Re: Unfair WO4 pricing

[Derin Bluhm]

First, I agree with everyone saying that the other real competitors will cost you as much or more for an enterprise class system. True, ASP can be had for nothing. That makes it pretty attractive to the small scale developer. I won't bother to comment on performance or further bash the boys from Redmond. That's been handled. If you only need to build limited applications or have small throughput requirements, WO may not be the best choice. If you need the horsepower you have to pay to play.

Regarding the new pricing, I feel it is an improvement. Under the 3.5.1 pricing, a small developer could not roll-out an application to the internet for general use (users not named), without giving up the $25,000 license fee. Now, you can buy the $7,500 license and serve up as many different applications as you like. Sure you are limited to hits on the application server, but at least you can deploy.

Besides, starting out, not many people are using the applications. If you suddenly find yourself an overnight Internet business success, you should be able to generate the income to justify the $25,000. I tried to build a cost-effective business model around limited deployment under 3.5.1 pricing but was unable to make the numbers work out. I have several general purpose applications that don't necessarily require login of named users. Now I can pay the $7,500 and roll them out. Under 3.5.1, it was $25,000.

Just my 2 cents. Of course, if Apple wants to cut the price....

Regards, Derin.