From: Marvin Dickens <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: Re: gEDA-user: More footprint stuff Date: Thu, 27 Jan 2005 21:41:57 -0500 Message-ID: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> On Thursday 27 January 2005 8:26 pm, Stuart Brorson wrote: > > The basic problem with software is explained by Capitalist Economics > > 101: Software's marginal cost of reproduction is basically nil, so > > in a ideally competitive market its price will tend over time to > > zero. Ways to get around this iron law of economics are: > > > > * Disrupt perfect competition, e.g. somehow become a monopoly, or > > prevent customers from having a real choice in the market place. > > > > * Keep the market in flux via research and/or constant introduction > > of new features/products, so that prices can never asymptote all > > the way to zero. > > > * Don't sell software. Give it away as a loss-leader for some other > > product which doesn't have zero cost of reproduction. > > > > You can see all three methods at play in the real world all the time. > > > > Stuart > > There is always IBM's favorite: Tie the software to the hardware so you can't > use the hardware without the software and visa-versa. Actually, it wasn't until IBM started charging for software that others also started to see buissness in selling software itself. If they only had avoided that step. :/ Cheers, Magnus
