How can we suck less?

[fullwiped]

Hello, from time to time, there can be serious delays lasting 2-3 hours, causing the website to take a long time to load. Perhaps switching to a more powerful server could help.
Regards.

[Death]

2 hours ago, fullwiped said:

Hello, from time to time, there can be serious delays lasting 2-3 hours, causing the website to take a long time to load. Perhaps switching to a more powerful server could help.
Regards.

This sounds like an issue on your end. We closely monitor the performance and have monitors in 30 different locations around the world to capture real-world user metrics.

[ViolationHandler.exe]

 

This feels misleading, mainly the first sentence given that everyone has their own definitions of established. I think this should be re-worded to be accurate unless you plan on making that actually a function that isn't behind a paywall.

 

The bypassing initial approval currently is only possible when you purchase the Creator Pro subscription to the site.

 

If eventually there are creators that can do this without this paywall, sure, the legal message there makes sense, however, I still think there needs to be something either added or changed in that message. Explicitly state that creators who PURCHASE the creator pro subscription are ALSO allowed to bypass the initial approval.

[Raichu]

3 minutes ago, ViolationHandler.exe said:

 

This feels misleading, mainly the first sentence given that everyone has their own definitions of established. I think this should be re-worded to be accurate unless you plan on making that actually a function that isn't behind a paywall.

 

The bypassing initial approval currently is only possible when you purchase the Creator Pro subscription to the site.

 

If eventually there are creators that can do this without this paywall, sure, the legal message there makes sense, however, I still think there needs to be something either added or changed in that message. Explicitly state that creators who PURCHASE the creator pro subscription are ALSO allowed to bypass the initial approval.

who asked

Edited October 10 by Raichu

[ViolationHandler.exe]

34 minutes ago, Raichu said:

who asked

me

Edited October 10 by ViolationHandler.exe

[Death]

19 minutes ago, ViolationHandler.exe said:

The bypassing initial approval currently is only possible when you purchase the Creator Pro subscription to the site.

Currently yes, but this will not always be the case, thus the broad wording in the disclaimer. In legal language, "established" can also refer to someone or something that has met certain criteria, including the formalization of a relationship (in this case, purchasing the Creator Pro subscription).

The phrasing clearly states "established or trusted," which makes a distinction between the two terms. In this context, "established" can mean either being appointed or, as mentioned, purchasing the subscription. I agree it would be misleading if we only referred to "established" instead of "trusted," but by your reasoning, it would imply we are saying "trusted or trusted users," which doesn’t make much sense, does it?

Ultimately, this is a legal disclaimer that most users will only glance at occasionally. The wording is intentionally broad to allow for flexibility in making changes to the service as needed, while still adhering to the original guidelines.

Footnote: you can't have your own definition of a legal definition (going to assume you meant interpretation of), you stupid goose.

[S0TR]

Hmm, but I love, and am highly addicted, to CodeFling and everything about this site; it's hard to think of anything that might need improved upon! 

HOWEVER, while sitting on this topic for a few days since I've first seen it because I just could not think of anything this site needed to change, I do finally have a few suggestions that may or may not have been said already

 

In regard to the Discussions tab of a Plugin's page

• Discussions open the most recent comments first

Whether that means you jump us to the last page immediately, and we can work backwards to read most previous comments, or if that means you swap the positions and where page 1 the most recent instead and the last page is now some of the first discussions; I don't really mind which, but I am more favorable to the latter here.

This came to mind as I am currently going through some Discussions about RaidableBases, (love you nivex), just seems backwards in my mind to click the last page (page 129), then go backwards to read most recent comments; maybe that's just me

In regard to both Discussions and Reviews tabs of a Plugin's page

• Keyword search features

As I mentioned, I am going through Discussions of a plugin to not only entertain myself, because I am addicted to CodeFling, but also to see if a question I have has already been talked about. Having a search feature where we can type in specific keywords, in my case I would be searching for "gunrack", and have comments/replies returned to us with our keyword in it would be extremely helpful as I am finding myself going back page after page just to see if other users have talked about it prior to being redundant myself and posting about something that has already been discussed!

