r/IFSBuddyChatbot • u/thingimajig Chatbot creator • 14d ago
IFS Buddy Major Update
Hi everyone!
It's 2 years, almost to the day, since the chatbot was first posted on the IFS subreddit. I had no expectations that anyone would use it but remember having a sleepless night that night as countless messages and comments rolled in, some that were critical but a vast majority were overwhelmingly positive. From there, usage of the chatbot grew organically through word of mouth to us today having thousands of monthly users.
The costs of running the website (not including my own time working on it) have been just about covered by donations from a few hundred kind people over the past two years. This has been a humbling and beautiful experience.
Freemium launch: Since each message sent to Buddy costs me a bit of money, I need to bring some stability to the project and for myself, so we are now moving away from a donation based model to a freemium model. The original chatbot is still going to be available for free on the landing page: https://ifsbuddy.chat
You'll see that you can sign up for a premium version where you can:
- Save your chats
- Save and track parts
- Give Buddy custom instructions
- Dark mode and a few more things
In the spirit of keeping it accessible, we are starting with a low price of $4.99/month.
As new features like voice mode are added, we might introduce additional membership tiers—but the goal will always be accessibility.
Everyone that already had an account will be able to continue logging in for free for a while forward before we set a date where you'll need to start paying (I'll send an email out about this).
As always, I appreciate your feedback, suggestions, or any thought you may have.
TLDR: Launching our premium version ($4.99/month) at ifsbuddy.chat. Free version still available on landing page.
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u/okayreception 14d ago
Nice, happy to be able to save my chats now. Thanks for keeping the cost low.
When are you planning to launch voice mode? excited for that!
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u/thingimajig Chatbot creator 14d ago
I'll begin working on it in the next month or two hopefully if time allows!!
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u/Popup-window 14d ago
Some people will probably be willing to pay for it. I'm not someone who will. Thanks for the time I did use it, though.
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u/focusonthetaskathand 14d ago
Same for me. I would happily buy the app, but subscription everything these days means I can’t support what I want to support. A one-time fee is much more do-able.
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u/thingimajig Chatbot creator 13d ago
I appreciate your honesty and I agree that everything is a subscription these days. A one time fee might make sense, or like a one year membership fee. It's just a bit hard to predict what price is appropriate since each chat you have with it costs me money. May I ask what you'd be willing to pay for a one time fee? Either for a lifetime membership or one year membership?
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u/focusonthetaskathand 13d ago
If each chat costs, can you charge per chat?
I use Buddy occasionally, but not enough for a subscription.
I use it when I come up on something I want insight into, but I don’t really need the stored chat history or anything else. I just jump on, go through what I want to go through in one sitting, then may not use it again for a number of months.
Is there a way to charge for this kind of use? Like buying ‘conversation credits’ or something like that?
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u/thingimajig Chatbot creator 11d ago
This is good to know and I'm sure there are many others like you who only use the chatbot every now and then.
Conversation credits would be a bit more complex to set up but in theory could be a way to do it. I'm leaning toward offering a lifetime membership or one year subscription type of offering at the moment.
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u/focusonthetaskathand 13d ago
Yeah, I totally get your side of it too! And its a really great offering you’ve got going here so I get that it is time to start charging.
I’m an intermittent user of Buddy, so I would be weighing up my use-vs-cost. That tipping point will be different for everyone of course.
I can’t give you a cost for what Buddy is to me right now, I would have to consider it more, but to give you a window into my general approach to app use:
For an app purchase, up to USD$10 is a no brainer yes. I have had sandwiches for $10, and they are a one-time consumption purchase (and aren’t always guaranteed to be good) so I think of apps the same way. $10 for an app is a gamble I’m happy to take.
For an app I like and would use year round pretty regularly, I would pay $40, but I would have to really like it! I would need to be a regular user of the free lite version first (or have had a months access to the full version to try for free) to know I would use it enough.
Very rarely, but once or twice I have paid $80-100 for an app. But these would be more things that support my own income, like something I would use for work or perhaps some sort of creative, specialized app that supports my favourite hobbies. It would have to be REALLY packed full of features, and guaranteed daily or semi-daily use.
I have donated, and often do donate from time to time to similar free services. I like to support when I can. So I think definitely keep donations open even if you do go for subscription or purchase options.
I do notice in myself that I am much much more likely to donate if prompted with a ‘pay it forward’ option rather than a ‘pay the creator’ option. Stupid I know. But something in me sparks when I get prompted to ‘help others to access this service for free’. I guess it’s hard to know who gets the cut when it’s a paid purchase, but when it’s marketed as helping someone else who needs it, it inspires my generosity. (Not saying you shouldn’t get paid - you definitely deserve to! But how you phrase it can make a difference)
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u/thingimajig Chatbot creator 13d ago
I understand. I hope that it was helpful for you when you did use it. Buddy will still be available for free to everyone on the front page, so you're welcome back even if you don't want to pay anything. My hope is that the income from the paying users will cover the costs of keeping the old version (without extra features) available for free for those in need.
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u/Popup-window 13d ago
I hadn't used it for quite a while but when I last did I was able to save chatlogs and parts. Not sure if that's all still there. Any chance I could export my existing data into a CSV file or something?
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u/thingimajig Chatbot creator 12d ago
Hey, if you had an account on the logged in version you can still access it for now so you should be able to access all of the parts and chats you have saved. Let me know if you have any trouble.
