CompuServe Messages

Well this issue certainly seems to have touched a raw nerve, judging by the number and defensive tone of the responses. I wonder just how many of the people who've jumped into this fray have actually walked the shareware route? More than a few, I think. My experience has always been that shareware is at best a sort of "extra loose cash" sort of proposition, and have never thought to depend on it for anything else. Of course, I read in FORBES a while back that the author of PC-TALK had pulled in something like $100K the first year, but that's got to be the One Big Fluke. Personally, I think of shareware as a way to inexpensively let the world-at-large know what a swell programmer I am. Besides, every tool I've ever put out as shareware began as just a personal project to give me some ability that I didn't have before — the recent NGI is a case in point. There might have been something else out there, but I didn't have it — so I thought to fill a little market niche. How different I viewed UEdit, which I never downloaded. I'm perfectly happy with EMACS, have used it for years on all sorts of machines big and small, and have never thought to get another shareware editor — especially since I picked up a few real stinko PD editors back in my MP/M and MS-DOS days. Before someone says this isn't germane to the issue, let me get to my point and suggestion: that there be some sort of shareware/PD "Shareware Publisher's Guide" to help the unwary or uninformed (indeed, I wouldn't be surprised if shareware coders weren't numerous enough to have their own forum, though god knows what they'd really talk about). A guide would be a very useful thing for the DLs in ANY forum. Shareware authorship is by nature a lonely thing, and there are no classes or schools for it. We should learn from each others' successes and failures. I'll start this out myself. Check for the message titled "Shareware Help." It's number 24294.