Orthodox Base Packages Discontinued? No
Now that Logos 7 is here, it appears that the Orthodox base packages have been discontinued. I'm not really all that surprised, since they discontinued the Platinum package while Logos 6 was still being sold. I am disappointed, but at least the resources can still be purchased individually. I hope the base packages are just being delayed, though.
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Hi Russel,
We do have plans to launch Orthodox for Logos 7. They should be ready later this week.
Senior Director, Content Products
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Ben Amundgaard said:
We do have plans to launch Orthodox for Logos 7. They should be ready later this week.
Yay!
Now the title of this thread needs to be edited in order not to inadvertently deceive people.
“The trouble is that everyone talks about reforming others and no one thinks about reforming himself.” St. Peter of Alcántara
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Yay is right! Thank you!
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Thank God! I was so upset when I saw the title of the topic.
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Suggest the web site say something like "Coming soon for Logos 7" rather than just linking to a void where Orthodox is missing.....[:)]
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Yes. I also figured it was missing since I was redirected to a page missing Orthodox base package which also led me to believe it was discontinued. Hopefully the package is filled with books I can use, not promises of prepub-books to come.
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Ben Amundgaard said:
Hi Russel,
We do have plans to launch Orthodox for Logos 7. They should be ready later this week.
Are we there yet? [;)][A]
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Working on it [:)]
We've had a few things come up this week and haven't wrapped them up. They're definitely in progress.
Senior Director, Content Products
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Ben Amundgaard said:
Working on it
We've had a few things come up this week and haven't wrapped them up. They're definitely in progress.
Y'all have had a tough week. Thanks for the hard work!
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Any plan for Chaplain package Ben?
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mike said:
Any plan for Chaplain package Ben?
Why not make this a separate thread?
I believe that because of a lack of newer pastoral resources, FL is planning to use some public domain resources to bulk up their new, as yet unreleased, Chaplains base package. Among the titles I believe we will see are:
- How to Help a Parishioner Who's Suffered from a Run-Away Horse
- Making the Most of Ministry Opportunities When the Circus Comes to Town
- Ministry to Itinerant Ice-House Workers
- Comforting Families Whose Children Will Not Stay Down on the Farm
- Mastering the Transition to Using the Piano in Worship
- Guarding Your Family from the Evils of the Telephone
- Sermons Preached in a Brushy Arbor
- The Evils of the Hobo Camp
- Ministering to Families at the County Farm
- Evangelism Strategies in the Age of Victoria
and many more just like this!
OK. So I know nothing more than you do. [;)]
Pastor, North Park Baptist Church
Bridgeport, CT USA
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How about a little more transparency. The previously-available libraries such as the Orthodox Library Builder are no longer available, and the new product was just launched without an Orthodox base package. This is more than just it not being available, otherwise there is no reason for previously-available packages to have gone away. And links to the former Orthodox base package now redirect to a page with all the base packages (but nothing for Orthodox), there is not even a "coming soon" page.
What's the deal? I understand the Orthodox probably don't have much buying power, but please don't make it impossible for Orthodox Christians to purchase their resources without bundling them with stuff we don't want/need. For instance, I can't even buy the Byzantine lectionaries without purchasing the full feature set or a Logos NOW membership. What gives?
I'd appreciate some frank honesty here.
- Does Logos intend to continue offering base packages to Orthodox Christians?
- Why was Orthodoxy excluded from the Logos 7 release?
- If Logos does intend to continue offering packages for Orthodox Christians, what is the anticipated product release date and will the same introductory v7 deals be available?
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The best way to get any sort of answer Dan in regards to your concerns is to email bob@logos.com. I agree there has not been enough openness and transparency about what is going on with the Orthodox product range.
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Dan O'Day said:
- Does Logos intend to continue offering base packages to Orthodox Christians?
- Why was Orthodoxy excluded from the Logos 7 release?
These two questions have been answered by Faithlife although more implicitly. The packages were not ready at the time of the Logos 7 release - getting a package together is complex. It requires that the resources add up to the same value as the packages in other denominations. It requires that the contracts for those resources allow them to be sold at a discount with some change in compensation to the publisher. It requires that the resources if not in publication be far enough along in the process for Faithlife to be certain they will be published (my guess is they need the files in hand for producing the resource). Furthermore, they need to be reviewed by someone who is Orthodox and knows if they will meet user need not someone who is guessing at what the Orthodox need.
