Six Apart announces more changes to Movable Type license

Via Lisa:
Apropos of Something: Six Apart announces more changes to Movable Type license

Oh my Lord, this is one of the funniest things I’ve ever read:

Update on Licensing
05.27.2004

It’s no secret that recent changes to the Movable Type license have received a mixed reception from bloggers (as the trackbacks to this post can attest). Many people have argued that the new pricing structure places an unfair financial burden on those users who maintain multiple blogs, as well as those blogs with multiple authors. We have kept a close watch on the feedback our licensing changes have generated throughout the blogosphere, and we have already incorporated many bloggers’ suggestions into our updated license agreements. As we continue to evaluate future options (both generated internally and by our users), the Movable Type license will continue to evolve.

That being said, we are very pleased to announce the latest changes to the Movable Type pricing structure today. In an effort to ensure that the software’s license does not discourage our users from maintaining multiple blogs or hosting blogs with multiple authors, we are switching over to what we believe to be a revolutionary a new pricing plan: pay-per-word pricing.

With the release of Movable Type 3.0014d, users will pay as they blog on a per-word basis (billing will be handled through the increasingly versatile TypeKey service). As a result, the license no longer penalizes those users who choose to maintain multiple blogs or host blogs with multiple authors. Instead, all users pay equally based on how much they use Movable Type.

Of course, we recognize that not all words are created equally. Therefore, the new pricing structure breaks down as follows:

Prices:

Prepositions, conjunctions, articles (definite and indefinite), interjections: 1¢ per word
Pronouns: 2 cents per word
Nouns (common): 4 cents per word
Nouns (proper): 6 cents per word
Verbs (passive): 5 cents per word
Verbs (action): 7 cents per word
Adjectives and adverbs: 8 cents per word
Proper nouns comprising names of other blogging software (i.e. “WordPress” or “Expression Engine”): 30 cents per word
Gerunds: TBA
Naturally, punctuation and HTML markup will remain absolutely free. Furthermore, hyphenated words will count as a single word for billing purposes (if the hyphenated form is the preferred usage according to the Oxford English Dictionary).

As an example of the new pricing plan, suppose you posted an entry to your blog reading, “I had a cheese sandwich for lunch today. Then, I got behind the slowest woman in the grocery-store line! Grrrr!” By my count (TypeKey will handle the sentence diagramming automatically in MT3.0014d), this entry contains 6 adjectives/adverbs, 4 nouns, 3 articles, 2 passive verbs, 2 pronouns, 2 prepositions, and 1 interjection. Therefore, under the new license, your entry would cost a grand total of 84¢ – no matter how many blogs or authors you have! Now, that’s not so bad, is it?

As a special bonus, MT3.0014d beta testers will receive the words “movable” and “type” for use in their posts free of charge.

We hope that these pricing changes will put to rest the notion of Six Apart as a company uncommitted to offering users of Movable Type a pricing structure that is both practical and, above all else, fair to all bloggers. Moreover, we look forward to hearing your thoughts on these developments.

You know what’s best? AOS bagged on MT. Next, inevitably, will be all the sheeple saying how wonderful Expression Engine is. Of course, they all ignored it while they sucked on the teet of the Ben/Mena mafia, but now it’ll be all about Expression Engine.

Doubt it?

Don’t say it publicly or you’ll just look stupid later on.