Do you think that its unfair for chess.com to charge money for most of chess.com's features?

nope chess.com is a job for erik and the crew and their bills dont pay themselves.

Nope.  Websites such as this cost a great deal of money to operate and maintain.  In fact, I consider it somewhat remarkable that Chess.com offers a free membership option. That's pretty generous.

God bless chess entrepreneurs....

I know this has been mentioned before, but Chess.com offers more than the other dedicated chess sites do for free. I know of one that will only let you play 6 games at a time without paying. I know of another site that will only allow you to play in one unrated tournament, if you want to play beyond that, you have to pay.

No webstie is free to run, the bandwidth, the servers, the storage, etc., it all costs money.

ok I have adjusted my views on the premium memberships.  I used to think that it is unfair, but now I realize that without them, we would not even be here on this forum.  Chess.com needs money to run, even with the advertisements.  And yet, I do not even feel lacking without the benefits of the premium memberships because chess.com is such a great (value) site.  It offers unbelievable gameplay with instant replay, now that's already a great plus.  And with a forum with like a gajillion different sections, I really feel like a community.  A community of people just like me who all just love chess.  Try finding that on another chess site.

RooksBailey wrote:

Nope.  Websites such as this cost a great deal of money to operate and maintain.  In fact, I consider it somewhat remarkable that Chess.com offers a free membership option. That's pretty generous.

God bless chess entrepreneurs....

 I agreed with Rooksbailey , chess.com is a wonderful website is one of the best for your money, I mean look at it, look at all the features it got,you can play, learn ,share just about anything you could ask for, what more do you want !?
For $30 a year is a bargain for me that only 10 cents a day wow! the guys (and gals) who work at chess.com is bloody hard and is doesn't come cheap and now think about it.

kco wrote:

RooksBailey wrote:

Nope.  Websites such as this cost a great deal of money to operate and maintain.  In fact, I consider it somewhat remarkable that Chess.com offers a free membership option. That's pretty generous.

God bless chess entrepreneurs....

 I agreed with Rooksbailey , chess.com is a wonderful website is one of the best for your money, I mean look at it, look at all the features it got,you can play, learn ,share just about anything you could ask for, what more do you want !?
For $30 a year is a bargain for me that only 10 cents a day wow! the guys (and gals) who work at chess.com is bloody hard and is doesn't come cheap and now think about it.

Yes, i agree its very cheap, i have recently changed my view and i think that i may buy a Gold Membership very soon, thank you everyone, good and unanimous answers :)

Baseballfan wrote:

I know this has been mentioned before, but Chess.com offers more than the other dedicated chess sites do for free. I know of one that will only let you play 6 games at a time without paying. I know of another site that will only allow you to play in one unrated tournament, if you want to play beyond that, you have to pay.

No webstie is free to run, the bandwidth, the servers, the storage, etc., it all costs money.

 Saw a website recently that wont even allow you the choice of a bigger chess board with out paying (it was a really lame site but still).

phishcake5 wrote:

Baseballfan wrote:

I know this has been mentioned before, but Chess.com offers more than the other dedicated chess sites do for free. I know of one that will only let you play 6 games at a time without paying. I know of another site that will only allow you to play in one unrated tournament, if you want to play beyond that, you have to pay.

No webstie is free to run, the bandwidth, the servers, the storage, etc., it all costs money.

 Saw a website recently that wont even allow you the choice of a bigger chess board with out paying (it was a really lame site but still).

That is pretty brutle!!

While I don't know the stats, I will assume that at least 75% of the people here are free members. That would require all the advertising and the smaller 25% to cover the costs of server, bandwidth, staff, etc. It seems to me that there is probably very little profit involved in this venture. The fact that Erik still does all this for all of us is a good thing.

The crown beside my name is my answer.

So.. its pretty much unanimous !!! Get a premium membership!