As for why they pulled the old offerings before the new ones were available - or at least rename them and make the resources available - that is a very good question.
Orthodox Bishop Alfeyev: "To be a theologian means to have experience of a personal encounter with God through prayer and worship."; Orthodox proverb: "We know where the Church is, we do not know where it is not."
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Now that Faithlife has affirmed that it will be releasing Orthodox base packages, I am okay with waiting a bit longer. The only thing I would have done differently, is I would have included a "Base Packages Coming Soon!" graphic when you go to the Orthodox store page. Other than that, I don't really think it is necessary to be more transparent. But that's just my two cents
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Dan O'Day said:
How about a little more transparency. The previously-available libraries such as the Orthodox Library Builder are no longer available, and the new product was just launched without an Orthodox base package. This is more than just it not being available, otherwise there is no reason for previously-available packages to have gone away. And links to the former Orthodox base package now redirect to a page with all the base packages (but nothing for Orthodox), there is not even a "coming soon" page.
What's the deal? I understand the Orthodox probably don't have much buying power, but please don't make it impossible for Orthodox Christians to purchase their resources without bundling them with stuff we don't want/need. For instance, I can't even buy the Byzantine lectionaries without purchasing the full feature set or a Logos NOW membership. What gives?
I'd appreciate some frank honesty here.
- Does Logos intend to continue offering base packages to Orthodox Christians?
- Why was Orthodoxy excluded from the Logos 7 release?
- If Logos does intend to continue offering packages for Orthodox Christians, what is the anticipated product release date and will the same introductory v7 deals be available?
I assure you that there's not attempt here at a lack of transparency and I'm very sorry it feels that way. Let me try to answer your questions as frankly as possible:
- Does Logos intend to continue offering base packages to Orthodox Christians?
Yes. We have no plans to discontinue our Orthodox line of products. - Why was Orthodoxy excluded from the Logos 7 release?
There are many reasons (some small and some larger) for this. As MJ pointed out, the primary reason is lack of available materials. It is a complex and sometimes protracted process to get new materials into our base packages. Probably the next most significant reason is that our Orthodox product manager left in February for a different job. That has left me (and Anglo-Catholic) and Lou (a Roman Catholic) to manager Orthodox-related things. While Lou and I have enough knowledge between us to handle the day-to-day management of the Orthodox product line, building a base package is a little bit harder and we want to make 100% sure we get it right. I'm just about done with a first draft of the packages and I plan to reach out to Gabe (the previous Orthodox product manager) to see if will will give them a review. Please know that the delay in shipping these packages comes from a desire to offer Orthodox Christians a quality product, even if it takes a bit longer. - If Logos does intend to continue offering packages for Orthodox Christians, what is the anticipated product release date and will the same introductory v7 deals be available?
I'm really hesitant to give a product release date at this point (I already regret saying that they'd be available at the end of last week). There are a lot of moving pieces and some of them are out of my control. That said, I am hopeful that I'll finish the first draft today and get it reviewed in the next couple days.
As to why we pulled the previous packages: again, there are a number of reasons for this. One of them has to do with the way our website handles base package tracks as they show up in comparison charts and other base-package related pages. Relatedly, the way we reconfigured the base packages for 7 (decoupling the feature set from the libraries) wouldn't have worked with the existing packages (because they fall in the English-speaking track of packages). Pulling out the resources and offering them separately would've been somewhat difficult and would've essentially made more Orthodox bundles.
I hope that helps give you a bit more clarity into the situation. You can rest assured that we are working hard on getting out new Orthodox base packages as soon as possible.
Senior Director, Content Products
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Thank you for the reply. I appreciate it. I didn't realize Gabe was no longer with Logos, so that explains a few things. I would recommend in the future to use the Orthodox products mailing list to let existing customers know they haven't been forgotten or have a coming soon placeholder next to Orthodox base packages in future releases. Folks are still clicking on ads such as this one but now not finding what they were looking for:
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Ben Amundgaard said:
1. Does Logos intend to continue offering base packages to Orthodox Christians?
Yes. We have no plans to discontinue our Orthodox line of products.
