New cPanel Pricing affecting 2022, what will DirectAdmin do?

[factor]

cPanel's value was based on future revenue potential.

For sure. They also intended to have a certain user base (Large hosting companies and super small one user) customers. No small to middle size customers.

Large hosters have large IT staff to help innovate and run the business. Which mean less support issues for Cpanel.
One person wont log a ticket in general they will just struggle or it will work good enough for them.

The model also weeds out small to medium size hosters or upstart business people who think you just install a server and collect money. Its also these people who post the issues and open support requests the most.

In other words they priced out all the people they didnt want.

 

[BillyS]

Well cPanel has said years ago that they will never increased their prices.

Do you have a link to where CPanel said they would never increase their price? I was with CPanel for many years and I never heard that.

To be honest, since the switch CP to DA I haven't increase them, infact I just have descrease the pricing for my customers. The last year 2020 I asked €3.09/mo excl. 21% VAT for cPanel hosting, since the migration to DirectAdmin I was able to downgrade the price to €1 excl. 21% VAT.

I don't understand the math here. Even with only 30 accounts, CPanel works out to under 1 euro per month per account. When you have over 100 accounts, the pricing is only 0.3 euro per month. How did you drop 2 euro just by switching to DA?

Anyway, it's silly to ask DA to never raise prices, unless there is an opportunity for labor arbitrage or to automate something, increases will always be on the horizon. I mean doesnt everyone want to make more money in 2022 than they did in 2021?

 

[DirectAdmin Sales]

We are not in talks with anyone to sell the DA project. If somebody claims otherwise, I welcome them to post proof. As for wanting a guarantee that prices never increase... that is extremely irrational.

I challenge anyone to look at their credit/debit card or bank statements, maybe the last 10-20 places you made a purchase. Go to their websites. Show me where any of them promise that prices will never go up.

While irrational people are busy with that exercise, let me address the rational people. Of course, you realize prices go up over time but you expect it to be done fairly and reasonably. And this is where our track-record comes in.

We consider subscriptions locked in. While this isn't a guarantee, there are customers that have had the same DirectAdmin license for 18 years without any price increase. No matter how hard you look, you will never find a DA customer who has received a forced price-increase on an active product/subscription. Compare this to our competitor who has done a major price increase, then yearly price increases after that. Yet, somehow we are still the bad guy.

Furthermore, we even have a solution for those who demand a legal/contractual guarantee that price will never go up. Since our beginnings, we have never restricted how far you can extend the expiry of a license . If you want a guaranteed 100 year price, you can do it!

If that's not enough, please remember that in the last few years we brought on @smtalk as an official owner/partner of DA -- many of you will remember him as being part of our community since near the beginning, and he is now the leading force behind our development and features. When it comes to ownership stakes, we focus on contributors who have become our trusted friends -- not investors or venture capitalists. In fact, if our intent was to sell out, bringing on another owner (with veto powers) would be the last thing we'd do.

We're the same group of people who started this company and we've had to make some adjustments to be sustainable, but none of these adjustments have ever involved breaking a promise.

 

[factor]

the last few years we brought on @smtalk as an official owner/partner of DA

I had not heard this. Congrats to him.

We are not in talks with anyone to sell the DA project. If somebody claims otherwise, I welcome them to post proof.

Well dang there goes my rumor for a FreeBSD takeover... LOL.

Yet, somehow we are still the bad guy.

Not the bad guy.
It a holistic corporate stigma. Corporations are bad in the minds of most people these days. EG Cpanel was looked at as good until "the owner" sold out to a big venture capitallist corporation. It just like IBM buying RedHat. Which is why I use FreeBSD or Debian. I may try RockyLinux in general they still have to be downstream of IBM.

contributors who have become our trusted friends

I hope this mean folks in Tennessee are still ok?

 

[DirectAdmin Sales]

I hope this mean folks in Tennessee are still ok?

Friends don't let friends use FreeBSD...

 

[factor]

Friends don't let friends use FreeBSD.

