strager 18 Posted March 9, 2016 Share Posted March 9, 2016 (edited) Hi all, After a good experience testing it at home, I instructed some of my users on one of my servers to download the app so they don't have to continue to use the tiny font's on the website on their iphones. My first user replied back that he was able to install the app but it is telling him to pay for something in order to connect. I was never prompted to pay for anything at all during testing on several devices (I did purchase a lifetime subscription back in the day but the devices don't know that) so I'm not sure why this is happening, I don't want to use Emby Connect or any of that other crazy stuff - I just want to give my users the IP address and have them connect to my server with the app. My users aren't going to be willing to pay anything so if my lifetime subscription somehow doesn't cover it whatever premium features paying provides we don't need. At the end of the day all I want them to do is see a list of "Shows" (events like weddings and stuff) and pick an "Episode" (video) to play when they want. How do I get them logged in and permanently get rid of the "Buy Me" prompts? NOTE: After some reading on similar issues people seem to be experiencing, it looks like there is a partial fix to this by having them connect to the local network - however, most of my family is on the other side of the country so this is not a valid workaround for me as I can't get them to come by and connect the app to the server. Edited March 9, 2016 by strager Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Luke 37046 Posted March 9, 2016 Share Posted March 9, 2016 Hi, the intention is for you to be able to share your subscription with everyone in your household, but not every single user that connects to your server. They will need to purchase the one-time in-app unlock. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
strager 18 Posted March 9, 2016 Author Share Posted March 9, 2016 Oh that's a real shame and likely a killer for what I intended to use this server for - Won't stop me from continuing to use Emby for my primary media server, but it makes it all but worthless for the small server stuff that Emby has always been really good for (and why it was a better option than those greedy guys at Plex etc. who try charging for all sorts of stuff) You might want to reconsider using the app as a revenue stream in this way- apps are really good at attracting users etc. but only if the app is free to use for at least it's most basic functionality. If you locked stuff like the Sync function or Emby Connect or even server administration behind a paywall that would be OK, but to prevent connections and playback to a local server just doesn't feel right and isn't something I can support 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
f-u-t 7 Posted March 9, 2016 Share Posted March 9, 2016 (edited) .............. Edited March 12, 2016 by f-u-t Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Redshirt 1487 Posted March 9, 2016 Share Posted March 9, 2016 but to prevent connections and playback to a local server just doesn't feel right and isn't something I can support If the "local server" has a premier membership then the iOS client will unlock for free. If the "local server" does not have premier then the client can be unlocked for a one time fee. If the server is not local then it is just pure tightassery to expect a free client when the users have done nothing to support continued development in the emby ecosystem. 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
strager 18 Posted March 9, 2016 Author Share Posted March 9, 2016 (edited) If the "local server" has a premier membership then the iOS client will unlock for free. If the "local server" does not have premier then the client can be unlocked for a one time fee. If the server is not local then it is just pure tightassery to expect a free client when the users have done nothing to support continued development in the emby ecosystem. You can call it whatever you want, those are the kinds of users that we have. They shouldn't have to support the continued development - that's why we pay our subscriptions for the server. Keep in mind that these are OUR users and NOT Emby users. It's like Microsoft asking every viewer of a website hosted on IIS to pay them when they visit the site. They don't do that because the host of the server already paid MS for the licence much as we paid you for a licence/membership. Even if you visit using the MS created browser (IE/Edge) or app you still don't have to pay to visit the site. The financial incentive for you to keep making the app is that it makes it easier for our users which in turn get us to continue to renew with you (if not a lifetime member) because their users are happy with it. Edited March 9, 2016 by strager 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
