Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!unmvax!pprg.unm.edu!hc!lll-winken!uunet!steinmetz!davidsen
From: davidsen@steinmetz.ge.com (Wm. E. Davidsen Jr)
Newsgroups: comp.binaries.ibm.pc.d
Subject: Re: Commercial software in comp.binaries.ibm.pc.d
Message-ID: <13415@steinmetz.ge.com>
Date: 24 Mar 89 13:48:56 GMT
References: <6191@bsu-cs.UUCP> <2967@looking.UUCP> <4981@cbnews.ATT.COM> <88464@felix.UUCP>
Reply-To: davidsen@crdos1.UUCP (bill davidsen)
Organization: General Electric CRD, Schenectady, NY
Lines: 27

In article <88464@felix.UUCP> art@felix.UUCP (Art Dederick) writes:

| So I take it you support the idea of Rahul and other moderators and
| Usenet sites donating time and resources for the monetary benefit of
| others without a piece of the action?  How about donating some of your
| time and money to the effort?  Don't you realize that if we let this
| continue, Usenet is subsidizing a commercial undertaking even if it's

  I think you miss the whole point of why commercial sites carry unenet.
We don't carry binaries to be nice, we do it because the benefit of
having the software is greater than the cost. If a good piece of
shareware comes along we can pay and use it. The cost then becomes the
net cost plus the shareware fee. In many cases this is still very cost
effective. Big firms spend a lot of money on evaluation copies of
commercial software which never gets used.

  Most sites don't care if someone benefits, as long as the site paying
the phone bill does. We don't carry things because they're free, or
refuse them because they're not.

  Now, on my BBS, I put up what seems useful to my users. Again I don't
care if someone makes money, it's a public service and therefore the
most useful things (my decision) get carried.
-- 
	bill davidsen		(wedu@crd.GE.COM)
  {uunet | philabs}!steinmetz!crdos1!davidsen
"Stupidity, like virtue, is its own reward" -me