Unraid pricing model based on the countrys' cost of living.

[Lolight]

I think Unraid's worldwide revenues and adoption rates would increase many times over if the license pricing model made it reasonable.

 

The costs are simply unaffordable to the residents of countries located outside of the "first world".

I think it would be fairly simple to automate a discount to the full license cost based on the origin of payment.

 

The discount could be pro-rated according to the purchasing power index of a given country:

 

https://www.worlddata.info/cost-of-living.php

Edited August 7, 2023 by Lolight

[JonathanM]

I think a better index would be linked to a percentage of a normal system build cost.

 

12 hours ago, Lolight said:

The costs are simply unaffordable to the residents of countries located outside of the "first world".

How much does the hardware cost in those countries?

 

I honestly have no clue how much a system costs to build in other countries, but I don't think it's unreasonable to compare the hardware costs to the software costs.

[Lolight]

7 hours ago, JonathanM said:

I honestly have no clue how much a system costs to build in other countries, but I don't think it's unreasonable to compare the hardware costs to the software costs.

I'd say the cost of hardware is normally more expensive in any country due to taxation and/or market inefficiency/size if compared to the U.S. prices.

Which makes Unraid even more cost-prohibitive as an add-on cost to an already dis-proportionally expensive system for a someone building a NAS in the third world.

There's no much of a choice when purchasing hardware but there are at least several options available for free NAS software.

Edited August 8, 2023 by Lolight

[ChatNoir]

I know that the suggestion comes from good intentions, but in my opinion, I am not sure that it is worth the effort and the problems it will create for Limetech.

How to handle people paying with Paypal, Alipay, etc ?

How tempting it will be for people from country A to pretend to be in country B if they see that they can pay the license 2 or 3 times less ?

 

All this will create overhead for the team, frustrations for some clients,...

[Lebowski89]

I remember NBA League Pass would do this (and probably still do).. with some countries being massively cheaper than others. So then everyone would just VPN themselves to that country so they could get the cheapest-rate possible. The cost of UnRaid is fine, you get value for money in the long run. Charging $150 for a one-on-one session with Ed and the others? That's a different story.

[Lolight]

19 hours ago, ChatNoir said:

How to handle people paying with Paypal, Alipay, etc ?

How tempting it will be for people from country A to pretend to be in country B if they see that they can pay the license 2 or 3 times less ?

A simple solution for discounted licenses would be a requirement to supply a proof of residence e.g. a copy of local ID - problem solved.

[Lolight]

15 hours ago, Lebowski89 said:

The cost of UnRaid is fine, you get value for money in the long run. Charging $150 for a one-on-one session with Ed and the others? That's a different story.

The cost of Unraid is fine for rich countries but way too expensive for the third world.

On the other hand I'd say that charging $150 for a privilege of being guided in an one-on-one session by a well known and highly acclaimed guru is absolutely reasonable.

[Lolight]

19 hours ago, ChatNoir said:

All this will create overhead for the team, frustrations for some clients,...

Sure there will be more work involved.

That's normally how it goes with rapid business expansion.

 

Assuming that LimeTech do desire to expand at an accelerated pace.

If they're complacent with the current situation and are overall comfortable with sales numbers then yeah, why to change anything.

Going forward they might be able to maintain their unique position unchanged... until a cheaper and simpler to setup competition comes along.

 

btw, had anyone heard anything of lately on the progress made in development by the supposed Unraid competitor?

Referring to the LTT's investment...

[ChatNoir]

3 hours ago, Lolight said:

A simple solution for discounted licenses would be a requirement to supply a proof of residence e.g. a copy of local ID - problem solved.

That would be quite problematic for IMO :

• not sure people want to share personal information
• how can we be sure it will not be stored, potentially mis-managed ?  (see GDPR for EU for example)
• how can LT authenticate IDs from different countries being sure it's not a fake ? it will not be in English, and possible not an alphabet known to the team  (funny thing, I just prompted 'chinese ID' in google to see what it looks like, the first link is for fakes  )

 

In any case, neither of us is in a position to make a decision. It's good to make proposal that can increase Unraid's reach.

Up to LT to integrate that or not.

[Lolight]

47 minutes ago, ChatNoir said:

• not sure people want to share personal information
• how can we be sure it will not be stored, potentially mis-managed ?  (see GDPR for EU for example)
• how can LT authenticate IDs from different countries being sure it's not a fake ? it will not be in English, and possible not an alphabet known to the team  (funny thing, I just prompted 'chinese ID' in google to see what it looks like, the first link is for fakes  )

 

In any case, neither of us is in a position to make a decision. It's good to make proposal that can increase Unraid's reach.

Up to LT to integrate that or not.

• most people in the third world won't have a problem
• same as the above
• OCR translation, with the payment processor allowing payments within a certain territory.

Judging by the LimeTech's past marketing strategies it does seem like that they are interested in promoting Unraid outside of the first world.

e.g. their recent 50% off coupon code (大鹏 YYDS) that's been shared on the Chinese Unraid Facebook page.

The coupon worked only if paid with Ali Pay attached to a Chinese ID.