The latest beta for Scrivener Windows says it expires November 15. The month of November is of course, the famed NaNoWriMo month where writers all around the globe unite to write 50K in one months time.
I sincerely hope that there will be another beta extending the time THROUGH the month of November, to allow all the writers to get through their Nanowrimo, pass or fail. To finally release the long awaited Version 3 of Windows and force those who having been using the beta version to pay and upgrade mid-month would be so very wrong.
That would be cruel and unusual and very low to do that to the writing community.
Such behavior would certainly be unusual for L&L. They’ve never earned the descriptors cruel or low. Worry not; whereas NaNo is an event they’ve been a longtime supporter of, I’m sure they’ve planned accordingly.
In two years of betas, they’ve never failed to post a new beta on or before the expiration date of the previous beta.
Just a warning: some people who practically live on these forums see this every time a beta expiration gets close, and get cranky about it. It’s not you, it’s them.
Many (mostly reasonable) suggestions have been made to change the message that Scrivener displays, pinning a post to the top of the beta & tech support forums, etc… None have been attempted by the developers or forum moderators. I’m not sure why these suggestions fall on deaf ears. I guess the moderators like this kind of thing popping up once a month or more?
If you decide to stick around (you are a beta tester after all, so should be keeping up with what does or doesn’t work in each beta release), be prepared to see panicked newbies and grumpy regulars when every beta expiration approaches.
I’m left to wonder why one would entertain using a Beta product for something that, apparently, is so near and dear to one’s heart as, for example, a Nanowrimo. It might be wrong of me, of course, to deign to ask the question, but I feel it’s necessary in light of the importance of outputting product during Nano.
Seriously? You’re using a Beta to write something as important to you as a Nano product apparently is? Not that it’s any of my business, of course. And not that the current Beta isn’t extremely stable, after all. But still…
Guys. If you’re freaking out about the beta expiring, then use the beta for testing and putting it through the paces to help the developers find the bugs, but do your actual writing in Scrivener 1. Or do your writing in Scrivener 3, and at the end of each writing session copy and paste the text into Scrivener 1 (you can have both running simultaneously)
IF version 3 releases in mid-November (which I do not think is likely), you would still have the typical 30 day trial period available, so no one would be forced to pay to continue.
This has been my method for a long time now. V3 is too aesthetically pleasing and has too many great features for me not to want to do the bulk of my work in it, but working in a beta for any amount of time kind of necessitates constant backups. I’ve never needed them yet, but I’d bet I would if I didn’t have them.
