Worst Ripoff i have ever vitnessed

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henrikjt

New Member
Hello All,

I just started working for a top Realtor. He is an older guy who likes to spend a lot of money on marketing his listings. He has been complaining about a web designer he hired to do a website for one of his listings.

I asked him how much he agreed to pay for it and he told me above $7,000. I was shocked when i saw the site which in my opinion is worth no more than $700. This is the site: www.thefloribunda.com

He has paid half so far and i really dont want him to have to pay for the other half. However, i still want him to have the website so I want to see if it is possible for me to replicate the site and therefore i need some help. What program would be the easiest to create this site? Should i use tables or how should i go about this?

Thanks so much!!
 
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Ken

New Member
I have a program that is super ez to use it cost me $120 with a backup cd

I could make a sit just like that for myself if i could think of content which i can't.

anyway the program is
Link It is very very ez to use you should be able to copy that site not problem:)
 
voodish

voodish

New Member
I'd do it for about $700.

However, the site isn't complete yet, there might be some bespoke database work to be added, that you don't know about?
 
tatsudoshi65

tatsudoshi65

New Member
Wow! That's crazy money for that. Could use a nicer color scheme. Why duplicate it? Why not design something totally new? Time?
 
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henrikjt

New Member
tatsudoshi65 said:
Wow! That's crazy money for that. Could use a nicer color scheme. Why duplicate it? Why not design something totally new? Time?
Click to expand...

Yes, mostly because of time and i don't want to make my boss feel bad my redesigning it unless i could make it much better, however, i do not have the creativity to do that myself.
 
wetgravy

wetgravy

New Member
to be honest ... that site is worth the $7000 just on the clean-ness of the code alone. While not visually impressive ... is a great example of css at its best. also, you have to think on why he is charging that much money for the site, i know if i had a shop outside my home ... the price i charge would be considerably more, let alone if i had any employee's. (mainly cost of overhead of my place of business, taxes, and still trying to pay myself would more than quadruple my prices for things like websites and the such.) So keep that in mind people before saying "Thats such a rip off people like that give the industry a bad name" There is a reason why people charge that much, and a reason people pay that much.

Now to replicating the site. This site has flash, and lots of clean CLEAN css. I never suggest cloning a site exactly as the person who made the site might be a little mad that you stole his hard work. (its sort of like taking a drawing from an artist and photocopying it) this is a legal issue as well, so make sure you talk to your boss (is that correct?) about if he wants the hassle of completely copying the site or even making it look like that site and dealing with a ticked off web designer before starting. Intellectual rights are a little ... touchy of a subject and could be a big hassle.

The flash on the site is in two places. The front page (side scrolling little graphics that go right to one place) and the gallery. The gallery is an opensource script and if you hunt for "flash image gallery" you'll find it. the front page though ... that you will have to make from scratch or do something similar but easier in html.

the rest is just a header, nav, left column, main text area and footer.
Since its relatively a simple code ... i would say bone up on your html and css. other than that ... you're really on your own since it is ... a really simple site.
 
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starteasy

New Member
I agree with Wetgravy. Although I personally feel $7k is too much for a site without database elements, it has flash elements which are usually not cheap on their own anyway.

I've said in one of my posts previously, that in this industry, same with many others, you are creating the product (a website) and therefore, as the creator, can charge whatever you want. Whether anyone pays that much...well thats another story. I think it is just unfortunate that your boss has paid $7k for a site that he could have paid $700 for and still had a successful online business portfolio.

A good example is console or PC game makers. We complain about paying over $80 for a game, but they have massive overheads and if you think about the release of Halo3, which has sold well over 1 million copies, the distributor would have sold those to resellers for around $70-$80 per unit. No idea how much of a cut the distributor takes, lets say $10 per game, thats only $60m-$70m revenue for an International release, online presence, and all sorts of backend stuff as well. Consider the time taken to make a game, and the time to make a movie, and you see that by all rights, we probably should be paying more for a computer game, or less for a movie. I know that there would be more income to that, but even if you double that, it still isn't much when you incorporate distribution, marketing, rent and wages. It may just be that the web business doing your site is popular, and can charge what he/she wants. But at the end of the day, its up to the consumer to decide through cost/benefit analysis.
 