f-u-t 7 Posted March 9, 2016 Share Posted March 9, 2016 (edited) .............. Edited March 12, 2016 by f-u-t Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Redshirt 1487 Posted March 9, 2016 Share Posted March 9, 2016 My definition of local is the same as the Emby developers, as defined in their Emby Premier FAQ. Which is "per household". Maybe they should add a commercial licensing option to support users who are looking to abuse the standard premier model. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Happy2Play 8271 Posted March 9, 2016 Share Posted March 9, 2016 But a cost sharing concept is insane also. If I got 1 dollar from 100 people to setup a server with Emby Premiere Lifetime, should all 100 people get free custom device designated apps? NO 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
strager 18 Posted March 9, 2016 Author Share Posted March 9, 2016 (edited) There is no cost sharing here..... You - Emby - have ONE user - Me I in turn have say 10 users - these are the people you are trying to charge here. You created the app for your users (ME in this example) so that they can in turn provide it to their users to have a better experience. The cost of the app should be part of our subscriptions. If anything you should provide a way so that I can charge my users for using the app if I so desired. You shouldn't even enter the equation because their relationship is with ME and not you. This is the same reason you have the "Branding" option (which still needs lots of expansion) on the advanced settings page - so that we can distance our users from Emby - they shouldn't even really know they are on Emby except for the Chromecast stuff (and the name of the app or course) which apparently there is no way to put our a server-specific app or otherwise remove the logo. EDIT: A "Commercial licence" - huh? Emby is supposed to be the open source alternative to commercially greedy companies like Plex!!!! Edited March 10, 2016 by strager 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
f-u-t 7 Posted March 9, 2016 Share Posted March 9, 2016 (edited) .............. Edited March 12, 2016 by f-u-t 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Angelblue05 4130 Posted March 10, 2016 Share Posted March 10, 2016 (edited) I can't help but feel the pay to play is not the right approach for emby products either... An alternative approach for the iOS app could have been: Limited: Basic Playback functionality, Folder Navigation type - a simple list, no artwork except for the single item presentation (right before playback). Premium: Essentially what the app is right now, beautiful UIs, remote control and whatever emby feature is added in the future. Essentially, paying for the emby experience. Still keeping the same "household premium license" concept to unlock the full iOS app, but giving free playback functionality regardless. From a user's perspective, the iOS app and the webclient via safari offers such a close user experience. The money really is in the UI and emby features, not in basic playback functionality. This is just my opinion as an emby user.. I understand the user can use the web client for free, but isn't that the equivalent of shutting the door completely on the iOS app for potential customers? It seems to me, to maximize the chances of selling the app license, you'd want the user to use the app in the first place, even if it's limited ways... The way it is right now, you are basically turning people away at the front door (by people, I mean users that are not emby server admins/household). Oh, and I'm saying all this in the nicest way possible... I do appreciate everything that's been done by the core Emby team. Edited March 10, 2016 by Angelblue05 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spaceboy 2493 Posted March 10, 2016 Share Posted March 10, 2016 Yep you're definitely going to get what you want by ranting raving and swearing. That always works. For my 2p I definitely don't think you should be able to charge your users without a significantly higher licence cost for those servers. I don't think it's unreasonable to ask users not in your household to contribute to Embys development by buying the app. And the way you describe it doesn't do you any favours Imo, this is a product for sale, if you and your users don't like it, don't buy it 5 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
anderbytes 139 Posted March 10, 2016 Share Posted March 10, 2016 (edited) I'm with @@Spaceboy . Even if it an open source project.... it doesn't mean it's charity! It only means transparency! It has a LOT of free features, and SOME paid, and this mobile version needs an one-time purchase for each account that is not in internal network. Devs here put a huge amount of effort developing and fixing the software everyday... so this one-time purchase is nothing compared to what you get. People in mobile devices that couldn't activate the app via internal network should have to pay ONCE a small fee and it will work 4EVER for that ACCOUNT (be it Google or Apple) ps: the guy above who hosted Emby in a remote location should be listened because of that scenario. Maybe at least Emby could allow 3 or 4 (family-size) user accounts in server that doesn't ask for paying. I'm from Brazil, things here like economy and salaries are screwed up, exchange rates for dollares are CRAZY, but still I did an effort and wanted to do my part contributing to this incredible software. So stop whining. Edited March 10, 2016 by anderbytes 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fc7 123 Posted March 10, 2016 Share Posted March 10, 2016 +1 @@anderbytes, @@Spaceboy Just to add my two cents I get the impression (and maybe I'm wrong) that some people in this thread may be using Emby for commercial activities/business and not for home or personal use. I'm not saying is wrong but I'm almost sure is not taken into account right now, nor expected from the terms of usage/licencing, etc, point of view Maybe the devs need to review this and create some kind of "Commercial usage" membership where other policies apply. Also, please, don't confuse open source (as in "transparent piece of code that you can review, audit and propose fixes to) with free (as in "free beer"). One thing doesn't imply the other... Cheers. