Hello,

Could somebody please tell me clearly what the Forumotion policy is regarding the offer and free renewal of custom domain names?

A few years ago I was offered a free custom domain name and have had it renewed for free up until this year when I was asked to pay for its renewal which I have rather reluctantly done so.

There was no explanation to me as to why the free service had finished. I have looked at several posts on the forums here and can find very little information. 

Thanks.

carl hibbs wrote:Hello,

Could somebody please tell me clearly what the Forumotion policy is regarding the offer and free renewal of custom domain names?

A few years ago I was offered a free custom domain name and have had it renewed for free up until this year when I was asked to pay for its renewal which I have rather reluctantly done so.

There was no explanation to me as to why the free service had finished. I have looked at several posts on the forums here and can find very little information. 

Thanks.

As far as many of us know its based on Activity Points which can be seen in the ACP. Only the top people at Forumotion know the criteria for it and its never made public due to people possibly exploiting this service. If your forum has reduced activity or other factors then it might not qualify again.

Remember this is a gift and not a guarantee.

Thank you Derri for your prompt reply.

I did look at this post:
https://help.forumotion.com/t133396-activity-points?highlight=activity+points

It is still not clear how and why the decisions are made and I would have appreciated an explanation as to why a free service has suddenly stopped albeit a 'gift'.  Has it stopped for everyone or are some forums still getting free renewals?  

If it is due to a reduction in forum activity then please could someone from Forumotion inform me and tell me what the threshold is please. I have no intention of 'exploiting the system', just some information and transparency would be helpful.

Imagine if I gave my staff at work an annual gift bonus (which I don't....) for about four years and then suddenly stopped, they would quite rightly expect an explanation.

BTW, I noticed that free domains were being given for the World Cup..... 

Hi,

Like we said that information isn't divulged to anyone, even staff here such as myself don't know the threshold or how the system works and every thread on this subject will tell you the same thing. The only general explanation is that it could be related to a drop in activity. I do understand your frustration after getting it for a number of years for free then suddenly having to pay for it again but like I said its meant as a gift for very active forums.

Also those World Cup Domain Names weren't exactly free domains, I believe from the screenshots given, I think FM got them and you could change them via your admin panel like you would do normally if you were changing your forumotion address. Those weren't like earning a free domain name like yours. They are like subdomain names.

carl hibbs wrote:BTW, I noticed that free domains were being given for the World Cup..... 

If you are referring to this, formation just introduced new subdomains. (forumname.subdomain.com)
Edit: Just saw Derri's post

We only know that it is based on activity points.  We do not know what is included in that.  We do not know what the amount is when Forumotion offers a free domain name.

Thanks again for your replies and attention.

This is still a mystery.  

I also found this article related to activity points:
https://help.forumotion.com/t133654-what-can-i-do-with-points?highlight=activity+points

I'm a little concerned that even 'managers' do not really know what the prcocess is. But obviously someone, somewhere in the organization must.
Who does actually make the decision (if a manager doesn't) and who impliments it?

From what we can gather so far it seems to be based on this 'activity points' system.
But can someone explain how indeed that actually works please?

What does one point equate to for instance? I have currently 261 but to be honest I have never taken much notice of this value....until now.  

I don't see that my forum activity has changed that much proportionally (members to topics/posts) in its 6 years of operation.

Carl.

carl hibbs wrote:Thanks again for your replies and attention.

This is still a mystery.  

I also found this article related to activity points:
https://help.forumotion.com/t133654-what-can-i-do-with-points?highlight=activity+points

I'm a little concerned that even 'managers' do not really know what the prcocess is. But obviously someone, somewhere in the organization must.
Who does actually make the decision (if a manager doesn't) and who impliments it?

From what we can gather so far it seems to be based on this 'activity points' system.
But can someone explain how indeed that actually works please?

What does one point equate to for instance? I have currently 261 but to be honest I have never taken much notice of this value....until now.  

I don't see that my forum activity has changed that much proportionally (members to topics/posts) in its 6 years of operation.

Carl.

Managers aren't actually employees of Forumotion they're just volunteers like myself who help out on the support forum so they aren't privy to any information on how the system works.

Nothing more can be said on the subject. You're offered a free domain name based on activity/points. That's all any of us know and can say on the subject because the information isn't divulged. I don't know what to tell you. You're going to get the same answer each time.

Hello,

Firstly, note that the offer of free domain name is still relevant in our forums  .  It's awarded randomly to some deserving forums relying heavily on their activity but not only. Indeed, the "age" of the forum and its compliance with Forumotion TOS are also very important. And in general, the most deserving forums are rewarded,
there is no mystery on that  

However, I recall one important thing: this offer is an exceptional commercial gesture that Forumotion makes to it's forums. This is by no means does it become an acquired right . The fact to get it several times doesn't give the forum a right of permanent access to this offer. The Forumotion community grows every day and it's natural that we share this free domain name offer between all our forums to give an equal chance to all.

Therefore, those who had the offer several times and not having it this year should be understanding because other forums were more deserving.   


Your forum has now only 266 activity points which is really low. And the forum dropped 20 points over the last 3 months ...   

Take care of your forum, increase its audience and I am sure that you can get it again for next time. You have 359 days for this challenge ...

Thank you 'Godfather' for your reply. That's much the sort of answer I was looking for.

So you have obviously looked at (the data on) my forum which isn't always a great hive of activity and never really has been! We like it like that. Yet it has been ticking along steadily for nearly as long as Forumotion itself.

I was never suggesting for one moment that free domain name renewals should be a right nor was I even complaining, far from it. The service here is excellent and that's why we stay!

I merely wanted to know how the system works and you have gone a long way in doing that.   

So, you can close this as query resolved.

Thanks,

Carl.