Dubmodder has always been a cool site in my book but now they are making users pay to have access. There is still a “demo” version of the site but it features only a few colors and even fewer options in terms of parts.

I guess it’s all about business but after being a free site for such a long time I hate to see them go to a “pay only” version. The reason they are/were so popular was because it was an easy way for people to mod cars without photochop skills. If it had been a pay-version site from the beginning I don’t think they would have had nearly as much success.

I realize they are only asking for $12/year but to me it’s just the principles behind it.

Here are the questions I pose to Dubmodder:

• Instead of charging for use, why not just sell more advertising to cover costs?
• How do you expect people to participate in your monthly Dubmodder contests with Performance VW if they have to pay to use your site?
• Could you use a “Donate to support Dubmodder” campaign instead of charging users?
• If you are going to charge users, could the software be accessed by paying a one-time fee and not a yearly charge?

I’ve thought about creating my own Mk3-modding program or software before, so maybe this is the push I needed to start learning Flash and to begin developing…