90-day Advance Warning: Tapatalk removal from Paste & Cut

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Monsta_AU

...can I interest you in some vintage blades?
Staff member
Forum Administrator
Grand Society
Joined
Feb 2, 2011
Location
Guildford.nsw.au
Hi Members;

I am posting notice today of my intention to remove all Tapatalk access and functionality on Paste & Cut, effective on or after April 30, 2017. I give you this notice in order to find alternatives to some of the functionality to which you are accustomed. This has not been a difficult decision to make based on the issues with the software, and the behaviour of the company behind it.

I have personally used Tapatalk for many, many years across a number of fora and for the most part the user experience has been good. There have been quite a number issues which have become known to many of you in the last 18 months, and there is far more on the site ownership side.

Right now, we are being pressured into purchasing a site owner account with Tapatalk in order to access features and functionality which we previously already had and have now been removed, at a cost of $5/mo. The main one is the Tapatalk signature which we could previously block server-side, but there are others which impact our ability to tune and restrict actions available to users which we do not wish to allow.

There is also pressure to get us to pay even more to create a 'branded' application which our users can download from the various app stores, however that would be charged to us at $10/mo, and then you would need to pay for the app itself. I already paid for Tapatalk Pro years ago, and are a VIP user. No way they should be doing that to us again.

There are a multitude of issues behind the scenses including badly coded scripts, security issues, unilateral decisions made by Tapa that affect sites, and removal of control of the plugin by site owners. The number of times a new release of the plugin has issues and/or fails completely is ridiculous. One update on the XenForo plugin needed four different versions to be released within 2 weeks to counter showstopper bugs.

For those not aware - I pay for the running of this site from my own pocket (Domains, Server, cPanel license, XenForo licensing, theme costs), although I have over the years had some very generous members step in and contribute to the site. We do not run advertising or ask vendors to contribute in order to keep a 100% independent view of the hobby. To be asked to pay for our site AND have our members pay is a bridge too far. I will not ask my members to pay for our own app.

Tapatalk is not listening to the people that provide their income - that is the site owners. We voluntarily add their code to our sites, from which they make money via affiliate links and a number of other ways. I have had enough and will take the only action I have available to me in order to voice my displeasure - remove their code from my forum. They will not listen to anything else.

To those that use and enjoy Tapatalk - I am sorry. I realise that this will be detrimental to your experience and ability to use the forums. We do however have a brilliant theme which is mobile-friendly and is also able to reconfigure itself based on the size of the screen you are using - smartphone, tablet, small latop or normal PC resolution. I ask that you give it a go, and maybe look to one of the apps provided by the imagehosting companies to add images into your posts.

Thanks;
Monsta
 
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