Flash Kit v2.0 - Your ideas here!

http://www.flashkit.com/graphics/flashkit2.jpg

I am sure that you have all experienced the current issues with Flash Kit.
Server errors, speed and download problems, and in some cases lack of access
all together.

In a nutshell Flash Kit has outgrown it's current hardware and software platform
and it is unable to handle the incredible load it is now placed under. To give you
an idea we have over 100k unique visitors a day, serve over 100gig in bandwidth
and show over a million pages a day!

We can no longer just hack and tweak to get maximum performance from the site, now
it is time to strip it down and re-engineer from the ground up. Flash Kit v2.0.

We are putting together proposals now for Flash Kit v2.0, some of the features we
are planning to implement...

1) Site speed - multiple servers on a scalable architecture
2) Better tracking of downloads,views, ratings
3) Member pages, linking members to content
4) Faster myFK, public and private listings of myFK selections (ie see webmaster picks)
5) Bulk download from myFK (like a shopping cart)
6) ExtremeFlash section for the very best fla files

We are also looking for ways to make the site more financially viable to generate
sufficient revenue to support our growing hardware and technical costs!

Any ideas you have for Flash Kit v2.0, and revenue generation ideas, please post to
this thread, help forge the direction of Flash Kit for the future!!!

Thanks for your help, and thanks for sticking by FK in the tough times!

[Edited by Flashkit on 01-31-2001 at 12:35 AM]

Why not try and compete with Macromedia for lessons? they offer a "lessons online + talk to the teacher" lesson on actionscripting for Flash5. Even though i'm tempted they "give" this for $265! I'm sure you could do better.

I don't know if this means a special education license, but it would be a cool feature in a resource site!
Thanks for considering:)
G.

Why don't you make FlashKit v2.0 100% Flash? Use the product that you are featuring.

UltraShock.com will probably be 100% Flash and it'll be tough for FK to stay competitive when UltraShock.com goes live.

I have posted a thread in feedback about self promotion using t-shirts, mouse pads and things of that nature. I've seen sites genrate a good amount of money and help to offload some of the costly upgrades.

The only case study I could thing of right now is http://www.clanladder.com which is a site that ranks online players in all types of games(and no i dont work for them). they ran into the exact same problem, you have and due to a great following, this 1 promotion paid for the entire upgrade.

God bless ver 2.0

I experience all sorts of problems with flashkit. I am looking forward to the bulk download as well. Maybe this can be something that can be done sooner then later, I think it will save people time. Also the idea about class is good. I think if you offer low cost, high quality stuff people will pay, i would be willing to let go of some cash for better knowledge. Anyone else agree. Joe

yes I believe http://www.blogger.com had a similar success story..
and kptoth, your observation was brought up about a month ago in coffee lounge..here's the link
:cool:

ps- FK v.2 : toned down color??? maybe?? :D

that UltraShock.com looks awesome!
But still, FK is the biggest FLash resource site on the net, I don't think any other site has over 3 thousand movies.
I really want to see the Flash Anime section, there are many good flash artists in here. Gotta have patience though:)
Faster FK site is soon to come? Great, then I'll enjoy FK even more !

Sincerely,
Nik128

don't forget the site map!!!!!!!!!!!


or once again people will get lost in a HUGE site!!!!!!1

Sounds pretty good Mark...
So these member pages... Say I had one... Would this link visitors to all the things I've made on FK, like open source movies, tutorials, sounds, and (pushing it!) posts?
Can we customise these pages? ;)

I'd like to show my moral support for FK through all this! All the FK team, you've done a great job thus far, and I can't wait to see what you pull from your sleeves!

I LOVE FLASH KIT!

And i'll end off with "HOUR OF FLASH!" :D
http://www.hourofflash.cjb.net/ for the uninitiated ;)

In the tutorials, i think you should find another solution
when it comes to all the pages, There are to little text on one page, i get annoyed when i read a couple of lines and then have to load another page.
You should also consider making a printable version of each tutorial.
Other then that i think your page should have Background about the flash programm, im thinking about where it all started, where it is now and where it is going. There should also be a couple of pages about how to get certificts and stuff like that.

GODSPEED V2.0

tobba

What would have been great, is the ability when downloading the tutorial files (that presently is just the bunch of files USED in the tutorial) is to get a real all-in-1 package for further offline use. So we could get a real tutorial in the zip, with explainations AND the files used for putting it in practice.It's a little hard to really use the tutorial zip's now, since as you are reading a Tutorial, you got the explainations but if you download the zip and want to put it in practice later, for offline hands-on, you have to connect on FK again and try to find the right Tutorial again...lack of time and of easyness.What better than looking for a tutorial,downloading the offline package (explainations+files for practice)and making his own myFK at home ? Another great feature would maybe be a tiny flash program provided for Mac and PC users so they would be able to automatically update their myFK online and on their own harddisk...a replication and synchronizing tool.