So when will a free Orthodox book of the month start to be available?0 -
Hey Ben!
What about us former platinum purchasers? How does all this affect us?
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David Ames said:Ben Amundgaard said:
1. Does Logos intend to continue offering base packages to Orthodox Christians?
Yes. We have no plans to discontinue our Orthodox line of products.
So when will a free Orthodox book of the month start to be available?Are they planning to have denominational/tradition-specific freebies of the month?
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Columbcille Dougherty said:
What about us former platinum purchasers? How does all this affect us?
'We' lost nothing. 'We' just do not have anything new to buy - yet,
'We' just need a dedicated Orthodox manager and about 10,000 additional Orthodox customers ready to buy at Silver or higher.
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Yasmin Stephen said:
Are they planning to have denominational/tradition-specific freebies of the month?
Logos and Verbum have free books of the month so why not others?? [[I hope they are at least thinking about it]]
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David Ames said:Yasmin Stephen said:
Are they planning to have denominational/tradition-specific freebies of the month?
Logos and Verbum have free books of the month so why not others?? [[I hope they are at least thinking about it]]
That would be great - but I would hate to have to pick a denomination and be limited to its freebies forever after!
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David Ames said:Yasmin Stephen said:
Are they planning to have denominational/tradition-specific freebies of the month?
Logos and Verbum have free books of the month so why not others?? [[I hope they are at least thinking about it]]
I thought the separate freebies was because there's logos.com and verbum.com, and not merely denominational.
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Yasmin Stephen said:
I thought the separate freebies was because there's logos.com and verbum.com, and not merely denominational.
That is the reason. There have been several Orthodox books given as the Free Book of the Month on Verbum. St. Athanasius' On the Incarnation of the Word of God was given as a freebie, for instance.
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EastTN said:David Ames said:Yasmin Stephen said:
Are they planning to have denominational/tradition-specific freebies of the month?
Logos and Verbum have free books of the month so why not others?? [[I hope they are at least thinking about it]]
That would be great - but I would hate to have to pick a denomination and be limited to its freebies forever after!
The way it works now is that if you know where to find them you can have them all. And the second is only 1.99.
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David Ames said:EastTN said:David Ames said:Yasmin Stephen said:
Are they planning to have denominational/tradition-specific freebies of the month?
Logos and Verbum have free books of the month so why not others?? [[I hope they are at least thinking about it]]
That would be great - but I would hate to have to pick a denomination and be limited to its freebies forever after!
The way it works now is that if you know where to find them you can have them all. And the second is only 1.99.
Unless it's Verbum's, which is only $.99.
“The trouble is that everyone talks about reforming others and no one thinks about reforming himself.” St. Peter of Alcántara
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Ben Amundgaard said:
I assure you that there's not attempt here at a lack of transparency and I'm very sorry it feels that way. Let me try to answer your questions as frankly as possible:
Thank you for your response Ben. The very simple way to avoid this problem is to communicate with your customers. You have forums, you have mailing lists you even had a Orthodox Blog and if memory servers me correct a Orthodox launch page on Logos.com. Make use of these means of communication with your customers. Don't just simply pull everything down without telling them what your good intentions are for the product range.
If you communicated this ahead of time, say 6 weeks ago that in four weeks time we need to pull existing Orthodox packages from the product range for a period of time, but they will be coming back at a yet to be determine period of time. But if you now have four weeks to upgrade your existing base packages before we remove the old ones - you might have generated some additional sales. When the Logos 7 packages were released for the other denominations maybe revival of the old Orthodox Library Builder might have been an option as a sweetener to those of the Orthodox Faith - maybe contractual issues prevented this but its just a thought about how Faithlife could have gone about this whole process in a different way that would have communicated to their Orthodox customers they are still very much valued and still very much a part of Faithlife plans instead of the cloak and dagger removal of the product range overnight. Faithlife seem to stumble from one bad PR exercise to the next with its customers. I just don't understand why they never learn from the same basic mistake of not communicating with their customers. It's Customer Service 101, Retail 101 and Marketing 101 basic stuff.
