Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!att!osu-cis!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!mailrus!ames!oliveb!sun!thetone!swilson
From: swilson%thetone@Sun.COM (Scott Wilson)
Newsgroups: comp.arch
Subject: Re: Cost of floptical s/w distribution
Message-ID: <74239@sun.uucp>
Date: 24 Oct 88 16:36:14 GMT
References: <8300@cit-vax.Caltech.Edu> <757@umbio.MIAMI.EDU> <1517@maccs.McMaster.CA> <10508@ncc.Nexus.CA>
Sender: news@sun.uucp
Reply-To: swilson@sun.UUCP (Scott Wilson)
Organization: Sun Microsystems, Mountain View
Lines: 27

In article <10508@ncc.Nexus.CA> lyndon@nexus.ca (Lyndon Nerenberg) writes:
>In article <1517@maccs.McMaster.CA>, dan@maccs (Dan Trottier) writes:
>> Plus it will add $50 dollars to the price of buying
>>software.
>
>Why? It seems that most software currently ships on QIC tapes. These
>go for around $50 (Canadian). The floptical costs C$65 according to
>everything I've read. Fifteen bucks isn't going to make a damn bit
>of difference in end user price.

Maybe the way to look at it is "how many $6500 machines distribute
software on $50 medium."  To say that "most" software currently ships
on QIC tapes is just false unless were talking about workstations
only.  Certainly software for Macs and PC's ship in much greater
numbers on floppies than does software for workstations on QIC tape.
My personal experience is that QIC tapes are always associated with
work (i.e., people with money to spend who don't really care about
buying 1/4" tapes) and floppies with home computer use.  If NeXT is
targeted for poorer computer users than $50 certainly is significant.
I've purchased Mac software that sold for only $65, there's no way
this could be sold if it had to come on $50 medium.


--
Scott Wilson		arpa: swilson@sun.com
Sun Microsystems	uucp: ...!sun!swilson
Mt. View, CA