Please God, do not go 100% flash.

That wold kill any speed benefits.

How bout changing the Design a bit - FK looks a bit well old - Its design work and layout isint the most exciting.

Please DO NOT Got total flash !!!!

Try to improve the chat area - it sucks ! no offence but it really is an odd format.

:D:D:D Free email :D:D:D Just a Wish !

SUGGESTIONS

1: Leave Flashkit in HTML for at least 5 years. There are definitely not enough people on solid connections to warrant a fully Flashed site (even though it could be incredible, leave it for the future).

2: Initiate some kind of a stronger networked community. Those who attack Flash (online media, jacob neilson, etc) should know that there is a huge number of developers world-wide who consider Flash part of their life now and into the future and they don't appreciate over-focus on the inevitable crud that some people will produce with Flash.

3: Start a service similar to elance.com that is mainly focused on Flash content. You would have to make it seperate from the Flashkit site due to the size of it but you could tightly link them in some way. Elance is a service that allows freelancers and employees to come together in one virtual place for everyting from Web/Flash/Graphic design to Legal and Accounting services. I have heard that Elance will be as big as Amazon before long. They have a member base of over 200,000 for many different career choices. Flashkit has a member base of over 100,000 and you could focus completely on Flash/Multimedia. I say use your members to monopolise on the availability of Flash for businesses across the globe.

4: Float Flashkit.com on the ASX. I'd buy in.

5: This has been touched on above but my 5th and final suggestion is a tighter community. Standards need to be developed so that Flash will continue to rapidly grow on the web - i.e: pop-ups, full screen, file sizes, pre-loaders, $ervice rates, etc, etc, etc.

Anyone agree with any of this ?

Stephen.

Here are a couple of things to bring in more revenue:

1) Have an executive membership fee to have access to complete tutorials. The fee would be very small, less than $150/year or $9.95/ month.

In this area, executive members would have access to such things as: complete tutorials - construction and deconstruction; high caliber example sites; fla upload support program; access to test flash beta programs; discounts to special flash events and free executive member Flashkit t-shirt.

Complete tutorials would have explanations right from scratch how an effect, menu, Actionscript etc.. was done, why it was done, the benefits and links to other tutorials that might help the member.

There would be complete examples of high quality sites that are downloadable so members could learn how to put a site together properly. The sites would be of a high caliber and would have a complete tutorial of not only how something was done, but also why it was done and what benefits would be achieved that way.

The membership would also include an area where members could upload fla's he/she are having trouble with to get help from other members as well as the Flash Gurus. This feature would have the fla's available for ten days before being deleted from the server. The support program would include 3 - 5 times per year a member could submit their fla for support from the flash gods of Flashkit.

Executive Members could have access to test BETA Flash programs and give their input. Members would have to sign a non-disclosure agreement to protect the companies that take part in such a program, but their input would be invaluable.

Members would also be able to enjoy discounts to Flash events, albeit small, but any money saved is good to put towards the next upgrade purchase of Flash ;-)

Executive members would be privy to their own EM Flashkit t-shirt as well as discount towards other Flashkit merchandise.

2) All Flashkit members would be able to download the daily new movies in one bulk zip.

I have found Flashkit to be an invaluable resource and I look forward to a newer version.




[Edited by Beamerboy on 01-31-2001 at 09:01 AM]

Definatly don't go all flash. My only main problem with the site is bandwith problems, and I've got a cable modem...All yesterday, FK was down...:( And there are always certain dead times when FK is slower than anything...I agree with Beamerboy a lot.

Beamerboy has made some v. good suggestions above. It could perhaps be taken even a stage further.

Why not have different tiers of memebrship. At the bottom FREE acess the basic features of FLashkit (perhaps as it is now). This could then rise through 2-3 theirs to the top level which more exclusive content.Lots of people have made some great suggestions as to what this could be.

What about extending the feautres of MyFlashKit. The memebrs with the most highest tiered access could have a toataly customizable site. Much like MyYahoo ot MyExcite. Where they had their own homeapge they entered, rahter than the deffault. It would be very cool to be able to costomize the home page to display only the content I was interested in. For example the could be a MyFlashKitBoards, where I could select boards which would appear in the list. Perhaps the user could customize the appeareance of the site.

