Recently I have noticed an increase in the amount of "private" information posted in the public areas. This is something I have noticed off and on, but moreso lately.

First off, let me say:

I know that by doing enough reading here and elsewhere, at this point one could build a "Lumenlab style" projector without purchasing the plans...that is obvious. There have been photos of the internals of projectors posted in the public areas on numerous occasions, and it doesn't take a genius to figure out what parts are used when they are (for the most part) for sale at the site.

What really makes this place worth the cost is the help offered in the private forums, and the design ideas/improvements and information shared by members. I see more and more public posts that distinctly refer to projector design and help requests, topics that make me say "Shouldn't this be in a private forum?". I look to see who is asking for help, and it is usually a non-customer (a "member")...Usually it looks something like this:



This continues untl it turns into a "help" or "design" thread, one that I feel should be in the private area.

My point isn't "Don't help anyone unless they buy the plans!", but I question posting internal pictures and answering detailed desgn/build/lighting/etc in the public forums, including the "projector results" area. After all, all of us here paid for the information and forums, paid for Brain's plan and the place to share ideas...do we really want to give it to everyone else for free? There are PLENTY of free forums (you all whch ones I mean) to get general, non-Lumenlab design help.

I always felt that the public areas were sections for people to ask "Does this really work?" and for members to respond, not for the public to solicit answers to questions that should be asked in the private areas....Often I wonder if these people got a set of the plans for free somewhere and are now asking us to help them in the public areas.

I may be WAY off base wth this, so mods feel free to delete this if I am out of line.

I agree completely. I think way too much info is posted in the public threads. I think it should be pictures of finished PJs and screen shots, general discussion of results and such so that people can get a feel for whether or not a diy PJ is for them or not. Anything further and they should spring for the $20 and access to the other forums.

It doesn't really bother me if other people are able to get the information without paying their $20 dues. I think it is kinda immature to cry because you had to pay but others do not. There really is no skin off anyones back if someone is able to save a few bucks.

That said, I am a believer that paying for the information adds tremendous value to the forum and establishes a committment that you don't see on other "free" forums. Most people contribute here because they have invested in this forum. It is human nature that if you have to pay for something you will extract as much as you can from that, and in doing so you end up giving just as much. Compare the amount of good advise on this forum to the amount of good advice on all of those other "free" forums. You will find more people helping others on this forum than all the others combined. That is because everyone in this forum has invested in its success by paying that $20 fee.

The other forums were free, so the natural perception to most people is that the information provided is just not worth much. If it is not worth much then nobody really contributes to them. If nobody really contributes to them then the information is not worth much. It is a cycle.

That said, I go back to my original statement about people saving a buck or two. They do not hurt those of us who are contributing in the least bit. What they really do, in an indirect way, is hurt themselves by limiting their participation and committment in this forum.

I dont work for LL nor am i affiliated with them in any way other than being a customer-


actually the "skin" does come off someone's back... the lumenlab founders, the hosters and admins of this site. This is a "pay to" site rather than a totally free public site. And if the information is available at some free forum somewhere then let the nonpayer get it there then and not underhand Lumenlab's business potential.

If Lumenlab were my site that i was paying for hosting and spending hours adminning; not to mention R&D work for future designs & improvment- realizingd this is time either sacrificed from "private" time or from "work" time then obviously i don't want someone underhanding my work or investment simply because its the 'robin-hood' thing to do and let someone (which turns into almost everyone) save a few bucks... thing is the few bucks they are all the bucks from one source of income for Lumenlab. Save a few bucks elsewhere in the project like buying cheaper wood or a cheaper monitor or whatever. For anyone who is actually considering doing a project like this realizing the components involved... 20 bux isn't much money- if you think it is... there is a possibility that perhaps your financial priorities aren't in order. (not to say that should stop you)
>8)

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Not really. The vast majority of people pay the $20 to have access to the forum. They CAN get the info for free if they looked hard enough, elsewhere. The fact is that many of you "Desire" to make it as difficult for nonpayers as possible out of shear jealousy. After all, if you had to pay then they should. But the catch is you paid for your benefit, not theirs or even Lumenlabs.

