"Updates" advice needed

[m0ds]

Hi there, I am selling a computer game via e-junkie. As you know PC computer games are generally larger than a PDF ebook and such. It looks like we're going to need to send out an update. Because the file is near 250mb, and the customer base has reached over 200, the update cost is $699. That's more than the product has made in sales.



I'd like to know if hosting it on a remote URL will still incur the filesize (per MB) cost. Despite paying more for larger hosting with e-junkie, it's a shame that along with that you have to pay huge amounts of money for updates. I understand the server/bandwidth costs you may encounter, and that's why I'd like to know if remote URL hosting means the MB update cost is somewhat reduced.



Cheers

[E-junkie_Guru]

At present Updates cannot be sent for products using a Remote Product File URL, rather than an uploaded file, but even if it were possible, the cost would be the same, as the Update fee covers the additional file-transfer bandwidth costs to provide a sudden surge of downloads for the file, rather than mere file-storage costs.. Even when the original copy of a file is hosted remotely, the downloads are still provided through our network from a cached copy of the file on our server; this is how we cloak your remote file URLs and enforce your link-expiration settings.



You might consider just parking a copy of the updated file on an affordable file-hosting service such as Amazon S3, then send a Newsletter (rather than an Update) with a link directly to that file. This would bypass our download delivery service, so you wouldn't be able to issue each recipient a unique, expirable link, but it would be far more affordable than sending an Update. You could just delete that file after a few days to minimize the potential for unauthorized downloads, once you're sure most Newsletter recipients who'd want the free update have obtained their copy.

[m0ds]

Thanks, I'll do it that way. Ultimately then it's $699 just to be able to send a customized URL out. Alternatively I could re-upload the file and then just send out free links to all previous customers by entering their email addresses in one by one on the 'send free link' page.



Bit of a shame that there are free ways to do this via ejunkie, but the filesize of a product holds all the streamlining of such an operation back. I should've realized e-junkie is geared towards small products not big ones, but appreciate your answer about this matter!



Overall I'm very satisfied with the service, just this one pivotal area of game design is not particularly compatible with the e-junkie system, but perhaps I should produce smaller games :)



M