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henrikjt

New Member
wetgravy said:
Now to replicating the site. This site has flash, and lots of clean CLEAN css. I never suggest cloning a site exactly as the person who made the site might be a little mad that you stole his hard work. (its sort of like taking a drawing from an artist and photocopying it) this is a legal issue as well, so make sure you talk to your boss (is that correct?) about if he wants the hassle of completely copying the site or even making it look like that site and dealing with a ticked off web designer before starting. Intellectual rights are a little ... touchy of a subject and could be a big hassle.

The flash on the site is in two places. The front page (side scrolling little graphics that go right to one place) and the gallery. The gallery is an opensource script and if you hunt for "flash image gallery" you'll find it. the front page though ... that you will have to make from scratch or do something similar but easier in html.

the rest is just a header, nav, left column, main text area and footer.
Since its relatively a simple code ... i would say bone up on your html and css. other than that ... you're really on your own since it is ... a really simple site.
Click to expand...

Thanks for your help
 
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hariara

New Member
Hi, i'm not sure what do you mean by "replicating", if you mean you want to download all the files to your local computer; you can just ask your boss and download it from the server...(as i see that www.thefloribunda.com is not a test site and it's a running site) so your boss should have username and password to get into the server and download them all right? Anyway, if he already paid $3500 he already has a right to get the whole files that currently online.
 
wetgravy

wetgravy

New Member
hariara said:
Anyway, if he already paid $3500 he already has a right to get the whole files that currently online.
Click to expand...

um ... thats more messed up than anything i have ever read. That is like going to a deli, ordering a sandwich and paying for half of it ... then saying you have a right to the whole sandwich. doesn't matter if the sandwich is $5 or $500 dollars ... it's still not good business.

so yeah ... that sort of thinking can get you sued. OP, i suggest you DON'T listen to that.
 
adamblan

adamblan

New Member
It really comes down to what's in the contract between your boss and the developer... Yes, the site is overpriced for what he got, but it's what he agreed to.
Also, since you're unsure of whether or not it's a good idea to use tables for the layout & you don't "have the creativity", I'll assume you don't really know jack about web design / development.
Taking this into account, it'd be a pretty awful idea for you to rip off someone else's design in an effort to save a buck.
 
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hariara

New Member
wetgravy said:
um ... thats more messed up than anything i have ever read. That is like going to a deli, ordering a sandwich and paying for half of it ... then saying you have a right to the whole sandwich. doesn't matter if the sandwich is $5 or $500 dollars ... it's still not good business.

so yeah ... that sort of thinking can get you sued. OP, i suggest you DON'T listen to that.
Click to expand...

What i mean is, if my client already paid 50% from the total amount; of course he/she has a rights to have an access to the files on the server and download them to study it, to change color, change words, etc to improve...i don't see something wrong with it.

My point is, why do all hassle try to replicate the site if you can simply download them from their own sever?

About your sandwich...no one say if you pay half you can claim the whole sandwich...

As for this case, I would suggest..open this problems to the web designer, do not replicate..duplicate..or anything else from backdoor, as it will get your boss sued. Having a new agreement terms seems a good way to solve this.

If your boss think $3500 is enough, then ask the designer what you can get with that amount of money...."you pay 50% of sandwich...you can enjoy ONLY HALF of it"...right? as long as you are not stealing it...
 
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conor

conor

New Member
rip off

that is an absolute rip off... It is a reasonably good looking site but with only markup and css... Rip off

As for replicating the site, just copy the source, get the images and the css and your sorted... There's no php or js involved so it should be relativley easy to replicate.
 
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