How make BigBlueButton be price competitive with commercial offerings?...

[Chris Seberino]

I want to be convinced that BigBlueButton is cost competitive and that
I should start
switching it. :)

Here is my question....commercial services are around $50/month which
includes support.

In order to justify running my own BigBlueButton, I'd need a big
server with the needed RAM
and CPU speed. I don't think you can find a Xen virtual machine for
rent for that low of a
price that can run BigBlueButton effectively. (Your docs also frown
on VMs for this.)

My own server in a building somewhere would be even more expensive.

Am I forgetting something?

Please tell me how to make BigBlueButton work compared to the
competition!

Thanks!

Chris

[Fred Dixon]

Hi Chris,

Our recommendation for a server is here

  

   http://code.google.com/p/bigbluebutton/wiki/FAQ#What_are_the_minimum_hardware_requirements_for_the_BigBlueButton

You have access to many support options, see

   http://bigbluebutton.org/support

BigBlueButton is available under an open source license.   These forums are for non-commercial support.  The options of where (and how) you host it are your own.

> Please tell me how to make BigBlueButton work compared to the

> competition!

Speaking as one of the developers, we focus on the core features for on-line learning.  If there is a feature that's missing, you can certainly add it yourself or engage some of the companies that offer commercial support.  

If your and individual looking for a web conferencing solution, we recommend you go with an existing vendor.  The ROI for BigBlueButton is stronger when one or more are true

  1.  You want to use open source software

  2.  You already have servers (as is the case with many universities and colleges)

  3.  You want to integrate components (or all) of BigBlueButton into your service offering an don't want to pay license fees

  4.  You need to be able to modify the functionality

Again, if your an individual looking for a web conferencing solution, we recommend you go with a commercial vendor.   There are some commercial vendors at the above support link that can offer you individual accounts for BigBlueButton at a very reasonable rate.

Regards,... Fred

-- 

BigBlueButton Developer

http://bigbluebutton.org/
http://code.google.com/p/bigbluebutton

BigBlueButton on twitter: @bigbluebutton

Chris

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[Geoff Nordli]

Hi Chris.

What are you comparing it to? GotoMeeting? Webex?

Or are you comparing the cost of commercially supported BBB hosting vs
the cost of running your own system?


Geoff

[Ed Phillis]

I think it must come down to features. Is there anything that BBB is better at and more suited to your needs than an alternative commercial product? If no then I would suggest there isn't very much in it. You could get xen vps hosting with 4gb RAM and 50gb disk space for around £50 (glesys for example). I think its nice to be in control of your own system and part of something a little more wholesome. I worked for commercial software companies for too long and what you get is a small and harassed development team and mostly jaded support personnel. With community, open source you get people who actually give a sh..hoot and development is essentialy crowdsourcing. Ultimately I think people like to pay the money and then the buck can stop somewhere else.

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[HostBBB.com]

Chris,

Bigbluebutton is all about tight integration to your business
applications, and ability to private label an integrated solution.

If you have modest usage requirements and no need to integrate
commercial video conferencing is the way to go for sure.

As for enterprise commerical offerings, you usually pay about
$750year per person in company that needs to moderate meetings. We
have had a number of medium scale companies that have 10-15 webx/
gotomeeting accounts corporate wide that pay 10K plus a year for video
conferencing and telco bridges. For these companies, deploying BBB
and integrating to company PBX saves money and gives better user
experiences with a proven ROI.

Also, the second case is custom training services.. Where you bundle
a moodle/wordpress solution integrated with 1 or many BBB servers.
If you charge for your training the ROI is there. There are some real
examples of small entrepreneurs and non-profits running successful
virtual schools and elearning businesses. The few hundred dollars
month you pay for a couple of hosted servers has easy ROI.

The great thing about the project is its very well documented and many
users are able to set up an inexpensive solution in a few days
utilizing open source software.

Regards,
Stephen
http://hostbbb.com

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[Chris Seberino]

I current pay about $350 a year for a Blackboard Collaborate account.
I've been doing that for years.
I run a small teaching business that services homeschoolers.

Since I am a techie and love open source, I'm rooting for BBB to be
the way for me to go.

cs

[Chris Seberino]

On Feb 2, 7:49 am, "HostBBB.com" <207t...@gmail.com> wrote:
> There are some real
> examples of small entrepreneurs and non-profits running successful
> virtual schools and elearning businesses. The few hundred dollars
> month you pay for a couple of hosted servers has easy ROI.

That is exactly what I am. I am an entrepreneur running a "virtual
school"
for homeschoolers. Perhaps when my class sizes grow and I hire
more teachers, BBB will be more justified. I've been squeaking by
with a single
Blackboard Collaborate account so far.

If you are providing solutions to elearning centers that service
hundreds
of students doing video conferencing, I would imagine your bandwidth
requirements are huge.

I can only guess that you invested in some awesome server farm
with fiber optic speeds at a deal and that is how you can offer
good deals to small business such as myself.

Thanks all for the info!

Chris

[Brikena KAY]

Hi, 

I am trying to launch a tutoring services company that offers one on one in person and online lessons at a reasonable cost to the students while allowing the tutors to make a living without having to pay too much in fees as is the case with a lot of companies in operation at this time.

I would operate at tiny margins with considerable risk and not too much initial capital. I was thinking about integrating big blue button on my wbsite. 

It is wordpress site on a shared server. 

Would I be able to do it or do I need a dedicated server? 

Can you recommend a developer that would be able to perform the integration and get me started?

Thank you 

Brikena Kay 

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[Brikena KAY]

[Brikena KAY]

[Fred Dixon]

Hi Brinkena,

IF you have someone technical on your team (they are comfortable installing and updating software on Linux), in many cases the most economical solution would be to setup your own BigBlueButton server at first (you need to procure the server from a hosting company).  We provide a one-line installation script, see

 https://github.com/bigbluebutton/bbb-install

that would install BigBlueButton in about 15 minutes (with SSL if you have a fully qualified domain name resolving to the external IP address of your server).

It the above isn't an option, then paying someone else to manage your BigBlueButton server (under a monthly contract) makes the most sense.

Regards,.. Fred

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