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From: apratt@atari.UUCP (Allan Pratt)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.atari.st
Subject: Re: Pirating on the ST in the USA
Message-ID: <1544@atari.UUCP>
Date: 9 Jun 89 18:02:59 GMT
References: <8905291145.AA23176@ucbvax.Berkeley.EDU> <382@nixpbe.UUCP> <2697@ssc-vax.UUCP>
Reply-To: apratt@atari.UUCP (Allan Pratt)
Organization: Atari (US) Corporation, Sunnyvale, California
Lines: 27

In article <2697@ssc-vax.UUCP> coy@ssc-vax.UUCP (Stephen B Coy) writes:
> The real bottom line for the developer is
> "Will I make a profit porting program X to machine Y?".   If the
> answer is yes then the port should be done, if no then not done.
> Percentages don't mean a thing.

(A) The message this responded to proposed using percentages, not sales
figures per se, to support a claim of high piracy, not profitability. 

(B) The "question" above is incomplete.  A developer has to compare
potential profit (and risk) of "porting program X to machine Y" against
those of "porting program A to machine B" where A and X, or B and Y, can
be the same (but not at the same time). 

In general, any profit-oriented outfit with limited resources (which is
all of them) has to consider not only the potential profit and risk of
an action, but the COMPARATIVE profit and risk of that action as opposed
to other action(s) it can take.  The one(s) with the most favorable
combination wins, where "most favorable" depends on the risk-aversity
and other considerations of the person or people making the decision. 

In other words, making a profit is not an exact science, and no project
can be considered solely on its own merits. 

============================================
Opinions expressed above do not necessarily	-- Allan Pratt, Atari Corp.
reflect those of Atari Corp. or anyone else.	  ...ames!atari!apratt