 

Although very minor improvements, I believe these could help with the QoL of this site. As a new plugin Developer hoping to find my footing and make a home here at CodeFling, I love every ounce this site has to offer, the community that surrounds this place, and would be the first to say if asked that CodeFling has other plugin sites beat by a landslide 

 

[HunterZ]

54 minutes ago, ViolationHandler.exe said:

bypassing initial approval currently is only possible when you purchase the Creator Pro subscription to the site.

CodeFling is pay2win? Smh

[Death]

15 minutes ago, HunterZ said:

Codefling is pay2win? Smh

Correct, but the ones winning are the customers who can access their favorite creator's latest files sooner. It was a bit unprofessional of them to share privileged information before we had the chance to announce it officially. It's still a WIP.

We'll announce it officially and explain what it means once everything is ready to go!

[misty.dev]

56 minutes ago, Death said:

Currently yes, but this will not always be the case, thus the broad wording in the disclaimer. In legal language, "established" can also refer to someone or something that has met certain criteria, including the formalization of a relationship (in this case, purchasing the Creator Pro subscription).

The phrasing clearly states "established or trusted," which makes a distinction between the two terms. In this context, "established" can mean either being appointed or, as mentioned, purchasing the subscription. I agree it would be misleading if we only referred to "established" instead of "trusted," but by your reasoning, it would imply we are saying "trusted or trusted users," which doesn’t make much sense, does it?

Ultimately, this is a legal disclaimer that most users will only glance at occasionally. The wording is intentionally broad to allow for flexibility in making changes to the service as needed, while still adhering to the original guidelines.

Footnote: you can't have your own definition of a legal definition (going to assume you meant interpretation of), you stupid goose.

So the criteria being paying 20$ a month? How does that make you an "established" creator?

[Death]

27 minutes ago, misty.dev said:

So the criteria being paying 20$ a month? How does that make you an "established" creator?

To purchase the subscription, you must already be a creator, meaning you've uploaded a paid file and undergone some level of vetting. This means specific criteria have been met for this feature to be accessible—it's not simply a matter of paying $20 for instant access. The use of established is ambiguous to apply to cases outside of what's described.

The policy clearly outlines its purpose, and a badge is prominently displayed above the purchase and download buttons, linking to the policy. It also cautions users to exercise their own discretion before proceeding, especially if a formal review hasn’t yet been made.

This part of the policy is meant to clarify what it means for a file to be published but not yet approved. How a creator gained access to instant approvals is irrelevant here. What truly matters is ensuring users understand the distinction and what it implies before they choose to purchase or download the file.

[Bubbafett]

On 10/9/2024 at 6:45 AM, BippyMiester said:

People bitching about the review process dont understand that its there for a reason. If a reviewer hasn't even made the minimal effort to open a support ticket to try and solve their problem, then the review is bullshit. It doesn't give the dev a chance to address the problem, or give the dev a chance to make the product better.

If there is sufficient evidence that the reviewer has tried to solve the issue with the dev, then the review gets pushed through.

Its not a hard process to follow.

Its not that hard to submit a review on the site, yes the reviews are curated to an extent. The REASON they are curated is because we want ACCURATE reviews... not just someone review bombing the fuck out of a series of products cause they aren't happy with the dev. When a potential new customer sees your product and that its only 1 star, the chances of them clicking into your product to check it out in more depth DRAMATICALLY reduces. Do you really want your product to have unmoderated reviews and be 1 star because of no fucking good reason? lol I don't think so. Thats why we have a review process.

Don't like our review process?

Are you a dev? Then do better. Focus on making your product(s) better, and more people will leave better reviews.

Are you a reviewer? Then make effort to try and fix your issue instead of just being a cry baby and bitching. Tried that? Then prove it. Screenshots? Discussion threads? Etc. You prove it, then 99% of the time your review is going through.

99% of all reviews that have gotten denied for MY products have been denied because the reviewer never tried to fix their issue and reach out to me. Simple as that.

If you don't trust the reviews because they are curated, then apparently you don't trust any of the plugins or products on the site either, cause those are curated too.

