meo@stiatl.UUCP (Miles O'Neal) (12/22/89)
In article <dupuy.89Dec21131227@cs.columbia.edu> dupuy@cs.columbia.edu writes: |In article <8300@stiatl.UUCP> meo@stiatl.UUCP (Miles O'Neal) writes: | | 1) If I release good, quality software, that meets a real need, that doesn't | need lots of support (I *said* quality*), with good documentation, then | why on earth would people buy it if they could get it free? | | 2) A lot of other people, such as 103% of all the MIS-heads in the world, | are going to lump it in with all that "public domain bulletin board stuff"- | useless garbage and probably full of viruses, or at least nasty bugs (their | perceptions, not mine). They would summarily have someone on their staff | shot who even LET the stuff in the door. | |It seems to me that there's a bit of a contradiction lurking here - first Miles |says "why buy it if you can get it for free?" nad then says that there are lots |of people ("MIS-heads") who won't use anything they don't have to pay for. While the 1st "people" lacks a limiting adjective (as in "most people") the 2nd "people" definately says "other people". MIS-heads are a different class than most people. reread it this way, and see if it helps. If not, take two buffalos and call me in the morning. |The obvious resolution for this is to advertise the program at the going rates |(with different prices for different CPUs, of course) in the MIS magazines, and |let people copy it if they care to. I think you'd be suprised how many people |will pay for it just so that the MIS-heads are happy. Except for the copying bit, that's how I would reach a broad audience anyway. But I get enough adventure riding a motorcycle to work in Atlanta traffic. I'm not about to bet my income on people's good graces. Mayhap having kids to feed (and having seen several negative income months at one point after we had them) has affected my outlook? Tell you what. You agree to give me what I'm making now, with decent benefits & raises, while YOU give the software away, and we'll talk, ok? -Miles