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I'd certainly welcome a chance to explore works from other traditions at a reduced price to see whether I would want to invest in a larger set.David Ames said:EastTN said:David Ames said:Yasmin Stephen said:Are they planning to have denominational/tradition-specific freebies of the month?
Logos and Verbum have free books of the month so why not others?? [[I hope they are at least thinking about it]]
That would be great - but I would hate to have to pick a denomination and be limited to its freebies forever after!
The way it works now is that if you know where to find them you can have them all. And the second is only 1.99.
WIN 11 i7 9750H, RTX 2060, 16GB RAM, 1TB SSD | iPad Air 3
Verbum Max0 -
David Ames said:EastTN said:David Ames said:Yasmin Stephen said:
Are they planning to have denominational/tradition-specific freebies of the month?
Logos and Verbum have free books of the month so why not others?? [[I hope they are at least thinking about it]]
That would be great - but I would hate to have to pick a denomination and be limited to its freebies forever after!
The way it works now is that if you know where to find them you can have them all. And the second is only 1.99.
And I do, each and every month - for which I'm very grateful to FaithLife. I should have been a bit more explicit about my point. Realistically, there has to be a limit to how many free resources FaithLife can afford to give away every month. They have what, seven denominational packages in addition to the "Standard" and Verbum packages - eight if you count Orthodox? That would be eight additional resources each month, plus another eight for either $0.99 or $1.99. I would absolutely love that. But that would be sixteen additional minimal cost books each month, on top of the four I'm already getting, for twenty in total. My library has already significantly benefited from the various free offers FaithLife has made over the last several years. If I were getting a couple of hundred books a year essentially for free, at some point it seems that it would reduce my motivation to keep buying new books. And folks buying new books is what keeps the lights on at FaithLife.
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EastTN said:
They have what, seven denominational packages in addition to the "Standard" and Verbum packages - eight if you count Orthodox? That would be eight additional resources each month, plus another eight for either $0.99 or $1.99. I would absolutely love that. But that would be sixteen additional minimal cost books each month, on top of the four I'm already getting, for twenty in total.
There is one problem to your logic. Once your library exceeds size xxx you already own the books offered so you don't get any that month.
Currently they are offered only in "Standard" and Verbum.
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David Ames said:EastTN said:
They have what, seven denominational packages in addition to the "Standard" and Verbum packages - eight if you count Orthodox? That would be eight additional resources each month, plus another eight for either $0.99 or $1.99. I would absolutely love that. But that would be sixteen additional minimal cost books each month, on top of the four I'm already getting, for twenty in total.
There is one problem to your logic. Once your library exceeds size xxx you already own the books offered so you don't get any that month.
Currently they are offered only in "Standard" and Verbum.
Sure. Every now and then the free book of the month is something I already have. That's happened to me twice this year. First, with the JPS commentaries offered in January, and then with Athanasius' On the Incarnation of the Word of God in April (and even then, I didn't have the audio, and I don't remember the plus one, but I don't think I had it either). I suspect it's not a clean cut-off, but simply a case where that will happen more frequently as your library gets larger. And given the variety of free books they offer, I suspect my library would have to become larger than I could imagine - or have any real need for - before it got to the point that I rarely got any benefit out of the free book program.
I'm not sure what you mean that the free books are only offered in "Standard." The JPS Commentary on the Torah from January was from the Jewish Publication Society, I'm pretty sure that Athanasius would be of interest to the Orthodox, July's books focused on Pentecostalism, and I think that the commentaries that were offered in August come from the Mennonite tradition. They seem to be covering the waterfront of everything that's not Catholic - and the Verbum giveaways cover that.
Don't get me wrong - I heartily encourage FaithLife to give me all the free books they can afford to! It just strikes me that they're already being incredibly generous. With the miscellaneous giveaways they periodically have, and counting the non-fiction Vyrso titles, I figure that I've averaged well over 50 free or nominally priced books a year over the last few years. I'm incredibly grateful that they do it, but I sometimes wonder how they can make it work financially.