#endrant

 

As a customer, having a review censored period is crazy. If a review is blatant review bombing then sure, remove it. Customers deserve to be able to see peoples actual thoughts and experiences with plugins without those reviews being "curated".

 

Forcing all negative reviews to go through support tickets first also violates the Consumer Review Fairness Act (2016).


Under the Act the following reviews can be prevented or removed:

• contains confidential or private information – for example, a person’s financial, medical, or personnel file information or a company’s trade secrets;
• is libelous, harassing, abusive, obscene, vulgar, sexually explicit, or is inappropriate with respect to race, gender, sexuality, ethnicity, or other intrinsic characteristic;
• is unrelated to the company’s products or services; or
• is clearly false or misleading.

https://www.ftc.gov/business-guidance/resources/consumer-review-fairness-act-what-businesses-need-know

 

Quote

Specifically, the act voids any provision in a form contract (like a website's terms of use) that (1) restricts a party's ability to leave reviews, (2) imposes a penalty or fee for leaving negative reviews, or (3) requires consumers to give up their intellectual property rights in the content of their reviews.

https://www.dwt.com/blogs/media-law-monitor/2017/10/protecting-the-right-to-complain-the-consumer-revi#:~:text=Specifically%2C the act voids any,the content of their reviews.

 

Curating files keep consumers safe from files that may cause problems to them or their server. Curating reviews is not the same thing, and does nothing but erodes peoples trust in the review process.

This does not mean that I don't believe creators deserve their positive reviews or that they earned them.

[Death]

9 hours ago, Bubbafett said:

If a review is blatant review bombing then sure, remove it.

This is contradictory. Either reviews can be curated, or they can't. You're introducing a moral standard to decide which reviews should be removed and which shouldn't. Essentially, we're doing the same thing, just with different criteria.

9 hours ago, Bubbafett said:

Customers deserve to be able to see peoples actual thoughts and experiences with plugins without those reviews being "curated".

The key term here is actual, which is the focus of our moderation. Our goal is to provide the genuine experience of the reviewer. We reject reviews that are fabricated, misleading, or related to support issues that the reviewer hasn't tried to resolve. Many reviews are driven by emotion and seldom represent the true experience. Our curation process ensures that reviews offer context, are free from emotional bias.

9 hours ago, Bubbafett said:

Forcing all negative reviews to go through support tickets first also violates the Consumer Review Fairness Act (2016).

We are not the party offering the service or product itself, but a marketplace for third-party content. Therefore, we can freely moderate reviews on files within our platform. Additionally, users agree to our moderation terms when submitting reviews. We ensure our practices comply with the Consumer Review Fairness Act, as we do not prevent users from sharing honest feedback, but we may moderate to ensure reviews follow our guidelines.

9 hours ago, Bubbafett said:

Curating files keep consumers safe from files that may cause problems to them or their server. Curating reviews is not the same thing, and does nothing but erodes peoples trust in the review process.

This may be a bit biased on your part, given the lack of reviews you've received as a creator. But I can assure you that when you wake up one morning to a 1-star rating because a user feels that you should have implemented a feature that was never promised or planned, you will think differently.

9 hours ago, Bubbafett said:

This does not mean that I don't believe creators deserve their positive reviews or that they earned them.

This comes across as somewhat misleading. You're assuming that most of the reviews we remove are negative, but in reality, over 98% of the reviews we moderate are 4 or 5 stars. While you're focusing on negative reviews tied to unreported support issues, the majority of reviews we reject are due to a lack of context or substance. We ensure that when customers read reviews, they see ones that genuinely reflect their experience.

I often hear this argument about wanting to see all reviews, but the reality is that most people don’t actually do that. You’re likely to skim past them, only focusing on the reviews that address your specific concerns. Having numerous "nice" or "works good" reviews becomes repetitive and can actually diminish the overall value of reviews.

[HunterZ]

Funny that people still try to submit substance-less reviews when there's already a feature for that: reactions.

