CompuServe Messages

thanx Don.. but one more point: over here (perhaps you know it) the distributors (because the salesnumbers are *not* as big as in the states) have to sell to customers as well as to dealers! Dealers want to get cheap products they can sell high. The other distributors do not sell to dealers and advertise with low level pricing and *no* support! How to survive?? The customers come to the dealer and ask for a program -> the dealer finds some pricesheet of (perhaps CompuStore) a distributor -> the customers tells the dealer that he's to expensive because in the ad of … there is a better pricing -> the dealer tells the customer, that he will give the customer a preview with a demonstration! (he does it) the customers goes home and calls the distributor of the ad and orders the program (he now can be shure that this product is what he needs). But the story goes on: the dealer tells his distributor that he's to expensive and should go for a better pricing….. what now????? And last not least the distributors (*not me*) are fighting themselves with (perhaps you've heared of the story about Atlantis) bad messages. One goes to the AmiExpo and tells every producer/publisher that Atlantis has got no more money and is nearly bankrupped (I think that's written totaly wrong). Five minutes later the man from Atalntis is going to the same producer/publ. and tells him, that he's here and he is not bankrupped… puh… But one thing as well: Yes, those guys (2 or three) have cracked or pirated software but they do not know who deprotects them (if they are) they just recieve it and test it for their own needs. This guy (<CB>) is one of those, he is developer and writes some software for the german market.. nothing too big.. just for his personal needs and looks at the software he gets.. he sais: "I't the word biggest beta-tester" and that's what he does, he looks at the sw and throws it away if it's not what he needs. If he needs it, he buys it and that's the way nearly everybody over here is doing it… not piracy (in it's original meaning) but looking, testing making decisions, throwing away or buying!