Secondly, from LL's perspective, they can restrict what is posted on their forums. That is definitly their perogative. But the fact that they are rather loose about the rules shows me that many of these tidbits of information that are provided in the LL public forums actually benefit LL by attracting customers to the private forums.

I can tell you that I was one of those customers who saw the value of the private forums after seeing what was in the public ones.



You see, that is why you DON'T have your own site. It could never be successful with that attitude.

[QUOTE]thing is the few bucks they are all the bucks from one source of income for Lumenlab. Save a few bucks elsewhere in the project like buying cheaper wood or a cheaper monitor or whatever. For anyone who is actually considering doing a project like this realizing the components involved[QUOTE]

And therein lies the secret to LLs success. They save you more in puchases than the $20 for the forums. You recognized it. I recognized it. And we both benefited (as well as LL) by the transaction. If someone does not recognize the real value of the $20 for the private forums, then it their loss. Not yours, not mine and not LLs.

Actually, that was kind of my point. When you and I joined this site (December of 04 and April of 04), it took some searching on other sites to find information for free (for me it did anyway, that was over a year ago). I didn't visit the site for quite some time, and when I came back I found the amount of information in the public areas quite large.



That was kind of the reason for me to point it out...to say something about it. It's the customers that are posting information, so how much information is too much? If it's ok with the owners/admins to publicly post anything, it's ok by me. I just used to see a lot of threads moved to the private areas, now not so much. The problem with your above theory though is, if the customers of the site are willing to answer any and all questions in the public areas, why would anyone pay for the private forums? Why buy the cow if you get the milk for free.



For me at least, that was when there was a lot less there. I'm not sure how it was four or five months ago. I think at this point you could get pretty much any question you wanted answered besides "Can I have the guide for free?" Non-customers are now posting their PLOGS there, exact Lumenlab designs, for example. Customers are posting a lot more than their image results...they are posting detailed internal pictures of their design. Non-customers are asking and getting answers to any question I see in the private areas....what monitors will strip well and which won't, etc. Like I said before, it often occurs to me that people have downloaded the guide for free somewhere and are now turning to the public forums for answers, and answers that were in the private forums alone are now given publicly.




If the content on the private forums is given out in the public forums for free, then there is no need to spend the 20 bucks. That is basically what is happening.

You may think I am crying about spending my 20 bucks while others don't have to, and that may very well be a part of it. What I really see is someone else's intelectual property being given away for free...and as a small business owner myself I know how I would feel if that happened to me. If the owners of said property arn't concerned about it, then that is their business. I just thought I would point out that it seems a shame that the actual supporters of Lumenlab are the ones that may be hurting it (albeit not on purpose) with the posts in the public forum. We are the ones that paid for the site's bills, paid for Brain's hard work, and help keep the site rolling along.

That all being said, there is a sort of "brotherhood" in the DIY community, and it's a fine line to walk between the friendly sharing of information and also trying to profit from your hard work creating an intelectual property. This is partly why I think a lot of the public posts are left as is. Heck for all I know Lumenlab makes a killing in the store and the owners could care less about the 20 bucks per person for the plans and forum access. If this was so though, I think folks like Brain wouldn't care so much about the scams trying to offer the plans or use Lumenlab's images.

But what do I know.

my only problem when i paid the $20 was the actual plans itself is outdated and not very clear on some parts it was more of a documentation of brains build. now there are many new things people are putting into their projectors, bulbs, reflectors, lcd etc. and parts being suggested in the forums that the plans hasnt made use of yet and this could stop most of the newbie questions that get asked on the forum. Also maybe there could be a FAQ section that will answer many of peoples questions when they read the plans. All and all the forums are the best part of this site besides the people and im glad i spent that $20.

