At 0:17 -0500 18/3/06, Kafka's Daytime wrote:
I responded to some of Travis' thoughts and I think that led us off
on a different thread. Changed subject line to a more appropriate
one.
Response:
Being a developer I am of course very interested in this thread. I
have read yesterday's post under the "Braille terminal" heading, but
am not familiar with the earlier discussions on collaboration and
lack of collaboration. I think the points Joe mentions about the
issues involved are very valid and I would like to add to his points
the financial dimension.
I have been involved in developing Assistive Technology software
since 1996, initially freeware, later shareware, and finally
commercial, because I found that people where asking me for way more
features than I could deliver without quitting my job and also
because I found that many schools, institutions, and funding agencies
cannot purchase online and thus require dealers as intermediaries.
Our software has been commercial in terms of its distribution and
pricing since 2002. I found commercial pricing to be necessary
because distributors and resellers basically request high enough
prices to have a sufficient margin (in terms of actual dollars) and
also because I quickly learned that the market for Mac access
products was way to small to earn a living at shareware prices. We
are a small company and only now are we beginning to be able to
outsource, for example, translations, but we cannot yet afford
outsourcing development work, let alone have additional developers on
a monthly pay role. I mean, I have subsidized the development for
years with my own labor, but you cannot ask someone you hired to take
more salary one month and less another month, or work below minimum
wage. So my point is that small companies in this field may simply
not hire or outsource because they cannot afford it or cannot take
the financial risks. This does not mean they are not interested in
collaborating, or unwilling, or discriminating against vision
impaired developers.
Now, to end with a more positive note. We do collaborate, making sure
our software plays well together with other solutions and products.
For example, I made changes to our KeyStrokes on-screen keyboard so
that a competitor could make it work well with one of their products.
I have worked with the developer of Snapz Pro X so that users of
on-screen keyboards can now also take screen shots. For this we had
to make changes at both ends. And, for example, I would be very
interested to collaborate with folks working on braille output/input.
So there you have it, my 2 cents.
david.
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David Niemeijer, CTO
AssistiveWare(R)
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://www.assistiveware.com/
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