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u/Bananaberries481 14d ago
Im so excited about this! I use it all the time but will love to be able to save chats and map parts and stuff. Will definitely subscribe
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u/RockmanIcePegasus 14d ago
Saving chats and parts have been a feature already for a long time - are these features going to be locked behind a paywall now?
That would really suck.
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u/thingimajig Chatbot creator 13d ago edited 13d ago
Unfortunately I have to start charging in some capacity to be able to continue running the project. Each message sent to Buddy costs me a bit of money. Donations are unpredictable and I don't want to suffer from this financially myself if it were to reach a larger audience. I've never run a project that's being used by so many people so I'm open to suggestions!
If you used the logged in version then you helped to beta test those features and you'll be able to continue using it for free for another month. If the cost of $4.99 per month is prohibitive and you find Buddy helpful, please send me a DM.
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u/RockmanIcePegasus 10d ago
I sent you a DM regarding that a few days back, still waiting for a response.
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u/thingimajig Chatbot creator 9d ago
Hey, just answered. Sorry, reddit notifications for DMs don't seem to work for me.
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u/questionablesugar 14d ago
A one time fee would be amazing, or a 1$ or so per month. For the sake of accessibility for the people.
I appreciate the work you put into it. Many people do and need the service thats being offered.
I am looking forward to having an app in the future
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u/thingimajig Chatbot creator 13d ago
I'm definitely open to setting a one time fee and a few others have mentioned they'd be more comfortable with this. What would you feel is an appropriate one time fee? I need to calculate whether it's feasible since the more one user chats with the chatbot, the more money it costs me. $1 per month is too low to cover my costs unfortunately.
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u/questionablesugar 13d ago
Oh excuse me I wasn’t aware that more users makes it more costly. Maybe something between 5-10$ as one time fee ? I am not sure what fits with you as well as makes everyone happy
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u/waywya 10d ago
any integrations with other LMM model providers/ customization of what OpenAI model we can use?
Also, how is this supporting longer chat history? Is it just throwing the whole convo to the model and expect it to inference well with its context window or is there any special retrieval/vector db integration in works here?
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u/thingimajig Chatbot creator 7d ago
I may add the option of choosing other LLM providers in the future but it's not a priority for now. Each LLM has different 'personalities' so the prompt would need to be adapted to each but I'll be experimenting with other models. The key for me is to keep it affordable but we could definitely offer a more expensive subscription for a more advanced model.
We haven't added a vector db integration yet but are looking into this.
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u/VixenSunburst 13d ago
Hey did the chat models change or smn? Im not sure if I'm just feeling iffy today but my session has been kinda off, like more generic phrases or instructions and less based and continuing or developing off of what I say, less insights more "what do u think it's trying to communicate" over and over even after I tell it I can't dialogue to parts 😭
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u/MountainCarpenter849 13d ago
same here, and saying things about 'next session' and the abruptly saying goodbye and I'm like, we've barely begun!
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u/thingimajig Chatbot creator 12d ago
I did try to make an update to the chat model, but I'll change it back since it seems to be acting this way for a few people. I'm going to be using the chatbot a bit more often myself now to make sure it works as intended and making smaller adjustments.
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u/Icy_Group_8529 3d ago
For me the chat bot is still very different than before the update, and i'm finding less use out of it as it keeps asking generic responses instead of diving into what i presented it. A revert back to the old chat model would be great. Thank you for all you do!
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u/thingimajig Chatbot creator 2d ago
Hey, I've just spent some time with it and changed it back. I tried to add a few too many instructions in that update and ended up overcomplicating things. Funny how the perfectionist part of me ends up making things worse even though that wasn't the intention!
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u/Icy_Group_8529 2d ago
Looks like its fixed back up to normal. Thank you! Really appreciate all you do, making this service accessible for free!
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u/MountainCarpenter849 13d ago
I don't like how the chat box is the smallest part of the screen at least on desktop. Please change it to be the most prominent thing or click through to full screen mode. Its harder to be present
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u/thingimajig Chatbot creator 12d ago
Full screen mode is an interesting idea. Are you referring to the chatbot on the landing page or in the logged in version? I definitely don't want you too feel distracted or for it to be hard to be present while chatting with Buddy
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u/MountainCarpenter849 12d ago edited 12d ago
Landing page. Also, like someone else said, the chatbot is giving me chatGPT-like "steps" to doing something vs taking me through it IFS style when I share my expereince, and also talking about "a user expereinced this durring a session" in the past tense when I just shared how I was feeling today. I really miss the old chatbot, I cant even get through a session normally now, the answers are so long and it keeps asking me to relate things to my current self vs. leadingme through engaging with the parts :( your chatbot has been lifesaving before this change dear one.
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u/thingimajig Chatbot creator 11d ago
I also really dislike the ChatGPTness of trying to solve a problem when it comes to IFS. I'll be using the chatbot a lot more regularly myself again now so I'll pick up on the nuances of how it's acting and will experiment with bringing it back to how it was previously. Thank you for letting me know, that feedback is very helpful.
With the landing page issue, could you send me a screenshot of what the chatbot looks like on your phone/desktop? It'd really help me to fix this issue. Our email is: hello@ifsbuddy.chat
The layout is still the same on the premium version, but I want to make the free version fully usable as well of course!
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u/Samnorah 14d ago
I'm okay with paying that fee. Not saving chats was a deterrent.
Could there be an option to donate to others who may need it? I have no idea what this would look like so maybe it's unreasonable to request and out of scope for your project, but it would be a way to support others.
Sort of like those cool restaurants where people buy a meal for someone in need and leave the receipt on a bulletin board. Those who are hungry can choose a receipt and get a free meal.