[Emigo]

On 10/11/2024 at 12:51 PM, HunterZ said:

Funny that people still try to submit substance-less reviews when there's already a feature for that: reactions.

but also, if your review says "this plugin is great! my players enjoy it very much! thank you!", This also gets moderated and they tell you to add this and add that..... it no longer is an organic review. I trust more in a review that says "this plugin is awesome!" that in one that has more notorius details that has been moderated. In my particular case, i havent left another review and i dont read them either because there is an gigante posibility that moderators put their own thoughts in it.

 

[HAVOC805]

Hello

have all free downloaded content show in the purchased section along with purchased items or create a downloads tab for everything a customer has downloaded including free to make it easy to find download history and to see if there are updates available for free items.

[HunterZ]

8 hours ago, Emigo said:

but also, if your review says "this plugin is great! my players enjoy it very much! thank you!", This also gets moderated and they tell you to add this and add that..... it no longer is an organic review. I trust more in a review that says "this plugin is awesome!" that in one that has more notorius details that has been moderated. In my particular case, i havent left another review and i dont read them either because there is an gigante posibility that moderators put their own thoughts in it.

I would hope that moderators aren't prompting people other than to give them general direction to include some details about what specifically they (dis)like about something.

As a prospective customer, "wow this is great A+++++" eBay-style feedback doesn't help me... I want to hear things like "this really helps make up for running small maps" or "I'm disappointed that this doesn't support tugboats" because it's going to help me judge how good a fit it might be for use cases that the author didn't think about. Consequently, I also try to think of these kinds of details when writing my reviews.

[dustyhansen]

I would really like to see a button to flag a plugin for staff review.

I have several plugins that the devs are completely non-responsive to support requests, discussion posts, etc. and they are no longer working and are still available for sale/download.

It would be nice if there were an easy way to flag a plugin as a problem and leave a note as to what the situation is so staff could review it and possibly pull it or whatever needs to be done.

I also really want a search feature for discussions as others have said. That would be super helpful.

[Emigo]

12 hours ago, HunterZ said:

I would hope that moderators aren't prompting people other than to give them general direction to include some details about what specifically they (dis)like about something.

As a prospective customer, "wow this is great A+++++" eBay-style feedback doesn't help me... I want to hear things like "this really helps make up for running small maps" or "I'm disappointed that this doesn't support tugboats" because it's going to help me judge how good a fit it might be for use cases that the author didn't think about. Consequently, I also try to think of these kinds of details when writing my reviews.

i trust more in a sincere opinion that in one with a lot of details because now i know that theres is a big chance that review was moderated. Anyway, its just my experience and has no importance. It seems that theres just a few of us that believe that this method doesnt work so it doesnt matter. We will just keep buying and not giving reviews or look for another site to read sincere opinions. Codefling will continue to exist and we costumer gonna keep consuming either way.

 

[Death]

On 10/12/2024 at 3:38 PM, Emigo said:

but also, if your review says "this plugin is great! my players enjoy it very much! thank you!", This also gets moderated and they tell you to add this and add that..... it no longer is an organic review. I trust more in a review that says "this plugin is awesome!" that in one that has more notorius details that has been moderated. In my particular case, i havent left another review and i dont read them either because there is an gigante posibility that moderators put their own thoughts in it.

Exactly, because saying "your players enjoy it" is no different from saying "nice plugin." But why is it nice? Why do they enjoy it? It's a small request to ask for justification of your rating. Also, we've never pressured anyone to write their review in a specific way. We only provide examples to show how you can structure your review to add meaningful context.

If you were to copy that wording, we’d reject it because it demonstrates a lack of effort. We genuinely believe that if you're not willing to put effort into your review, it's better not to leave one at all. Leaving a review without context does a disservice to everyone.

[Death]

6 hours ago, dustyhansen said:

I would really like to see a button to flag a plugin for staff review.

I have several plugins that the devs are completely non-responsive to support requests, discussion posts, etc. and they are no longer working and are still available for sale/download.

It would be nice if there were an easy way to flag a plugin as a problem and leave a note as to what the situation is so staff could review it and possibly pull it or whatever needs to be done.