At the lower levels of access, there could be preset templates, customized by FlashKit staff. For example a homegpage for developer/coders, or a homepage for designers, one for Newbies ... etc.

Please dont go down the Full FLash route, but what ever you do I know it's going to be the even greater!

FlashKit.v.2 will rule.

P

I like Flash Kit the way it is. Just speed everything up a bit, especially the forums (they define the word slow at the moment). Maybe feature a bit more flash presentation on the site, but I agree with the suggestion not to go 100% Flash, the functionality just isn't there yet.

How about an Annual 'Flashkit Members Produced Site'. Someone lays out the groundrules for the site, and then any member of Flashkit can add to/(alter) it. Everything is opensource. Maybe that's to complicated come to think of it. Anyway, at the end of the year, the site is completed and showcased.

Making money huh? Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.........already a lot of good suggestions. How about launching a "Flashkit Members Conference"? Just a thought....

Can't wait to see what happens.

Regards,
Shad0w

One thing I don't like the sound of though is different membership status affecting you access to Flashkit. The MOST IMPORTANT part of Flashkit is that anybody can access anything. Everything in the community is shared. Now this is just my opinion, and I expect a lot of people will disagree, but if I had to pay for the privilage of what I already get out of Flashkit now, I don't think I would. Maybe. But probably not......hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.

Well for revenue, I think I was one of the first to mention merchandising a long long time ago and I still believe flashkit should have it's own store. This time around don't get the shirts made up yourself, contract out to another company and have them sell all the shirts, mugs, mouse pads, etc online. You get the commission they take care of all the shipping and handling. Try http://www.cafepress.com/

There should also be a software store. Forget about referral programs and have an actual online store. Find a big enough company who sells most of software that people talk about here and ask them to set up a shopping cart on this sight. Flashkit get's so many visitors that most e-tailers will bend over backwards to have there products listed.

For Speed...Delete old posts after four months. I know you guys want to keep an archive but even text adds up and consumes much needed space on any server. Clear out the old and in with the new. Memory costs money.

Also I would like to see more articles that are not based on the board forums. Almost every feature on the main page goes directly to the boards. What happened to articles and interviews?

Well that's my two cents.
Mike

Well, here goes...
Clearer ruling on posting - this site is for flashkit developers and should not be used as a playground for flaming, posting crap etc. The lounge has its uses but some people abuse it and just post rubbish turning genuine flashers out of the lounge. I know there is a boardroom now but how much more space and speed would there be if it weren't for these adolescents?

A FAQ for each forum so the same question doesn't appear 16 times every day

No or little flash. Just coz this is a flash developers site doesn't mean it should be flashed. The little there is now is sufficient. download speeds and the like would kill people (remember people are still using 14k modems!)

& for revenue why not include a mailbox - i.e. [email protected]. couple of thousand people sign up for it and flog their email addresses to the companies that are willing to pay for it. i know I would like a flashkit mail address and wouldn't be bothered about flogging it to junk mail distributors if it meaned better, faster and more improved flashkit. Oh well, better move over and let someone else speak

Quote:

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Originally posted by RazoRmedia
& for revenue why not include a mailbox - i.e. [email protected]. couple of thousand people sign up for it and flog their email addresses to the companies that are willing to pay for it. i know I would like a flashkit mail address and wouldn't be bothered about flogging it to junk mail distributors if it meaned better, faster and more improved flashkit. Oh well, better move over and let someone else speak

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Im not entirely sure i would appreciate my email address being sold to the spammers, i get well pissed off with Hotmail doing it all the time, but maybe you could charge for the address itself, or give a choice.... you could pay for your address and have it guaranteed spam free, or you could have a free address and accept the spam.
Make sure that the spam is not from total junk places, i.e porn and credit cards...

dave

I would be willing to pay a reasonable subscription fee.
This site would be well worth it and has help me in many ways.

okay.. for money! easy! you guys need to run a bakesale!!

I mean think! all the people who come here buying baked goods!! wowzers!.. just kidding..

A: don't make it all flash, all the backend scripting would take forever (uploading, downloading, the boards, bandwidth) we would probibly see v2.0 in the year 2005!
B: dont have a multi - member site whre there's a fee..
a lot of people would stop coming and maybe all together..

MY small suggestion may have been when you join u are assigned a brand / logo .. and then you have that little icon beside your name almost like battle of the logos.. then companies who wanted their company in the site action would pay for it. Maybe....

