Why is there a limit on the ad impressions?
If I use my own ad server, why would it matter?
It's free for non-commercial purposes? Please do tell me how an ad plugin can be non-commercial?
I am so disappointed OVA came from LGPL to an awkward commercial license (not sure what's worst: GPL or.commercial)
@Doug Hi Doug! Thanks for your answer.
Reading my post again it does sound like I was very angry...I was just mad and sorry if I sounded harsh or something. I understand the financial aspect behind it although there are other alternatives than the approach you guys took (e.g. commercial support, or paid updates, etc.).
I'm sure you guys ponder those options, that's why I'm so surprised.
So the thing is that OVA development was pretty good even before going under the umbrella of LongTail. I'm surprised the previous work would not stay the was it was, and the newer optimized/polished/etc. version would not be free.
What happens to people who already used OVA before?
My second comment was about "WHEN IS A COMMERCIAL LICENSE REQUIRED?" in http://www.longtailvideo.com/open-video-ads/licensing/.
It says:
"You are entitled to use this product without charge for evaluation or strictly non-commercial purposes". I guess "research" is a non-commercial purpose...
This whole paragraph just gave me the wrong impression. Might be just me.
I did exchange some emails with Paul for a while...I'll shoot you guys an email then.
Thanks Doug,
Luc.
@Luc That's absolutely right. There are a number of models and we considered several. In the end, we chose the model that we did because we felt it struck the right balance between providing an open framework to which others could contribute and incorporate into any player, and being able to deliver the features & support required by commercial users of JW Player and Flowplayer.
As for the previous versions of OVA, they should still be available. I'll double-check on that and if not, make sure they make the transition over. There will be no further development on them obviously, but you'll be able to get the previous source code.
I do see your point about the wording on the commercial license requirements. We were trying to leave the door open for people to use OVA for JW Player and OVA for Flowplayer in non-commercial settings. Research is a good example, but there are also a number of other use cases we've seen applied to advertising plugins by non-commercial users.
Thanks for your feedback, and if you have any other questions or concerns, please don't hesitate to contact us.
@Luc We considered the licensing model carefully as OVA grew up as a project. On the one hand, we wanted OVA to be free and open source, since we truly believe that the entire video industry will benefit by moving to standards-based advertising (much like the display ad industry did by widely adopting IAB standards). On the other hand, we invest an enormous amount of time and resources into developing OVA, particularly in developing the plugins for JW Player and Flowplayer. So we decided to split the project.
The core framework, OVA for AS3, is completely free and open source under GPL. You can use the code to incorporate it into any Flash-based video player. It supports all of the core VAST functionality. We have a diverse range of contributors, including independent developers and leading ad servers. We have worked, and continue to work, closely with them on this open source project.
The player plugins, OVA for JW Player and OVA for Flowplayer, are available under a commercial-only license (though we do also make the source available). This work is done almost exclusively by us. They are commercially-oriented products, and we develop and support them as such. For that we do charge a fee. As for the ad impression limit, that is to ensure the licenses we sell are commensurate with the value being provided and associated support required. Servicing a customer with 1M impressions per month is very different from one with 10K per month. We’ve found that the vast majority of customers fall under the 100K mark, making it a suitable threshold.
I’m not sure I know the language to which you’re referring (“free for non-commercial purposes”) in the context of OVA. If you can point me to it, then we’ll fix it accordingly. As said above, OVA for AS3 is open source and the player plugins are commercial.
Last, it sounds like you were working with OVA previously. If so, please contact us directly and let us know about your project. I’m sure we can work out an arrangement to suit your needs.