On 7/2/20 11:34 PM, Brian Westerman wrote:
How much would a hobbyist pay for a Harley, a really nice drone, or
some of the other expensive hobbies.
I don't have figures handy, but I strongly suspect that all of the above
don't average out at $5,000 a year. I suspect they come in considerably
lower than that.
People pay upwards of $1K a year for a new phone.
Even that is only 20% of the cost of z/PDT. You probably (could) get
much more real world use out of your phone than you do z/PDT.
... I suppose you are correct, if you can't justify the cost, then it
might seem too much.
It's not only the matter of justification. There is also the fact that
some, if not many, people interested in mainframe simply don't have that
type of money to put towards an interest. Further, for many, the
interest and probably casual at best, especially early on.
Asking someone who's been spending a lot of time on the mainframe to
spend $5k / year who is willing to do that in lieu of a Harley / boat /
sports car, sure. But that is a much smaller segment of the market.
Remember the unofficial layers eight and nine of the OSI model. Eight
being politics and nine being money. They are in that order because if
you can't beg, borrow, or steal the money, you can't spend it on something.
Although, the alternative of doing it illegally is not even what I
would consider to be an option at all.
I'm not advocating for an illegal option.
I am advocating for a new and different legal option.
I'd like to see something that would allow me to access a contemporary
z/OS / z/VM system with about 1 MIPS of user space processes (I don't
know what the OS needs these days). I'd be willing to pay $20 to $100 a
month for that. Where is the mainframe VPS that is approachable for
hobbyists and students? Even $100 a month is rich for many hobbyists
and students. But that's at effectively five times more accessible than
a z/PDT.
All of the mainframe VPS options that I've seen are targeting businesses
that are going to spend 4+ figures a month. Which again excludes
hobbyists and student.
I find it very difficult to believe that some business couldn't rent out
tiny z/VM guests as VPSs for < $100 a month. Limited resources (storage
/ CPU / DASD) would be perfectly fine for hobbyists & students.
I want to be crystal clear on something. I think that z/PDT is
perfectly acceptable for businesses, even small ones. It is only the
smaller / lower end market that it is a problem for.
Unfortunately, it's this smaller / lower end market that /needs/ to have
their interest captured, lest the current guard will find that there are
no new guard to be had.
Master the Mainframe is a nice thing for the first 3-9 months. But
where does someone who has completed MtM turn to after the 9 months
before they have a job. Even when they do have a job, they probably
can't play / learn / grow on the work system like they could a personal
guest VM.
</rant>
--
Grant. . . .
unix || die
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