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
strager 18 Posted March 10, 2016 Author Share Posted March 10, 2016 (edited) +1 @@anderbytes, @@Spaceboy Just to add my two cents I get the impression (and maybe I'm wrong) that some people in this thread may be using Emby for commercial activities/business and not for home or personal use. I'm not saying is wrong but I'm almost sure is not taken into account right now, nor expected from the terms of usage/licencing, etc, point of view Maybe the devs need to review this and create some kind of "Commercial usage" membership where other policies apply. Also, please, don't confuse open source (as in "transparent piece of code that you can review, audit and propose fixes to) with free (as in "free beer"). One thing doesn't imply the other... Cheers. I haven't seen anyone here who's using it for commercial purposes. I have a large extended family - the point of the server I was working on was to create a centralized location where everyone (aunts, uncles, cousins) can post their videos etc. and the rest of the family (who are now spread across the country) can access them. Just because there are multiple people involved doesn't make an activity commercial. For my 2p I definitely don't think you should be able to charge your users without a significantly higher licence cost for those servers. If there was a way where I could charge my users for app access (To help cover the bandwidth costs, licencing costs etc.), I'd be OK with providing a percentage of that fee (5%?) or a flat one time fee to Emby - as long as I was the one to pay that and not the user. My issue is NOT with having to pay - it's with my USERS having to pay Emby. I wouldn't mind paying more for the subscription - I was happy to pay it the first time because I support the software. The problem really is that Emby is trying to take my users and turn them into Emby users. The first sign of this was with the Emby Connect features that there is no easy way to disable. Than they added the giant non-removable icon to Chromecast. Now with the iOS charges, they've taken the next step to try and pull my users into their orbit and I really don't appreciate it. Perhaps the best option (I hate to even suggest this) would be a fork here.....iOS apps are generally pretty simple to build and it shouldn't take more than a few months work to reproduce that functionality on my own. I hate to reinvent the wheel, but the more I think about this the more it bothers me. I intentionally chose Emby because it was Open Source and was a community project that wasn't about milking me and my users and because it had the ability to re-brand the interface and other parts of the site. With Plex, my users knew they were on Plex and thought of the service as Plex which is what I wanted to get away from. With the fork option of course, Emby gets nothing going forward. Even the current "premium" features would likely become free as it developed and it would hurt development of the Emby ecosystem - a community I've come to enjoy. I'd rather not see that happen and was hoping for a more amicable solution here that didn't involve me spending hundreds of hours re-developing something that already exists and that didn't harm the community. One way or the other however, a solution to this quandary needs to be determined. Edited March 10, 2016 by strager 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vidman 589 Posted March 10, 2016 Share Posted March 10, 2016 It seems very strange that you say your server is for family use then go on to refer to them as YOUR users and want to go to lengths to obfuscate the fact that they are connecting to an emby server 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spaceboy 2493 Posted March 10, 2016 Share Posted March 10, 2016 No it was mymovies that made it sound like he was running a commercial operation but you don't do yourself any favours either as vidman points out. Your threats of blackmail aren't really going to go down well either. The solution us there, you just need to decide whether you want to accept it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fc7 123 Posted March 10, 2016 Share Posted March 10, 2016 And why the webclient which works fairly well in many browsers is not an option? Keeping in mind that is free.... Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
