John Francis wrote:
mike wilson mused:
Not sure I agree with you (I don't think the photographer analogy stands up at all) and I still don't understand why music CDs are so much cheaper, given the development costs are similar.
You're confusing unit manufacturing cost with product development cost.
A decent music CD can be put together in a year by maybe a couple of dozen people, probably not even working full time on making the CD.
Something like PhotoShop involves more like a couple of hundred people during a multi-year development phase, not to mention needing product support (there's no post-sales support on a music CD). Factor in the fact that software engineers tend to be rather higher paid than most musicians, and a 40-to-one price ratio doesn't seem that ridiculous.
No I'm not. My argument was based on an orchestra, that has years of training and months of development costs for a performace. The higher pay is a function of the higher retail price which is a function of the amount customers are willing to pay. Or believe they need to.
mike
