Hi Steve.
>>> Sure there is per-unit cost. Anyone who says otherwise has never
>>> produced commercial software and had to support users!
>> See my .signature -- I write commercial software. But let's take
>> shareware for example -- usually, the customer receives no
>> physical goods for their money. In this case, there are no
>> per-unit costs -- it is all flat rate.
> In the late 80's I wrote a series of music synthesizer
> editor/librarians for the Mac. They were first released as
> shareware. While it was kinda cool having Steve Winwood and Will
> Lee call me for help, there were a lot of people that were just
> plain work. I finally sold the programs to a commercial company
> for less than they were worth, just so I could dump the support
> headache.
Throughout the 80's and 90's, I have written various software that I
have released as shareware or hamware as appropriate, and many copies
were supplied through the Fidonet BBS that I ran at the time, all with
my contact details therein for anybody needing support.
During the 17 years that I have been doing this, I averaged around one
support request a MONTH, which never bothered me enough for me to
worry about it. I attributed this to the fact that I was VERY careful
to ensure that the standard newbie approach to installing software
(put it into the drive, look for a program thereon, and run it)
actually worked - usually, the root directory consisted of three
entries; two files named README.1ST and INSTALL.BAT and a directory
called DATA on which the HIDDEN attribute was set.
> I maintain there is a per-unit cost!
If there is, then your software is not very good...
Best wishes from Riley.
+----------------------------------------------------------------------+
| There is something frustrating about the quality and speed of Linux |
| development, ie., the quality is too high and the speed is too high, |
| in other words, I can implement this XXXX feature, but I bet someone |
| else has already done so and is just about to release their patch. |
+----------------------------------------------------------------------+
* ftp://ftp.MemAlpha.cx/pub/rhw/Linux
* http://www.MemAlpha.cx/kernel.versions.html
