[OT] money (was: Microsoft removes Netscape support from IE)
Jecel Assumpcao Jr
jecel at merlintec.com
Fri Jul 27 22:18:06 UTC 2001
Though off topic, this thread has touched on many things that are very
interesting for me.
On Thursday 26 July 2001 17:15, Noel J. Bergman wrote:
> Chris Espinosa: We'll never do that; we're a HARDWARE vendor! The
> software is just to sell our hardware.
That is my position as well. The key issue is to license your hardware
design as widely as possible. Just because Apple did it badly doesn't
mean it is a doomed model.
I have set up a Swiki about my object oriented hardware:
http://www.merlintec.com:8080/hardware
There is still not much there, yet. The Self/R swiki is equally sparse:
http://www.merlintec.com:8080/software
A few weeks back I seriously considered adopting Squeak as my system
software exclusively since I feel a strong community is more important
than technical details, but in the end I decided to try to build a
simpler system and run Squeak (and Java) on top of it.
But I don't see closed software as a real option (except for Microsoft,
for now) for the foundation layers. So I will try to make money from
hardware instead.
> I do think that people will balk at the constant cost "subscription
> model", which is pay-for-use, but who knows? And has for your
> scenario that has Windows dying off in favor of free software, there
> are plenty of arguments that the free software model will fail, too.
This is not "pay-for-use" but "pay-to-rent" instead. There is a very
serious difference. If you rent Microsoft Office, you are unlikely to
use any alternatives since you already paid for it. With a true
pay-for-use system, however, just having it on your disk doesn't cost
anything. Supposing a competitor charges the same thing as Microsoft,
it would cost me the same to type my next letter in Word or AmiPro and
it wouldn't be a big deal to have both installed.
Of course, users might like this "ticking meter" system even less than
"pay-to-rent" but it is closer to "friction free capitalism" than the
rent model and it has lower barriers to entry. It is also better suited
to "peer-to-peer capitalism" where anyone can contribute and make
money. There is more at
http://www.virtualschool.edu/cox/Superdistribution.html
I don't think application software has to be free. I don't think
content has to be free. Let's find a way to make money from this stuff
and to attract a lot more people who will also make money.
And underneath all that: free system software and neat hardware!
-- Jecel
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