anderbytes 139 Posted March 10, 2016 Share Posted March 10, 2016 That's what Open Source is for.... if you want to develop your branch, just do it, and hope it will be a fair concurrent of Emby Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
strager 18 Posted March 10, 2016 Author Share Posted March 10, 2016 (edited) Spaceboy, on 10 Mar 2016 - 07:46 AM, said: No it was mymovies that made it sound like he was running a commercial operation but you don't do yourself any favours either as vidman points out. Your threats of blackmail aren't really going to go down well either. The solution us there, you just need to decide whether you want to accept it. Threats of blackmail??? There aren't any threats at all.... It seems very strange that you say your server is for family use then go on to refer to them as YOUR users and want to go to lengths to obfuscate the fact that they are connecting to an emby server Of course I'm going to lengths to obfuscate who developed the middleware they are connecting through. I don't put a giant IIS logo on the website - they don't need to know that it's a Windows/Microsoft hosted site - they are connected to my server and see my "branding". Emby is (or rather should be) the same way. I am the one providing the content, the CSS design, etc. - all Emby is doing is providing a framework for me to do so and an easy way to handle things like chromecast connections, log ins, and metadata management. Edited March 10, 2016 by strager Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spaceboy 2493 Posted March 10, 2016 Share Posted March 10, 2016 (edited) Spaceboy, on 10 Mar 2016 - 07:46 AM, said: Threats of blackmail??? There aren't any threats at all.... bullstits, you can dress it up however you like but by threatening to fork the project and following it up in the same para with "hurt development of the Emby ecosystem" and "and that didn't harm the community" are only going to be read one way Edited March 10, 2016 by Spaceboy Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
strager 18 Posted March 10, 2016 Author Share Posted March 10, 2016 (edited) bullstits, you can dress it up however you like but by threatening to fork the project and following it up in the same para with "hurt development of the Emby ecosystem" and "and that didn't harm the community" are only going to be read one way Go re-read my paragraph. I'm saying I DO NOT want to harm the Emby ecosystem. I'm activly looking for an alternative to doing this. That's not a threat - that's negotiation. I'd much rather this issue is resolved in an amicable & happy way that keeps the community together. There is more than one way to skin a turkey, and I've overall been happy with Emby's approach until now and I'm confident that they will come up with a solution that appeases everyone- after all they have the most to gain by keeping their users (us) happy and keeping the community together. Would you prefer people just got angry and left without talking about it? Splitting the community in two would be bad for everyone and should only be an absolute last resort. All efforts (reasonable and otherwise) should be made to prevent that scenario. Edited March 10, 2016 by strager Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vidman 589 Posted March 10, 2016 Share Posted March 10, 2016 Spaceboy, on 10 Mar 2016 - 07:46 AM, said: Threats of blackmail??? There aren't any threats at all.... Of course I'm going to lengths to obfuscate who developed the middleware they are connecting through. I don't put a giant IIS logo on the website - they don't need to know that it's a Windows/Microsoft hosted site - they are connected to my server and see my "branding". Emby is (or rather should be) the same way. I am the one providing the content, the CSS design, etc. - all Emby is doing is providing a framework for me to do so and an easy way to handle things like chromecast connections, log ins, and metadata management. I like how you make it seem you did all the hard work and "all Emby is doing is providing a framework" for you Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spaceboy 2493 Posted March 10, 2016 Share Posted March 10, 2016 Go re-read my paragraph. I'm saying I DO NOT want to harm the Emby ecosystem. I'm activly looking for an alternative to doing this. That's not a threat - that's negotiation. I'd much rather this issue is resolved in an amicable & happy way that keeps the community together. There is more than one way to skin a turkey, and I've overall been happy with Emby's approach until now and I'm confident that they will come up with a solution that appeases everyone- after all they have the most to gain by keeping their users (us) happy and keeping the community together. Would you prefer people just got angry and left without talking about it? Splitting the community in two would be bad for everyone and should only be an absolute last resort. All efforts (reasonable and otherwise) should be made to prevent that scenario. you are doing it again. i don't want to harm the emby community........unless you do what i want splitting it in half.and now you represent half the community? maybe its just a poor choice of words on your behalf.... over and over and over Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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