discussion: To Beta, or Not to Beta?

Hi Folks,

I'm at the testing stage for my Texi Pets, and want to get a good number of testers trying them out and giving me feedback before I develop too much more, as the code is quite complex and as we all know, developers are the worst testers of their own products.

What I'm trying to decide is whether to try and find a select group of testers and keep testing closed, or whether to just throw them out there with a public open beta and self-expiring versions to keep the environment clean so to speak.

What opinions do people have on offering open Beta's of products in development vs closed Beta's?

Thanks. Russell.

I say, closed then open betas. It works for the RL software industry -_- And remember, any expiration can be defeated...

That is incorrect, expirations are quite easy to build into objects. If you put date checks into the beta testing products' scripts, so that the main functions will kill the object if it is past a certain date, it is quite easy to force the object to expire.

This is assumes that your product is dependent upon scripts. It is much more difficult, even impossible, to incorporate expirations into furniture and related objects that do not need scripts for their core functionality.

Yes, that is what I am currently doing.

The con against going closed beta is finding a good group of testers who will contribute. If I took the first (e.g.) 5 to come along, they may make no contribution to testing. At least with an open beta, any responses you get will be from people who've actually tried it.

You also need to offer the testers something for their time and contributions, like a free version of your product once you go to non-beta stage.
BTW, I'm up for beta testing whatever you have(pets, I suppose), and will give awesome feedback. ^.^

That's already on the table for my current testers. I'll keep your offer in mind pending the outcomes of this discussion.

Thanks for the offer.