What do folks think of tribe's new Premium deal?

[Gibson Pearl]

Tribe has just announced that members can now buy a monthly $5 Premium tribe membership...what are people's thoughts on this? Personally I am waiting to see what other perks they plan on offering before joining up. Right now the perks are kind of lame. Lord knows I don't need another website newsletter!

I love tribe of course but am not sure if this is the best path. Is it money they need or a better business plan? I'm hoping they roll out some awesome perks to make it worth the $60/year. What perks would YOU like to see?

[Brad Dosland]

Tribe isn't cash-poor (especially given the pay day the ownership recently received from Cisco), Tribe is strategy-poor. There's no sustainable business model in place and the laughable goal of hiring an engineer to add whistles and bells with a subscription system proves the lack of thought being put into the business. Once you shave off membership management expenses and payment fees, you'd be lucky to break even. Sadly true. What's needed is a bigger picture solution that converts Tribe's assets (small but tightly targeted traffic) into a continuous stream of revenue that allows the service to not only maintain but also (gasp!) grow.

[Shalini]

Not sure yet. Like you, I am waiting to see what they are offering.

[stephanie]

I want to see the perks before I pay - if all it means is I get the star next to my name instead of the circle, not worth it... Until then, clicking those ads...

[Danielle]

I agree with Brad. Tribe is strategy-poor. They simply kill the dog today with this non-sense idea of paid subscription.

[Elisa]

I don't know if charging for membership is the solution. If they have a poor business model, which, for what I see it seems to be the root of all of Tribe's problems, then all the money in the world is not gonna do any good. That said, I'd like a "2week/30day free trial" of the perks and then I'll decide if they're worth paying 60 a year or not. That's what Photobucket does once in a while, offers a free 30 day premium subscription just to see if you want to upgrade or not. No "blind faith" here. And if it's gonna look and feel like MySpace then I'm sorry but no thanks. I don't need another myspace account. But, we shall see.

[Jeffrey Webb]

Yeah, it probably isn't going to work for all of the reasons mentioned earlier, but I'll most likely kick in anyway. I really want to see tribe survive and I agree that there are so many more things that need to be addressed by the owners................. but if I don't contribute and it does fold, I think I'll feel real bad about it. So, call me a sucker...............

[Tammy]

Well to be honest, my reason for not wanting to pay is really more basic. I'm trying to save every penny I can for other priorities in my life and tribe isn't one of them. Yeah $60 a year isn't a lot of money, but I have other things that I'd rather spend it on. And I'm sure that, in this economy, I'm not the only one in that situation.

[Candi Oldfield]

I am right there with you. I just dont have the extra $5 a month. I sometimes can't even get to dance class because I dont have the gas money, I have to drive 30 minutes one way, and sometimes it's just not there...

[Ruby*East]

I think that it's money they need, or want. I love tribe, but do not think it's worth 60 bucks a year. Think of how big Myspace is and it remains free.

[ColleenEMP]

Think I'd rather gift aid the £30 to some where with actual need!!!!
But would hate to lose Tribe as 'evilspace' (ha ha) and Face book DO MY HEAD IN!!!!

[Natasya Katsikaris]

I think there are many ways tribe can make money without charging subscription fees ... frex a tribe marketplace where people can sell things on tribe and tribe gets a commission (myspace is doing this with music ... ebay has done it successfully) Or charge minimal fees per event posting (i.e. pay 50 cents to post your event, etc).

I don't want to pay $60 for social networking ... but if I sell something ... or have an event to promote ... of course i am happy to pay commission. Hmmm. maybe I should post this to tribe ... people are generally willing to PAY money to MAKE money ... surely tribe management could take advantage of this ????

cheers,
natasya
www.neareastdance.com

[TribalDancer]

Well, the good news that so many people seem to be losing sight of is that you can continue to use tribe exactly as you always have AT NO COST. It is only the new features they are adding which would be limited to subscriber access. I think that sounds fair.

What would I like to see?

EDITING!

I want to be able to edit my posts for at least 15 minutes after I post it, so I can edit out typos. I don't want it to be editable forever like some forums, where people can run in, stir the pot, run back and delete their post three days later after a shitstorm has begun. Full editing all the time allows for too much trollage. But limited should be allowed.

Better threading. I want this for all accounts, of course. The way discussions thread right now can be a bit confusing.

I would love a floating link, like a "find" function, that I can click on to take me to just the new posts in a thread. So I click it, and it takes me to the first new post. The little link stays floating in the upper left corner, say, so I can click it again and be taken to the next one. In busy threads it is a pain to scroll hoping to see the little orange markers for new posts. I would love to just be able to hit them boom boom boom.

Along with that would be to have spellcheck. That would help a lot of posts get off my grammatical last nerver. ;)

Maybe theme choices for your main page. I don't access tribe through my profile page, so the themes I set up there I rarely see and are more for people visiting me. I want my home page to be themable (and if it is and I somehow missed this, tell me what to do! I tire of this plain old white).