Sell it to me

[Ihsan's Knife]

I am somewhat confused. Why should I buy vBulletin? What advantages does it have over phpBBv3? Why is it the better system? Give me an advertisement pitch. I want to hear exactly what it has to offer as opposed to phpBBv3 (on own webspace, of course), and why that is worth 180$.

[derfy]

Well, I was going to suggest you search, but

"The following words are either very common, too long, or too short and were not included in your search: why, buy, vbulletin"

Heh.

[Sully90]

I am somewhat confused. Why should I buy vBulletin? What advantages does it have over phpBBv3? Why is it the better system? Give me an advertisement pitch. I want to hear exactly what it has to offer as opposed to phpBBv3 (on own webspace, of course), and why that is worth 180$.

That is up to you to decide. If you believe vBulletin is worth the price, then go for it. For more info on vBulletin, I'd suggest you read this: http://www.vbulletin.com/features.php

[Colin F]

We believe the key to vBulletin's growing success is the extensive range of useful features, the ease of use of the software, the quality of our code, and the excellent technical and customer support we provide.

All of our staff (Developers and Support Team) are paid. This is not a hobby that we do on our spare time - rather, it is a real job and responsibility. We believe that we provide the best bulletin board software and support available.

To get the perspective of our customers on why they've chosen vBulletin over the alternatives, I suggest you look through our testimonials page:

http://www.vbulletin.com/customers.php

[cheat-master30]

Okay, you want to know why vBulletin is better than phpBB? Well the main reasons it's better are that:

1. It's commercially supported. So instead of relying on volunteer support (although the support by vBulletin.org and .com members is fantastic as well), you have a paid support team to help out when something goes wrong, which phpBB cannot offer.

2. vBulletin has more features by miles. Social networking features are there, quick reply is there, reputation is there, infraction system is there and advanced usergroup permissions are there. And to put it nicely, phpBB is lacking in anything past very basic core forum features.

3. vBulletin has a nice, active modification community. Sure, phpBB does as well, but you can't get IBP Arcade for anything other than vBulletin or Invision, and you can't get Photoplog, vB Credits (and add ons) or some other excellent mods for anything but vBulletin.

4. It's guaranteed not to splinter off or to shut down quickly. phpBB, like most open source programs could theoretically split into multiple sub groups with different versions of the same code base for different forum softwares, and the core could easily be abandoned. Not so with vBulletin.

5. I hear it's better out the box than handling big boards than phpBB (and Gaia Online is not out the box phpBB, by far).

6. You often get more members with vBulletin. Heck, from my research, I moved from a free Invisionfree board to vBulletin, and ended up getting like a hundred + times the members and posts that I had on free forum hosting. Many others only join vBulletin forums, and many others have had better luck with their forum when using paid software than free software.

[hitmancode47]

Here are a few of my reasons to buy vbulletin over PHPBB3

Vbulletin as a AMAZING AdminCP user interface

The user and groups configuration is MUCH easier to setup

You can add money subscriptions for forums etc (i LOVE this system)

You can change the colour of usergroups and add automated promotions (or admin decision)

You can use subforums in a way that is quite unique

You can get 24/7 EXPERT customer support (Kerry-Anne is famous in my books, heard ALOT about her.. seems professional)

You can make customised social groups for posting etc. (like a forum but like a group forum)

You have networking capabilities..

Want more? lol
-Hitman 47

[_Quads_]

Everything they said.
I started with phpBB2.X, used it for several years. Was anxious to see and use the new 3.0 dev branch, which is miles ahead of 2.0X. I self taught myself phpBB 2 and 3 by trial, error, frustration, and hours upon hours of digging through support forums.

That being said, I was pretty solid in phpBBB. And I was pretty happy with it.
A buddy of mine gave me a peek at his vB ACP.
My jaw dropped.

I've since installed it, migrated a rather large phpBB forum over to it, and wouldn't go back if I were paid to do so.

Hands down, vB, for the lack of a better term is "the nuts"