I don't think people are unhappy with improper info being put into the public forums because of jealousy, rather because we have been asked by the admin to limit the info in those forums to avoid technical specifics, yet while 90% of us can do that, a small amount do what they are not suppossed to. Granted, most are just being nice with their responses, but we should be careful to avoid posting pictures, and talking people through builds when they have not paid for access, as this is what we agreed to when we paid for access to the sites. On my part, I could care less if Brain decided to make it all free now. The $20 was a small price to pay for the info I gained.

I am one who downloaded the plans via Peer-to-peer, not to rob lumenlabs but to see if the design was within my capabilities to complete. When I saw that I would be confident to complete one I ordered my lenses and paid $29AU for forum access, not for the plans as I already had them. In the process of building there is always something that pops up and you need more information. I would not even try to do a PJ without the help of the protected areas, I consider it as a warrantee, guarantee that I will be able to complete the project no matter what problems pop up. If you look at the access fee as just a part of the cost of the projector it doesn't hurt at all. A very reasonable warrantee. I don't regret it for a moment (and I am very tight with my money).

Yeah, most of us are. That is one of the reasons we do DIY in the first place.

Hey guys, don't get me wrong. I am just looking at it from a different perspective.

The $20 fee is not a burden on the forums that everyone would forgo if they could. It is actually what makes the forums better. The $20 fee is what gives the forums VALUE. Without it, the forums would be just as empty as the other "free" forums are.

It is human nature to try to extract your money's worth. When we do that in the forums we become participants of the forums. The more people who participate in the forums the more valuable it becomes. All of this started with the simple $20 fee.

There will always be information out there for people to find. I think that the vast majority of people spend their hard earned $20, not because they can't find the information elsewhere, but because they recognize that there is value in being part of the private forums.

However, I will concede that the chemistry that gives value to the private forums could be upset if everyone treated the public forums with the same degree of participation as the private forums. However, again, I think it is just human nature that that will not happen. The perception of value creates value. In the public forums there is nothing to provide a perception of value.

While the plans themselves are outdated, for the cost of $20.00, the information in the forms is priceless.
I do believe the a small token of $20.00 for the upkeep of this domain is well worth the price. And to give that information away for free and suject this domain to close is not worth it.
My 2 cents.

So i guess if you count up all the members to lumenlab and multiply that by 20 dollars the subsequent result is irrevelant?


well I wouldnt think so. To say I posted my comments out of "jealousy" is unjustified... mainly because you aren't me and don't know why i would or wouldn't post anything. Everyone has their own reasons for why they post anything.

I was taking the perspective of the people who actually run the site. You stated that it wouldn't be successful by enforcing the limited access by restricting information.. yet it appears that for awhile LL did and was successful. If LL isn't enforcing information access as much now, well, that their deal and I'm not too worried about it - except that LL should be the ones to decide that, not customers of LL who have taken upon themselves to share whatever information they want with nonpaying customers.

I don't understand the statement. LL has control over their own website. That is incontestable. However, I did not know that the information I paid for and the design I have, which is based on the LL design, but which has several innovations I incorporated from either the forums or myself is now owned by LL.

I guess that means I can't post any information about anything since all of my knowledge comes from some source other than myself. It must all be owned by someone else.

Does that mean if someone asks for advice in a free forum we can't provide any advice that we may have heard or obtained in some way in the private forums?

I think there was a post earlier where someone threatened to sue one of the LL forum members when he showed everyone a lightbox design. While the forum member provided the proper credentials, the person threatening to sue did not want anyone using any type of lightbox at all because he felt he owned the concept.

I do not think this was right. Do you?



You are correct. I know not who you are and am unjustified in making broad accusations. However, I would venture a guesse that jealousy is probably one of the predominant motives for withholding information, especially when that information neither helps nor hurts the person withholding it. Only you can can determine if jealousy is one of your primary motives.