Wordpress prices have been reviewed, what about AE?

So, as some of you have seen on Envato Notes, the prices for wordpress themes have been reviewed and increased.

When is it our turn ?

It has been mentioned before, that the ae project files are under priced on here.

New Wordpress templates can sell about 20-40 a day, check out the new After Effects projects to see how much we sell per day

Where there is a demand – there’s an opportunity, and so far that opportunity lies more within Themeforest.

Once we’ll get close to the sales numbers these guys from Themeforest get, Envato will take good care of us, so far the global market shows us that even at 15$ – 25$ people aren’t really “rushing” to buy.

Yes, vh ae projects are underpriced, but it’s one of the rules in this game, and everybody wins – the best quality and the lowest prices for buyers and more sales for authors.
Looking forward to hear if staff are planning aftereffects category pricing changes in near future.

That said, Johnny, templates here at Videohive have been dropping drastically in price. The nominal prices are about the same as three years ago (meaning that they’re already 10% cheaper in real terms), while the average time investment and quality in most projects has gone through the roof. Without a doubt, customers are getting much more for their money than they were three years ago.

Videohive sits well below other stock sites in terms of its pricing and really shouldn’t experience too much downward pressure on prices from the competition. However, I think a side-effect of the way files are reviewed and priced is that prices are forced down. Given the de-facto price ceiling of $30, the effect of file quality going up as authors bid to out-compete one another is that prices in general are forced lower. A file that might have fetched $25 three years ago might fetch $15 now.

So while I agree, that price changes should be in reaction to global market forces, demand and competition, I’d say that the downward price trend and the effects of inflation need to be evened out every once in a while. I welcome the fact that Envato is ready to make across the board pricing changes to reflect the state of things.

felt_tips, you definitely have a point there, although, if you compare it to other products its pretty much the same. Its up to the staff here to decide, but

For ex: Lets take Computers, you’ll get a great i7 quad core today for the same price you bought a 486dx 2 33mhz 20 years ago, a Pentium II 10 years, and a so on causing the good old 486DX2/66MHZ to be thrown away.

Technology is moving really fast, we can try to catch up or watch it as it fly by, our call – The time it took us 3 years ago to create a template was due to Hardware limitations as well, nowadays its more common to create better quality in the same amount of time thanks to multiple cores, more GB ram, etc.

You can’t make the cost of computer hardware analagous to human labour.

I have worked in this industry for the best part of 20 years. I remember well when I first had access to a 1GB external hard-drive (a rarity at the time). If I recall, it cost the company I worked for about $1000. The price for a similar amount of storage now is around 8c and it’s faster and more reliable. That’s a price slash of over 10,000 times.

Using your analogy, a freelancer who was paid around $450 / day back then should now be receiving the princely sum of 4.5 cents for a day’s work. I hope I never see that day.

Was it really ever about human labor? Envato defines it as “Digital goods”

Therefore the analogy would be that a freelancer that was paid 450$ a day just to sit down and wait for his Indigo to render a super low poly 3D model 20 years ago, today is paid 450$ a day to Model, Texture and Light the high poly version of that same model.

A freelancer who can only model low res today at the same pace they used to 20 years ago is doomed, and that makes perfect sense.

I don’t remember ever sitting around being paid to watch things render. You just had to be a lot smarter about what you rendered and when.

I’m not trying to deny the march of technology, nor the fact that the tools of our trade allow us to create more, faster. But the fact that wages have fallen in the field I work in is certain. That’s part of globalisation and part of the fact that what once was quite an exclusive thing to do is now accessible by pretty much everyone.

None of us wants to end up as a faceless shift worker in the “Digital Goods Sweatshop” and it’s worth keeping trends in check that appear to lead in that direction.

@johnybd, don’t argue with felt

In my opinion the sales won’t be affected much. As people who come here to buy are the one’s who can’t afford hiring a freelancer. So paying an extra 10$ will still be better than paying over 400$.

Should we throw a vote? Our opinion must be heard

felt_tips said
None of us wants to end up as a faceless shift worker in the “Digital Goods Sweatshop” and it’s worth keeping trends in check that appear to lead in that direction.

felt tips: It feels like we’re off the topic, was this thread initially about our wages as industry workers who are employed ? or about the prices that this marketplace sets for us ? There has to be a distinction between the both, yet, you keep going back to phrases such as “Sweatshop” or “Labor” “Shift worker” , and is it really related to Envato?

This is a Marketplace here, we are traders, businessmen, merchants, we sell the goods and we take risks and evaluate what will work or might not, unlike normal employees, most merchants have no promises nor guarantees that they’ll even make 2cents per hour – this is our choice whether to take that risk or not.

The great thing about it is, that we have a mutual interest, with Envato – its easier for some to try and change the way they price our goods, market us, etc…

For me, personally, its easier to let them hold the wheel and drive – they’ve been doing it for long enough and they give me the peace of mind to focus on creating the goods instead.