Sebastian Luque wrote:
Thanks for your explanation. I just find it odd that anybody would want
to deliberately buy something that's available for free. I, for one,
wouldn't trust anybody trying to sell me things I can get for free. I
would dig *very* deep in search of a scam. But I would need to know the
product is available for free in the first place.
Indeed, you'd have to give people a very compelling reason to pay you
for it.
At the simplest level, if the cost is the CD is very low, a user with a
dial-up connection might decide that paying you $5 is more convenient
than spending 5 hours downloading. And in rural areas it might actually
be cheaper too (if they have to dial long distance).
If you want to charge more than a nominal price, you probably want to
add something extra, like a manual, or a support contract.
Another idea is what Linux distributions do. All the software they give
you is free. So what are you paying for when you pay them? Simon Phipps
has an interesting analogy. Do you buy newspapers? The "news" themselves
are free. No one owns the events, or the rights to report them. You buy
a newspaper because you like the way they package the news. You like
their choice of news, their editorial style, their political stance,
etc. The reasons why you'd buy a Linux distro are similar.
Cheers,
Daniel.
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