I also really want a search feature for discussions as others have said. That would be super helpful.

It's hidden under file actions. I'll make a dedicated report button soon.

[Death]

6 hours ago, Emigo said:

i trust more in a sincere opinion that in one with a lot of details because now i know that theres is a big chance that review was moderated. Anyway, its just my experience and has no importance. It seems that theres just a few of us that believe that this method doesnt work so it doesnt matter. We will just keep buying and not giving reviews or look for another site to read sincere opinions. Codefling will continue to exist and we costumer gonna keep consuming either way.

A review isn't sincere just because you wrote it. In fact, the opposite is true, a genuine review should reflect actual experience rather than generic praise without highlighting any real benefits the file offers.

[Emigo]

22 hours ago, Death said:

A review isn't sincere just because you wrote it. In fact, the opposite is true, a genuine review should reflect actual experience rather than generic praise without highlighting any real benefits the file offers.

A genuine review is an opinion that comes from the heart, not one induced by moderators. 

[Emigo]

22 hours ago, Death said:

Exactly, because saying "your players enjoy it" is no different from saying "nice plugin." But why is it nice? Why do they enjoy it? It's a small request to ask for justification of your rating. Also, we've never pressured anyone to write their review in a specific way. We only provide examples to show how you can structure your review to add meaningful context.

If you were to copy that wording, we’d reject it because it demonstrates a lack of effort. We genuinely believe that if you're not willing to put effort into your review, it's better not to leave one at all. Leaving a review without context does a disservice to everyone.

If the review works or not is decission of the costumer reading it, not yours. If i read a review that doesnt fulfill my expectations then i will not consider it. Every person has the hability to take or leave what doesnt work. If i read one that says "this plugin is shit" of course it has to be deleted and investigated but i dont feel the same impact in one that says "this plugin is awesome". I already know what the plugin does. If i read the reviews its because i already read the description and watched the videos that the developer uploaded. I just want to know if those who bought it are happy with the purchase.  But like i said before, it doesnt matter.. Codefling will live on no matter if those who dont like this system keep buying here or not.  

[Death]

On 10/14/2024 at 7:02 PM, Emigo said:

If the review works or not is decission of the costumer reading it, not yours. If i read a review that doesnt fulfill my expectations then i will not consider it. Every person has the hability to take or leave what doesnt work. If i read one that says "this plugin is shit" of course it has to be deleted and investigated but i dont feel the same impact in one that says "this plugin is awesome". I already know what the plugin does. If i read the reviews its because i already read the description and watched the videos that the developer uploaded. I just want to know if those who bought it are happy with the purchase.  But like i said before, it doesnt matter.. Codefling will live on no matter if those who dont like this system keep buying here or not.  

You feel that a review saying, “this plugin is shit” should be removed and investigated, but don’t expect the same scrutiny for reviews that say, “this plugin is awesome.” Both types of reviews, if lacking substance, are equally unhelpful. If a review doesn't explain why a plugin is great or bad, neither offers value to someone considering a purchase. Reviews need substance, whether positive or negative, to genuinely help potential customers.

On 10/14/2024 at 7:02 PM, Emigo said:

f i read the reviews its because i already read the description and watched the videos that the developer uploaded. I just want to know if those who bought it are happy with the purchase.

You argue against removing reviews for lacking context or substance, but at the same time, you say you're reading reviews to see if people are genuinely happy with their purchase. How would you know if someone is truly satisfied if the review just says something vague like "nice plugin" without any explanation?

If reviews lack detail, like simply saying "this plugin is awesome" or "nice plugin," they don't actually tell you whether the purchase was a good experience or if the plugin met their expectations. Without context, reviews become meaningless, whether they're positive or negative. This is why moderation for substance, not just sentiment, is important for ensuring reviews provide value.

On 10/14/2024 at 6:54 PM, Emigo said:

A genuine review is an opinion that comes from the heart, not one induced by moderators. 

Genuine doesn’t just mean expressing a feeling, it means providing an honest, informed opinion based on actual experience. A review that truly comes from the heart would have substance, offering details about what made the product great (or not) for the reviewer.