Jim,
At 01:58 AM 2/23/2007, Jim Winstead wrote:
On Thu, Feb 22, 2007 at 11:33:47PM -0600, mos wrote:
> That's just one guy's opinion. :)
And quite misinformed, unfortunately.
The pricing is what I am getting off of your web site. So if I am
misinformed, then it is MySQL AB that is misinforming people.
I have your database competitors telling me that MySQL license is $595 *per
year* because they keep misreading your web page. It's not just me. The
whole database community is confused as to the pricing for MySQL AB. And
let's not even get into your licensing interpretations.
$595 is the per-server price for MySQL Enterprise, which includes
support, the network monitoring and advisory service, and more. It is
not the OEM pricing. You may notice that we don't publish OEM pricing,
precisely because it is far too easy for someone to think they just need
to multiply some base price times some theoretical number of units.
So why can't they??? Does someone in MySQL AB sales have to wave some mojo
over the licensing application before you can come up with a number for the
customer?
Why not have an OEM breakdown of prices for 1-9 units, 10-99 units etc.?
That's how other database firms work. They are up front with their pricing.
Why keep people in the dark of MySQL AB pricing? It seems to me like you
change the prices from one individual to another for the same quantity of
OEM licenses otherwise you would publish the prices.
If you are an ISV looking to license MySQL for distribution with your
application, contact the MySQL sales team. They are happy to work with
you to fit find the pricing model that makes the most sense. (Or, of
course, you can just open source your application.)
Great. Let's see. I have this one customer for my application and I need
one OEM MySQL license. What's it going to cost me? Hmm. Could it be $595?
People can't figure out what to charge for their commercial application
until they determine what your licensing will cost them. They might sell
only 5 applications per month, and then next year it could be 20. Then it
could be back down to 5 per month. If your pricing is pegged to the
quantity over a certain time period, then their profit margins will be
going up and down like a yo-yo. That's no way to run a business.
And I hope we can now consider this horse to be sufficiently dead.
When you start publishing accurate pricing on your website, then it can be
considered dead.
And you wonder why people prefer to use other royalty free databases
(Firebird, PostgreSQL) for commercial applications? You're losing a lot of
customers with this licensing subterfuge. Sheesh. :(
Mike
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