I really cant understand what you are complaining about?. 
What I understood the alpha testers are not getting the game for free. they will still need to buy it the day that its released. 

So the only thing they get is an opportunity to send in feedback on whats working and whats not. *

Are you against all sorts of testing or just in this case? Im sorry but I just cant see anything negative with this approach.

 

1 minute ago, ca_metal said:

If you are not a fan of their methods (and have the right to be), just forget they are doing an insider program and wait the final release (as you said you would prefer to just wait).

Oh to be absolutely clear, if I get selected for insider testing I am the biggest fan of the excellent scheme, and take back all of the above. 😉

 

54 minutes ago, nickhod said:

I'm reasonably sure every alpha tester was naturally excited at the prospect of playing MSFS, rather than thinking "oh good, now I get to do unpaid work for Asobo".

You hit the nail on the head.

It's a clever way of capitalizing off peoples expectations to finally get their hands on the product. 

Why this works is beyond me. People shoud realize that testing is work. And work needs to be payed and not a privilege to participate in.

49 minutes ago, Lorby_SI said:

Your post made it sound like Microsoft is doing this to reward people. They don't. They do this because they have to. No other way to get a decent sample of real-life issues and performance in a controlled fashion.

Then why do they think they don't have to pay their testers?

24 minutes ago, nickhod said:

 

The biggest AAA games have bigger budgets and teams Asobo have for MSFS. For instance Asobo quoted around 100 people on MSFS. GTA V took a team of 1000. Yes .. one thousands people.

When people say "oh flight sims are so much more complicated than other games", I tend to tune out tbh.

This is the only point I can agree with you. There is not so much difference between AAA games and a flight sim. Furthermore, most of past issues has come because of this. 
 

But paying to test is a useless method IMO. We can be satisfied or not with the way AS/MS has chosen testers, or with why the last alpha invitations wave ended 4 days before than announced, or with why only NASA specs with 16GB has been invited so far. 

But I don’t want a new star citizen honestly. I prefer a complete product with improvements after release than an eternal pay to test game with constant issues.  

1 minute ago, aleex said:

But paying to test is a useless method IMO. We can be satisfied or not with the way AS/MS has chosen testers, or with why the last alpha invitations wave ended 4 days before than announced, or with why only NASA specs with 16GB has been invited so far. 

I can understand the argument that uncontrolled pay to test is useless. But, explicitly saying "if you have 32gb and a 2080ti you can pay $___ to test. 1000 spaces available, first come, first served".

It just seems fairer to me..
If I don't have the right hardware I can't test
If I don't have the cash I can't test
If I miss the 1000 spaces I can't test

Entry requirements and expectations are transparent and managed.

The current system has too much of a "you're not invited to the cool-kids party" feel about it for my liking.

As others have said, Asobo can do whatever they want and this is purely my opinion.

This ain't it, Chief.

I was under the impression that being given access to the game long before release day was a kind of payment in itself.

14 minutes ago, Farlis said:

Then why do they think they don't have to pay their testers?

They pay their testers. There were some open paid positions for testers on their homepage, to work on their studio on France. The testers from the Insider Program are not official testers, they are just people from the community that are willing to help on the proccess. 

Besides their inside testing they wanted to test it within the community, so they opened up their program to the outsiders. And that's not a job nor anything like that. You don't have to do anything even if you are chosen (there were cases of people not noticing the invitation e-mail for weeks on reddit and they still could download it and test it without issues).

Edited February 24, 20206 yr by ca_metal

1 minute ago, Krakin said:

This ain't it, Chief.

Hey at least we're not talking about undulating runways.

I've sacrificed any hope of testing the game before release day so we have something to argue about discuss.

I too, have been enthusiastic about getting into Alpha. But, at the end of the day I think I'll be overall a lot happier when I get to experience my first flight in a finished product where all the show stopper bugs have been cleared out of the way in the Alpha testing program.

I havery no hope for testing either, but not going on about it. I'll get it soon enough. Hmmm never picked for anything as a matter of fact. But not complaining as a have a great career that pays stupid money and my wife is 20 years younger. MSFS testing is hardly that important to complain about how people are chosen. #metoo

3 minutes ago, nickhod said:

 

It just seems fairer to me..
 

The current system has too much of a "you're not invited to the cool-kids party" feel about it for my liking.

 

 I had all the qualifications, a dated hardware, a very lousy connection and a long experience of simulation. Perfect to test the offline version ! 

I applied, was not selected, can live with it. I dont feel being  less of a (almost 71 yo) cool kid 😋.

There are two approaches to the testing, in my opinion  

- you don't do it seriously, and you play with a game full of warts. Not for me.

- or you take it seriously as you should, and then it is real work.  The spring is very early this year and my garden calls for a lot of work anyway 😎.

Last thing. Why should it be fair, Nick ? Fairness is overrated.

The size of the world compared to other games is so many magnitudes more difficult to test.

They need hundreds of testers and the cheapest way to do that is a private alpha.

Just now, domkle said:

Last thing. Why should it be fair, Nick ? Fairness is overrated.

I totally get your points, and life certainly isn't fair.

Early access to a game, gadget, movie does tend to be fair though. Pay more money, get in a line, first come, first served, only top tier members etc.

People keep saying just how much hard work testing MSFS is. I guess we don't know because of the NDA. I have hard time imagining people are there with clipboards and Excel sheets of frame rates in different areas. Don't they just play the game and report issues as they find them?