BUt definatly speed things up and I can't wait for v.2 (when do u think it may come out?)

keep up the god work.. i mean with more then 100 thousand members you guys must be doing something right!>.


jastor

Flashkit has been a tremedously valuable resource, partly because of quality, and partly because of the shear volume of developers who use it and share their wisdom on the boards.

I think most of us realize we've been getting a good deal here. I know my company would hesitate at a $200+ subscription because the higher-ups don't personally realize the value. I think you could get the majority of the users to willingly pay $10, $20, even $50 for a subscription.

I don't think any of us want to see FlashKit go away because we smothered it to death with our usage.

At the very least, I bet if you put up a "Save FlashKit" with a PayPal button that let us put $5 in your account you would get a lot of donations.

I think you guys should make a very complete sitemap. When I first started to visit FlashKit, it costed me weaks to find out where everything was located. I still am not sure I know it perfectly:(:(... The layout shouldn't be remodelled, I think it's great. The explanation about how to make a tutorial should also be better:D:D:D:D

This is really hard. I mean, flashkit has always been a great FREE, OPEN SOURCE kind of deal. If it would become a membership base, or even partially membership base, many members might leave and i'm sure that's not what FK wants. I think there has to be a different way of generating some more income.

perhaps a pop-up add or something. yeah they are annoying but at least it could help a bit. Everybody could help out by clicking on the ads too...

I read lots of interesting ideas here; following are some thoughts:

1) I'm strongly on the "Don't Flash the site" bandwagon. I'm not an expert yet - and there are companies trying to make Flash sites load as fast as HTML pages - but for a site as big as FK, a full Flash movie would be enormous. If we do get 100gig of data added per day, then the file would continue to grow more monstrous by the day.

2) On the idea of making it a pay site: That too I'd be strongly againt. Salon magazine tried to go pay on the 'net a few years ago; this almost destroyed them.

People don't like to handle things on the Internet that aren't free, whether they are as useful as FK or not. Personally, the fact that it's free has made it an even more invaluable resource for me.

Someone on this thread mentioned the Blogger example; it's a good one. They set up a donation fund to upgrade their equipment. It netted over $15, 000 in a few days - AND the donation of equipment by companies that saw their benefits, and wanted to help. I'd see that happening here too.

3) I like the idea of making downloadable tutes work offline as a good suggestion. I've been on other sites that offer downloadable PDFs of tutes; that works well.

I'd go even further, and suggest that open source movies on site be more usable too. At the moment, you can only learn from them if you already know Flash at 100% - then click on every frame to study the ActionScripting, and hope you can figure out how things work from there.

That would be stupid, yes it would help pay for stuff, but if there are over 1million page views a day then get some sponsorship> no annoying popups or whatever but charging? no way! I for one would not pay, flashkit is really good and everything and it's one of the few dites i do visit but i certainly wouldn't pay. that's why there is a community here because people are all the same, if you start having different layers of community it will create an elite and thus destroy the community. Education is for everyone not just those that can afford it!
Speed is the biggest issue here in my opinion, most of the time I am not at work it is entirely unusable and it just gets aggravating.
More focus on showcasing work and bulk downloads is a very good idea. What about masterclasses and chat sessions with the best designers in the world that sort of thing.
The live support thing is a cool idea as well http://www.justflowers.com is one i used recently I had a major problem in that i had to get flowers to my grrl in Miami (I live in the UK) and i managed to mess up the card number for my credit card but I went on their live 1 to 1 chat with an operator and she called me internationally to sort it out and still got the flowers there the same day (it was 4.40pm and they were only open till 5) that would be a very cool feature to have. Maybe limited to people that have proven themselves worthy of helping out (some sort of certification thing) you go and log on and that then makes you available to help and people can request your help. E.g a list of "assistants" that are logged on right now and are willing to help.
ok that's my 2cents worth.
aLN
:)

Quote:

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Originally posted by Nik128
...
I really want to see the Flash Anime section, there are many good flash artists in here. Gotta have patience though:)

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[unbiasedopinion]I agree entirely and wholeheartedly.[/unbiasedopinion] :D

What I think would be really neat as well is if the chat room were expanded to allow for online discussions from Flash professionals (scheduled interview/chat sessions),.

I also would be interested in seeing some form of Flashkit classroom - an area set aside where "classes" could be held - where a "professor" could gather a bunch of people who want to learn a specific area of Flash, then through things like bulletin boards, chats, and file download/upload areas, and contact lists, a virtual class could be held for a number of weeks per group.

i have to agree with those that are against the paying to access flashkit, i could afford it but it would be a hassle, me being from the united states, think of the money conversion, plus there are some young 'uns on here that would have to rob their own parents or rob the quickie mart to get access, i agree with the flashkit merchandise, that would be a great idea, same with the ability to buy software directly from you. hmm, improvements, new, hipper color scheme, with the fonts section seperate them into catagories, ie grunge, techno, etc... thats my 2cents worth.