Unless it is more than 1% of their sales...

 

[IT_Architect]

I'll go with your rumor. I like it better.

 

[factor]

I like it better.

IKR if we could have only had a few more people buy FreeBSD licenses.

I wish there was some way I could help keep it going. I looked a VirtualMin but its not even close to as polished as DA.

 

[IT_Architect]

IKR if we could have only had a few more people buy FreeBSD licenses. I wish there was some way I could help keep it going. I looked a VirtualMin but its not even close to as polished as DA.

I have an idea! Let's build on your rumor. JBL compiles DirectAdmin and you work out the install packages and scripts. You become a DirectAdmin reseller and the exclusive FreeBSD DirectAdmin reseller for earth. You get paid for your efforts and reselling. DirectAdmin works out a deal with you for a free license to one user and 4 domains so people can try it out. The support is sold by you as well. If they want the next version of it they need to pay you. When they want more, they can pay you and you can pay JBL.

I looked a VirtualMin but its not even close to as polished as DA.

Then it hasn't changed much over the years I've followed it. That whole line of products is Mickey Mouse. It almost does everything and actually does nothing unless you work on it and is generally unmaintainable. There was another one I followed too that was more polished but required manual config as well. I set DA up with ports once. That was tough and I ran out of energy even though JBL was interested and gave me pointers along the way.

You would have the satisfaction of saving us from having to live with a Mickey Mouse operating system.

 

[Active8]

When it comes to ownership stakes, we focus on contributors who have become our trusted friends -- not investors or venture capitalists.

That is the spirit !

 

[factor]

the exclusive FreeBSD DirectAdmin reseller for earth.

LOL.. for EARTH... LOL

You get paid for your efforts and reselling.

Getting paid would be good...

I would gladly help support a second installer for FreeBSD. If the main executable "directadmin" would just continue to work on FreeBSD. I think that is the rub. They don't want to put in DEV time for FreeBSD.

Then it hasn't changed much over the years I've followed it.

Yep best I can tell they are stuck in the old days. They don't even have a module for PHP extensions or nginx. Its like they stopped at Apache.

They to droped FreeBSD support a while back.

They do have some things that are better than DA though backup and restore (way better), Server to server transfer, Webmin clustering is super cool, they support migration from plesk, directadmin and cpanel. The ability to set custom defaults is better.

I set DA up with ports once. That was tough and I ran out of energy even though JBL was interested and gave me pointers along the way.

there is a old github project for this its also on the DA forum. Its unmaintained. The biggest issue is would the DA exe work on FreeBSD. I assume they will remove all the FreeBSD code in the Aplication Image (exe) so its a no.

 

[IT_Architect]

I would gladly help support a second installer for FreeBSD. If the main executable "directadmin" would just continue to work on FreeBSD. I think that is the rub. They don't want to put in DEV time for FreeBSD.

I would think there would be little difference in the DirectAdmin code, and that they don't maintain separate sources but rather separate modules where adpating is necessary, which is an area that woulnd't change much, and it would have the effect of forcing permanent licenses into maintenance because it would require a maintenance subscription, part of which JBL would be entitled to for their efforts. In the mean time, they would not need to maintain expertise in FreeBSD nor host it as that would be taken over by you.

 

[factor]

In the mean time, they would not need to maintain expertise in FreeBSD nor host it as that would be taken over by you.

Well I might need a benefactor to donate some high speed servers to host all the code and files. LOL you keep this going...

 

[IT_Architect]

Well I might need a benefactor to donate some high speed servers to host all the code and files. LOL you keep this going...

That's not out of the question actually. Our servers are in SoftLayer's DAL-13 DC, which is the best connected area in the world.
I have one, Intel XEON E5-2690 V4 35M Cache, 2.60-3.5 GHz, 14 cores, 28 threads X 2 Processors = 28 cores/56 threads 64GB that is mostly filtering air and a stand-in spare and backup target on the VPN with a GB, not 10G, connection.