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From: ast@cs.vu.nl (Andy Tanenbaum)
Newsgroups: comp.os.minix
Subject: Re: Andy's comments on 1.5
Message-ID: <5675@star.cs.vu.nl>
Date: 26 Feb 90 09:07:59 GMT
References: <11127@nigel.udel.EDU> <5441@star.cs.vu.nl> <Feb.24.16.12.57.1990.2533@frogpond.rutgers.edu> <25e76a05.69c5@polyslo.CalPoly.EDU>
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Organization: Fac. Wiskunde & Informatica, VU, Amsterdam
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In article <25e76a05.69c5@polyslo.CalPoly.EDU> jdudeck@polyslo.CalPoly.EDU (John R. Dudeck) writes:
>It seems to me that the most practical arrangement would be to have the
>media, the listing, and Andy's book on OS's be separate products.
The economics of publishing are more complicated than you might realize.
There is a lot of overhead, and the way it is amortized greatly affects the
price.  We are doing it this way to try to minimize the price for the largest
group of people. 

As an aside, in the computer industry, a machine that says for $X in the store
typically costs about $X/5 for parts and the labor to assemble it.  The rest
is overhead of one kind or another.

Andy Tanenbaum (ast@cs.vu.nl)