Jeff

I saw someone saying "Why not make FK in FLash"...well I dont think that is possible...
Flash is too slow and can't handle all the features a site like this has to have.

Well I had to say that :)

As for the ideas,

You already did what I wanted by starting FK !!

Greetz

LOSE THE NAVIGATION THAT TAKES 8 CLICKS JUST TO GET TO SOMETHING (AND TRY TO EXPLAIN IT AWAY BY REVNEUES GENERATED)

THAT WOULD CUT YOUY LOAD TIME IN HALF.

THE NAVIGATION IS THE WORST OF ANY SITE ON THE INTERNET.

MF

I agree with you Stephen.

I think that a redesign would improve the site.

Why don't you convocate a competition for the layout and design of the FK 2.0?

I think that would be challenging.

wow, long thread, and I haven't read it all, so some of this may be repeats....

I think it's a really bad idea to go all Flash. ultrashock.com *looks* cool, but I don't know how well that'll all work out. seems like it would be REALLY slow.

I definetly think it's good to get new and more servers.

I also like the idea of having Flashkit teaching conferences or what-not. you could just have some of the guru members give a Flashkit sponsored 2 day conference in their region, or something like that. the teachers will be able to get a good turnout from Flashkit members, so Flashkit can get a good percentage of the $ and also pay the teachers as well.

I also like the idea of bulk-downloading. and also compressing tutorials all into a .zip file. include all the html and images as well as the .fla and .swfs I'm not sure if they should be included with bulk downloads, though....may have to seperate the tutorial downloads from fonts, music, sfx, etc.

two cents from me...

One area that could be covered is advice on marketing your site. Although I appreciate that Flashkit is mainly focused on design and backend, there's no point in having a great site if no one can find it.

Maybe create a tutorial section on how to get a decent listing in search engines, the use of keywords etc. Although there are many sites of this nature around, there is a gap in how to get a search engine to recognise a site that's done completely in Flash.

Please do not spend a lot of time re-designing Flashkit. We need to get Flashkit BACK UP TO SPEED -- PERIOD. I just waited almost (3) minutes to bring up the 'next' page and I'm on cable modum. Flashkit is the center of the known universe. It's the only site I've ever visited every single day. It is invaluable to me. I don't know what I'd do without it. But it must function with speed and efficiency.

I support the PayPal DONATION scheme to raise quick money.

Neither would I mind Ad Banners. In fact I always wondered why Flashkit didn't have them with all its visitors.

1 -- Add more servers.

2 -- Fix the broken links and database errors.

Once this is done, then think about re-designing.

M
[Edited by Metrov8 on 02-16-2001 at 08:02 PM]

1. Don't start the subscriber fee - as I understand it is that Flashkit i snot in dire need of money - but it needs to cover some costs related to hardware upgrades. I think something more in line of a store would be in order. Something like this maybe.
2. Keep the colors and layout the same - but I like this idea of the CSS color changer, so people can customize the site.
3. NO FLASH!!! For us dialup users it would ruin it! If you want Flash theres another flash resource somewhere completely Flash. Go there!!!!
4. Get the new version of vBulletin - as I recall there are Private Messages and lots of new features! Couldn't hurt - especially if you are starting fresh on a new server anyway!
5. One thing that we may have to do is to delete some of the very old messages - right now there is 389415 posts and 109828 members! The database has got to be at least a gig right now - thats gotta totally bog site performance
6. Make me a moderator!!! That would really improve the site!!! j/k lol
7. Make a testing forum where people can go and test out vb code and footers and stuff and people dont yell at them!
8. More Later...

I am positive that charging for flash kit info will be a huge turn away and just help other sites boost traffic. I love Flash kit. It is by far the greatest Flash resource out there. Keep it free man! Look at CD-audio, compter progs, etc. If people can't have it for free - they go else where and/or get it for free. - I say show potential advertisers your hit count and you will have peeps paying mad cash to advertise (not a lot of advertising) on your site. Just my ideas - oh and as far as the all flash site goes - I think that would not be the way to go. Text driven tutorials make things easy to d/l and copy and paste. thanks guys! I look forward to Flash Kit 2.0!

Quote:

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Originally posted by tapo
I have posted a thread in feedback about self promotion using t-shirts, mouse pads and things of that nature.


God bless ver 2.0

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i would like a FK mouse pad
i bet those would do well