Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!ncar!boulder!snoopy!wallwey
From: wallwey@snoopy.Colorado.EDU (WALLWEY DEAN WILLIAM)
Newsgroups: comp.windows.ms
Subject: Re: Windows Programming
Message-ID: <22165@boulder.Colorado.EDU>
Date: 12 Jun 90 18:56:30 GMT
References: <1990Jun11.110735.13581@usenet@kadsma> <1990Jun12.010850.17716@sun.soe.clarkson.edu> <22139@boulder.Colorado.EDU> <NELSON.90Jun12132554@image.clarkson.edu>
Sender: news@boulder.Colorado.EDU
Reply-To: wallwey@snoopy.Colorado.EDU (WALLWEY DEAN WILLIAM)
Organization: University of Colorado, boulder
Lines: 47

In article <NELSON.90Jun12132554@image.clarkson.edu> nelson@clutx.clarkson.edu writes:
>....I understand that they
>shouldn't give it away.  But they could *at most* sell it for the price
>of the materials.
>
>--
>--russ (nelson@clutx [.bitnet | .clarkson.edu])  Russ.Nelson@$315.268.6667
>Violence never solves problems, it just changes them into more subtle problems

MicroSoft isn't in software just for us programmers or to see Windows to
become popular(although they would like it very much).  They are in it
to make a profit!  The amount of money(and time) that MS has put into the 
Windows SDK warrents that it be somewhat expensive. Also MicroSoft will
charge what they think the market will accept.  (That is--The market
that they want to sell to...) 

As far as costs go, the manuals that came with my SDK 2.1, are probably
worth $100 alone!  Another thing is that MicroSoft has spent alot of
money trying to get the SDK to the point where it is today.(granted it
still could be alot better!)  The way that it should be paid for is by
those who use it--the developers, not the users of windows, for they
already have large enough costs as it is with the applications software.
They shouldn't have to pay for your and my development utilities. 

Also the ~$325 mail order price is actually very good considering what
can be done with it!  You can do alot more with the ~325 SDK kit than
you can do say with comparable priced software like Lotus 1-2-3 ver 3.0
or Excel or Word for Windows, etc. You have to think of it just as
another application and a powerful one at that! 

Another thing that the price does for MSWindows is make sure that only
serious people use the development kit.  MSWindows programming, although
not impossible, is not for the 'Average joe'.  This way MicroSoft can
design the SDK and have their support for the "Big Guns" rather than
hundreds of thousands of programmers.  I know this sounds elitist, but I
think this is how MicroSoft views the world.

You did make one good point, and that was that MicroSoft (and
programmers for that matter) would benifit from the increased amount
Windows code and Programms floating around if more people had access (afford)
to write Windows programs.  Of course the same could be said of
MicroSoft C.  Why not give that away free, and have more users be able to
write DOS and OS/2 programs?  Because people will buy it if they have
to! 

	My $0.02 worth...Maybe less...
	-Dean Wallwey