cmcmanis@stpeter.Eng.Sun.COM (Chuck McManis) (11/06/90)
In article <658@tron.UUCP> (Bill Shipley) writes: >According to a recent news article, NeXT sold about 7,000 machines in their >first year. This does not appear to be enough to support large scale >application development. > ... but at the rate they are selling I would expect new software to > appear much more slowly than it did for the ST. Software sells for a _lot_ more money on the NeXT, selling 1000 packages at $2,000 is equivalent to selling 10,000 packages at $200 or 20,000 and $100. Remember that the sale price to the developer is the one he or she charges the distributor. The price to the end user is about 40 - 50% higher. When is the last time you paid $150 for a program for the Atari? Did 19,999 other people buy it to? (Probably not, selling 1,000 copies of a non-game type program on the Atari platform is considered to be a major "hit") Add up the numbers for yourself. 1000 * 150 = $150,000. That is enough to pay for one full time programmer for a year and have $50,000 left over. Advertising, shows, and production will eat out most of that $50,000 leaving about $5,000. It's really tough to make a living on $5,000 a year. -- --Chuck McManis Sun Microsystems uucp: {anywhere}!sun!cmcmanis BIX: <none> Internet: cmcmanis@Eng.Sun.COM These opinions are my own and no one elses, but you knew that didn't you. "I tell you this parrot is bleeding deceased!"