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Thanks for this and for keeping the Orthodox packages "alive"
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I just hope the Orthodox packages are out in time for Orthodox users to take advantage of the Logos 7 launch pricing offers
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Ben,
I'm sure you could probably reach out to some of your Orthodox users for assistance. I know you have worked with St. Vladimir's And St. Tikhon's Orthodox Theological Seminaries, and I can assure you that both locations are chock full of (admittedly very busy) Professors, Priests, and Deacons, who could offer valuable insight into what Orthodox clergy, academics, and pious laymen would find of value.
Mine is only one Deacon's opinion, but I can try to offer some assistance, as well.
You might get a slightly different viewpoint if you reach out to Holy Trinity Seminary in Jordanville (Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia), and Holy Cross in Boston (Greek Orthodox Archdiocese).
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Hi all,
We finally shipped the L7 Orthodox packages. It will take a while for the various pages throughout the site to populate, but you can get directly to the product pages (a big thanks to Gabe Martini for reviewing these for us):
https://www.logos.com/product/81188/orthodox-gold
https://www.logos.com/product/81187/orthodox-silver
https://www.logos.com/product/81186/orthodox-bronze
https://www.logos.com/product/81185/orthodox-starter
As you'll see, there is currently no Platinum level package (primarily because we don't have enough Orthodox content to construct a Platinum package). We don't have plans to ship one in the near future. If/when we do, I'll post here.
Sorry, there is a caching issue on the site. I'll repost when the products are actually live.
Senior Director, Content Products
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[deleted]
Senior Director, Content Products
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With other packages there is an intermediate step after you "add to cart" before checkout where you are offered some additional discounted resources.
Seems that may be what still needs to be added ?I can find Orthodox Gold with a search and I can "add to cart", but I cannot see its contents yet (saved to later)....
[:)]
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Ben Amundgaard said:
[deleted]
If the links are being prepared then the product can not be far behind.
Assuming that the Orthodox packages will use the Verbum feature sets, yes?
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David Ames said:
Assuming that the Orthodox packages will use the Verbum feature sets, yes?
when you add the package to the cart, it adds the Logos Feature Set, not the Verbum Set. It's easy enough to swap out, but I would've defaulted to the Verbum set myself.
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What are the differences?
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David J. Wilson said:
What are the differences?
May have missed something but this is what I found
Verbum 7 Full Feature Set
Other
Catholic Topical Index Dataset Documentation
Saints Dataset Documentation
Logos 7 Full Feature SetCourses
LT271: Study the Bible with Logos: Jonah 1 *
LT271: Study the Bible with Logos: Jonah 1 (Audio) *
LT271: Study the Bible with Logos: Jonah 1 (Videos) *Datasets
Bullinger's Figures of Speech Dataset0 -
That's about all I see as well.
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The product pages are not working, but you can add the Orthodox packages to your shopping cart.
Orthodox Starter
logos.com/buy/81764
Orthodox Bronze
logos.com/buy/81765
Orthodox Silver
logos.com/buy/81766
Orthodox Gold
logos.com/buy/81767
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I wouldn't order anything till you can see what you are getting but form placing these in my cart, unless there are any last minute changes to libraries
Orthodox Starter - free to me i.e. I already own all the resourrces
Orthodox Bronze - under $10 for me
Orthodox Silver - approx $48 for me
Orthodox Gold - approx $172 for me
I did previously own the Orthodox Library Builder, Logos 6 Orthodox Platinum and the Logos 6 Orthodox Studies XL Bundle.
Looks like Gold is where I'm going to get the most change in resource offerings.
The following link may give an insight into what some of the new resources in these packages may be for you based on your current ownership:
I"m seeing a fair bit of CP and the odd Prepub mixed in amongst Live resources i don't own a license. Clicking on individual resources shows which base package they are assigned to, if any, but till we get the final release it's not final.
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Is there still no word on when these product pages will be live?
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Disciple of Christ (doc) said:
Orthodox Starter - free to me i.e. I already own all the resourrces
Orthodox Bronze - under $10 for me
Orthodox Silver - approx $48 for me
Orthodox Gold - approx $172 for me
Heads up: the link does not seem to add the Feature Sets
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Randy W. Sims said:
Is there still no word on when these product pages will be live?
They are live now.
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