John Francis wrote:
If an orchestra only gave one performance every three years (or if they gave up public performances, and tried to survive solely on CD sales) you'd be paying a lot more that $600 for a ticket or for that CD.
I get the impression that most of the larger, more famous orchestras get most of their income from recorded music sales. They do that by selling at low profit, high turnover.
In any case, your legal choice is whether or not to buy the product. If the company sets the price too high then there is an opportunity for somebody else to step in and sell a comparable product for less. Rationalise it as much as you like, but at the end of the day you're stealing something because you don't want to pay the purchase price.
The point I'm trying to make is that I think software organisations could make similar profits by using the same model as orchestras. It's only because the buyers are conditioned to buying at high price that they think it is neccessary. Where buyers have refused to pay the high prices and resorted to mass piracy, the vendors have dramatically lowered their prices. Whether this is possible because they make such profits from "legitimate" sales that they can subsidise it is something I have no way of telling.
Everywhere I look in business, there are exhortations to improve efficiency by reducing overheads and production costs. Funny how you can still pay top whack for software and it is as grotty as a (insert your favourite grotty thing here). Buggy, crashing, awkward, memory hogging junk most of it and it doesn't seem to matter what you pay.
mike
