#PD vs. commercial sw
8 messages in this thread
I'm sure it will be hard for some people in this forum to imagine, but
there are people out there who don't want to hear about public domain
software. They only want to hear about commercial software. Why?
Support, documentation, updates, etc. In the long run, you get better
support, docs, etc. buying commercial software than PD software.
John…
I just want to clarify something. When you say:
"In the long run, you get better support, docs, etc. buying commercial
software than PD software."
You are including SHAREWARE products as commercial, no?
Michael
….from the north coast (go Cavs!)
Are you begging me to make another generalization? 🙂 Shareware ranges
from "send $5 to my favorite charity" to "Send me beer" to "Send me $100
and we'll see what happens" to "Send me $40 and I'll send you a printed
manual, a fully operation version, and my home phone number." Over the
long run, yes – you'd gain more by buying commercial software than sending
money to shareware authors. I can say that because only "commercial" means
a certain set of characteristics: it's not fool-proof or crook-proof, of
course, but what is?
hehe… I wasn't trying to back you in to a corner, I just wanted to know
which side of the fence you considered shareware to be on. I'm a bit
disappointed in your reply.
"…you'd gain more by buying commercial software than sending ??money to
shareware authors."
That has not been my experience. My wife does the accounting for her
businesses with a shsareware product (PC) called Ultra-Check. The
registered version includes a very nicely printed manual, and whenever she
needs help or has a problem, she calls and speaks to the author…
weekends, nites, etc.
For years, SID has been one of the most valuable Amiga productcs I own.
With few exceptions, there isn't a commercial house out there that has
provided the kind of support that Tim Martin has.
If you want to talk about the PC market, take every number you can think of
and multiply it by ten – at least. I bet there's a number of shareware
authors who make a living at it in the PC market. When you do nothing but
work on product X and you're self-employed, I'd say you've gone
"commercial" in a many respects. For every nice program out there, I can
find another that says "send me beer money if you like this."
OK, so Eet starts a PD/shareware review magazine. The first issue table of
contents says "Review of SID, review of toolBox, review of a substitute
file requester." What are you going to cover in the next issue? Second
question: you think this magazine is going to be more popular than
now-dead .info? Hope you've got a rich uncle.
There are also people, possibly a majority of Amiga owners, who have no
idea there is PD or shareware available for the machine. Since they don't
know about it, they probably have no strong feelings about it.
To be brutally honest, much of the support, docs, etc., which you keep
touting as the reason you're in love with commercial software, is hardly
something to brag about. Quite frequently, the documentation is either
unusable or virtually non-existant. (A one page, mimeographed sheet on a
piece of hardware comes to mind immediately. I've had the same on
software, complex software, as well.) If the company doesn't go out of
business, you might (MIGHT) get some support from them, but many Amiga
vendors fail. Even when they don't, they may not be too responsive. (I
could name names, but that would not accomplish a thing.) Admittedly, much
PD or shareware suffers the same failings, but at least you don't have a
fairly large investment in those offerings.
PD and shareware are viable, and in some cases preferable, sources of
software for the Amiga owner. When a magazine does not mention them, it is
doing no service to the Amiga community.
I just got a $800 external hard drive from one of the biggest Mac mail
order companies out there. I got one page of docs, double-sided, including
documentation for installation of three-four other devices that I didn't
order. We can generalize all day long. Do you disagree that commercial
software tends to be of better quality than PD software?
Some commercial software is considerably better than PD. Some runs
about the same quality, and some is just plain junk. PD does not
necessarily make the program any worse than commercially written software.
(I'm lumping shareware with PD simply because I was too lazy to type it in
every time.)
The thing is that Amiga has a healthy base of good quality PD software,
often doing things that commerical software doesn't. The fact that it was
not written to make money for some company does not make it bad. Some of
the most valuable programs for the Amiga are PD. Ignoring this whole
resource will not make it go away.
Bill, K3OZM