This is always the stance we have taken upon discovering servers with donation policies that are dangerous to the entire project, we cannot be seen to be making money off Mythic/EA's Intellectual property.

In regards to the donation policy we accept that some donations are required for server upkeep, but we cannot allow in game benefits to be offered. Just by calling it a donation does not make it a donation, what you are doing is a shop.

You offer
- Levels
- Items
- Money
etc

This brings a culture of having to pay in order to compete, and makes us worry because you make money out of DOL's work and of Mythic Intellectual Property.

We have never supported any server which requires money in this way.

Uthgards donations are a fine example of how to process them, people can donate and receive nothing, or they can receive items which do not affect gameplay of others. They currently only receive items such as a non combat pet. Uthgard appealed to its users to help it out financially and they received donations from their users enough to fund their own server.

Tolakram

If you run a good server people will donate to keep it alive. If you want to provide cosmetic only advantages we do allow it. Nice models, morphs, extension, titles, etc. Saying it's ok because a player can still get the items with time is not ok, never has been ok, and won't be ok in the future.

Hiatus

It's paying to compete, this will lead into legal troubles later on with mythic. Servers that are with DoL cannot have this, it is a shop that point is not arguable at all. A new played logs on the server and pays to play, a person who has been on the server takes weeks to get their gear. It is an unfair advantage over other players regarding time and various other affects.

Faith

Before you read on, please read the true meaning of what a donation is.

You are NOT paying for a service.

You are NOT purchasing goods.

You ARE donating to the server, you are not purchasing goods.

Blue

Let me give some hints what a donation is: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donation

Donations are gifts given without return consideration. This lack of return consideration means that, in common law, an agreement to make a donation is an "imperfect contract void for want of consideration."


Everything else is also known as "purchase".

Uthgard

Uthgard is a free service. Unfortunately hosting the servers to provide this service and it's community platforms is not free and comes along with monthly costs. If you want to support our work and help us to keep the costs lower for us, please donate. Even small donations will help us to reduce our monthly costs and are greatly appreciated. Unfortunately donation offers like hardware are not helpful, because our servers are rented and we simply can't enhance their hardware by adding components.

Please note that due to our Uthgard policy there are no rewards or specials in return for donations which give you game advantages. We don't want players who can effort to donate to have an easier standing than a standard player. Only your skill should decide on Uthgard whether you are successfull or not. We think that this is what Uthgard separates from other free to play MMORPG's.

If you want to donate, please use the button below. Each donation helps, regardless of the amount. Write your main character or forum name in the donation so we know who to thank. Thank you for your help!

Others

Ok, so I 'donate' you some money, and you spontaneously 'donate' me some gear. Yeah, not cool.

"purchase: To obtain ownership of a security or other asset in exchange for money or value. also called buy.

Unofficial Acceptable
This is not the official list, cosmetic only changes are acceptable:
- Name changes
- Play Model changes
- Title changes
- Item Model changes
- Non combat pets
- Broadcast Capabilities

Unofficial Not Acceptable
- Gold
- Items
- Levels
- Abilities

I am unsure as to how transfers should be handled, and we will have to discuss this, but I think transfers will need a cooldown, so you can't just pop over and change things about, and it may have to be server wide and not donation required.

[Ephemeral]

Something else you should add to that 'allowed' list would be the allow players to add a new item to the server with their choice of stats and such; seeing as you said that was okay in IRC.

(Keep in mind this will almost certainly kill your server unless you restrict the stats, because it gets a little ridiculous)

[Tolakram]

You used a spell checker for ridiculous, didn't you?

[Hiatus]

You used a spell checker for ridiculous, didn't you?

Hahahahahaha

[Graveen]

i missed the joke

or this is similar to color/colour ? eagle vs the queen ?

LIGHT ME !

[Ephemeral]

Think I missed the joke too.

[Tolakram]

Every American on the planet spells ridiculous wrong without the aid of a spell checker.

[Etaew]

Every PERSON on the planet spells ridiculous wrong without the aid of a spell checker.

[Dinberg]

Every PERSON on the planet spells ridiculous wrong without the aid of a spell checker.

Also - since when am I an 'other'?!

And I'd like to also say in my opinion, there should be NO reward for donating. Maybe at most a title, but definately not morphs. The second you put a 'reward' on donating, it becomes a transaction in my eyes.

[Graveen]

Cosmetic changes seem reasonnables. I agree that, effectively, even a title is 'something more', but don't throw the baby with the bath'water (??) our goal is to ensure rules are understood and correctly followed, it would be enough for me, i must admit this is typically something totally time eating and penible than been forced to recall them the rules