@HHawk
Sorry. I did look up the company named in your signature (Server4You). Wow. A lot of negative reviews. How come man?
It must have been clear that I mention some hosting providers in my signature - there is not enough space to mention all hosting providers that I have actively tested with Plesk instances. Server4You is not my company, it is a hosting provider, so no need to answer the question "how come man?"
o far Plesk interface has become slow and certainly not better. Some highly requested stuff is still not available directly e.g. Open Lite Speed, Varnish (work-around nowadays), Redis, etc. etc. etc.
Open Lite Speed does not add value, Varnish does not add value ...... and both - especially Varnish - are a bad (and unsecure) alternative for Nginx.
Plesk Panel is Nginx based, Plesk has full support for Nginx.
Nginx has full support for Redis, Memcache(d) .......... simply install Redis Server and include some lines of Nginx directives into Plesk config - that is all!
Okay. I already spend (again) too much time on this. I have to go to the office. But if Plesk proceeds this way and let the greed (from Oakley Capital Investment Group) lead them, I doubt Plesk will be existing in a few years. It's either that or Oakley Capital will sell Plesk off to so some foreign company. Mark my words.
You can never spend too much time on this.
Your alleged adversary, being either Plesk or Oakley, may or may not read your posts .......... however, the community does!
Plesk will exist in the near and far away future - Plesk is promising convenience and that is what most Plesk users wish to pay for.
Alternatives to Plesk are scarce, with natural dynamics of people switching from Plesk Panel to another panel and from other panels to Plesk Panels - that is the essence of the dynamics on the market for control panels for many years now (and that will never change).
The reality is that alternatives to Plesk will undercut Plesk prices (to gain market share) and increase prices (to regain lost profit) as soon as they can, hence making Plesk (or other control panels) a viable option again.
It really has nothing to do with "ownership", it simply has to do with market demand and market supply.
If you are asked the question "would you increase your prices, knowing that you can increase your prices without any problem", then the answer is : YES.
Now, with the last statement, we can turn to Oakley and "ownership (structures)" in general.
Any owner of a company continuously asks the question "can I increase the prices and get away with it?" - if they can, they will increase prices.
Any company considering to purchase / invest in anoter company asks the same question ........ since they want to have a return on investment.
And that is the issue here ...... return on investment.
They will always sell ...... if there is a positive return on investment ...... but also if there is only the prediction of future negative return of investment.
So, yes, your predication is always correct : "ownership" of Plesk will always be transferred to another company - a simple fact.
And, yes, any new owner of Plesk will always attempt to increase prices and will increase prices if they can.
And, yes, this cycle will continue over and over again : ownership changes and price changes are positively correlated!
Stated differently, you are absolutely right ........
.......... and now we can address the topic of why your posts (and those of other community members) are relevant!
Is there an alternative? An alternative that can break the continuous cycle of "new-owners-new-prices"?
Yes, in theory there is - consider a company that
- is supplying specific products or services that are intensively used by a group of easily to define customers, (and)
- is fully owned by all of the individual members in that group of easily to define customers, (and)
- is associated with ownership structures in which no individual owner has more power or financial interest than other individual owners,
and that - theoretical - company could simply mimick and offer Plesk products and services ...... or even purchase Plesk.
No, in practice there will never be such a - theoretical - company, given the facts that amongs others
- such a company would - in the short and long run - require that an equilibrium amongst individual owners exists,
- the equilibrium would imply that all individual owners have equal parts of total ownership and equal parts of profit,
- equality of ownership and profit shares would require that each individual owner pays the same price for products / services,
- the equilibrium can only survive as long as the prices are constant or continuously declining towards zero,
- the equilibrium at constant prices can only survive if profit shares are exactly equal to the constant prices of products / services,
- the equilibrium at constant prices can survive, but will not survive - it does not make sense to pay for something and get an identical profit share,
- the equilibrium at zero prices will replace the equilibrium at constant prices,
- the equilibrium at zero prices will survive - it is an economically binding "contract" that makes sense and that will not give reward to deviate from it,
and all of the above is an economical approach (read: based upon sound economical theory, including game theory) to explain why
- companies aiming for profit will always exist, as long as individual owners cannot come to a binding "contract" and are rewarded to deviate from it,
- open source is STRONG can ALWAYS SURVIVE as an alternative, since there is no reward for deviating from the "contract".
Nevertheless, let's skip the theory and let us skip the explanation.
We, as community members, have to be BRUTALLY HONEST .........
........ and simply state that we cannot even agree upon opinions or the smallest of topics, let alone that we can agree upon the direction that can be followed by Plesk to improve their products / services in order to satisfy customer demand.
In essence, Plesk does an excellent job to satisfy the full diversity of all demands of all individual Plesk users - compliments to Plesk Team!
Sure, Plesk is using the "support-everything" method in order to increase customer satisfaction.
Sure, this "support-everything" method comes at the price that not everything can be developed in time and / or properly.
When being honest, are we - as a community - not also partially (!) responsible for not providing the suggestions (or solutions) that Plesk can focus on?
In my humble opinion, I need to take my full responsibility ....... therefore, I provide feedback and suggestions whenever I can.
A discussion about pricing and price increase may be valuable, but it might be more valuable to suggest concrete solutions to Plesk Team.
I sincerely hope that other people start to think about the way that they can contribute to the development of Plesk.
Plesk is good enough ........ and can be made better, provided that the community can agree upon at least one thing that can be improved.
One thing, a couple of things, it should be possible - it is not a big ask.
Kind regards......