Quote: "How is this going to translate to more downloads and sales? If it doesn't why is anyone going to bother"
It's a ratings system, and that's it. We rate your game based on the content as it relates to sensitive subject matter. If we can establish the IGRB as a respectable/ reputable organization with a proven track-record of honesty and integrity then having our rating on a title will bring forth a level of integrity and professionalism to your gaming titles. The website will list why your game recieved its rating and icons, and will have a sub-directory that lists all of the games you've had rated, plus the ratings they've recieved, which for some detail-oriented consumers may prove to be another avenue for exploring the games you develop.
As for the money thing: You have a really good point there Jess. But we should seriously discuss cost margins, if there are any... is there anything that's going to cost us capital here? Most non-profit organizations have either official government support (which we might not be eligible for because we're an international group) or they live and breath based on donations they receive. The IDGA, for example, is a NFP group, and with each annual print they need to report their earnings, losses, etc. But they have an actual office and whatnot... if we're based on the net, we shouldn't have even close to the same expenses that they have.
But we should accept donations because lets face it: people will want to stick around with the organization longer and they'll be more honest and dedicated if there's a stipend involved. Not that it would probably be very big, but I think all of us who are involved should get a small amount of the donations for all of the hard work we'll be doing to keep this thing up and running. This is, in my opinion anyway, especially true for the web developers and the ratings officials: Jeku, did it cost you anything to register the site? What will it cost to keep the site and server up and running 24/7/365, including the database of developers and titles and all that fun stuff? And the ratings officials should get something, probably moreso than the e-board members, because it's their hard work testing these games for hours and hours and filling out reports and whatnot that will keep us afloat. The charges would have been a decent alternative source for income, but you made a really valid arguement so now I agree, let's ditch the idea... but how will we divide up the donations? I think we should discuss that.
I'm writing up a full charter, which we'd release via PDF (and maybe even by mail if we could afford that) to the developers and media sources that we work with. It includes information regarding a range of topics, including who we are and why we're doing this, our income/ expense reports, rules for developers and submission details, a detailed explanation of our ratings system, etc. It'll probably end up being 30 pages long (somewhere in there), and it'll be finished as soon as we've defined the group fully because I'm writing it as we discuss these things. The EULA might not be applicable to this group because we aren't distributing anything to the developers other than the ratings logos, which aren't software (there isn't technically an end-user). But we should have some formal license agreement that we distribute, something short and to-the-point that goes out to every single developer who wants to work with us... if you want to write it, be my guest
my hands are pretty full with the charter.
- Matt
PS.- When the charter is done I'll post it so everyone can explain what changes they want to see. I'm not putting anything in it that we haven't all agreed on so most of those changes will probably end up being aesthetic.
"Hell is an Irish Pub where it's St. Paddy's day all year long" ~ Christopher, The Sopranos
