Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!cs.utexas.edu!usc!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!mips!apple!chuq
From: chuq@Apple.COM (The Bounty Hunter)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac.programmer
Subject: Re: Shareware and $$ (was Re: Public Domain Software programming)
Message-ID: <40230@apple.Apple.COM>
Date: 12 Apr 90 21:25:07 GMT
References: <3094@umbc3.UMBC.EDU> <49b9d37b.15840@valley.UUCP> <52755@coherent.coherent.com>
Distribution: usa
Organization: Dotty Eye's PI's
Lines: 80

dplatt@coherent.com (Dave Platt) writes:

>> Second, from my experience, don't bother.  It gets distributed quite widely,
>> and VERY few people pay.

I feel like someone should pop in and point out the difference between
'distribute' and 'use' here. I take a look at a fair number of shareware
programs over a period of time. The number I use is rather small. Just
because I downloaded it from GEnie and didn't pay for it doesn't mean I'm an
idiot. It may mean I decided it wasn't useful to me, so comparisons like "It
got 500 downloads and 4 checks" aren't necessarily valid. (which is not to
imply those 496 people all threw it out, just that some percentage did. The
rest didn't pay).

>True.  I doubt that there are more than a handful of people who have
>made a substantial amount of money from their shareware products...
>Scott Watson (Red Ryder),

Who decided he had to take his product commercial

>Don Brown / CE Software (DiskTop),

Who decided he had to go commercial to survive, and only distributes
freeware stuff (like Vaccine) now as promotional material for his commercial
products.

>Jeff
>Shulman (VirusDetective),

Who still has shareware stuff out there (thanks, Jeff!) but also has
crippleware/demoware as well.

I point this out only to remind folks that the 'successes' of shareware are,
at best, marginal successes. It's more or less a no-win situation for the
author.

>>                              These people then have the nerve to expect
>> support for the software.

>Nerve?  Well, I dunno.  If you're asking somebody to pay you for the
>right to use your software, then (in my humble opinion) it's not
>surprising at all if they expect you to provide support of some
>degree..

Damn straight. And they should. The idea of shareware was to allow people a
chance to buy something of commercial quality without the markups involved
in a commercial endeavor -- distributor and retailer markups, advertising,
packaging overhead, et al. That doesn't mean the author doesn't have the
responsibility to deal with the product like a real, commercial product --
just to get the middlemen who like to stand in between author and customer
with their palms sweaty out of the loop.

There are authors who do a good job of support: Dave Dunham, Jeff again, the
author of Boomerang (with his billions of bug-fixes and his refusal to
accept money until boomerang stopped being betaware) come to mind offhand.
But you're still shipping a commercial product, and that means that you have
a responsibility to your customers to support it (your *paid* customers,
I'll emphasize. If they're supposed to pay and don't, they got no room to
complain). The number of shareware authors who have cashed checks and
disappeared, only to have the program break on new machines or new releases
of system software are legion, and one of the reasons why I think many
people are wary of shareware in general.

>It's probably significant that the few people who have made money from
>their shareware products seem to be those who DO provide some degree of
>support for their users.

Agreed. I'm more likely to send in a shareware check to someone that shows
he cares about his users than a generic about box with a plea for money.
It's called building a relationship -- there are so many random (and trivial
or useless) pieces of software clamoring for my shareware money that
something has to make themselves stick out above the noise.

-- 

Chuq Von Rospach   <+>   chuq@apple.com   <+>   [This is myself speaking]

I regret to announce that--though, as I said, eleventy-one years is far too
short a time to spend among you--this is the end. I am going. Good-bye.
		-- Bilbo