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On paying for software

seths.blog

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Re: On paying for software

#101

Post by Torwald »

ttoinou wrote: post #88
Torwald wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Copying data is a fundamental operation that all computers are able to perform and it costs nothing. That is not true. Running, maintaining, etc the IT infrastructure is costing money, electricity etc. It doesn't come for free.

Marginal and transaction costs are very low. But you are right on the principle : storing, copying and transferring data always costs energy (in physics, temperature, energy and change of entropy are linked together)

OK, maybe you still have a point. What then, would be the threshold for saying: now, at this point, the costs of X are not marginal anymore but substantial enough to be taken into account?

Re: On paying for software

#102

Post by matheusmoreira »

rootlocus wrote: post #99
matheusmoreira wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Suppose that a copy takes 1 second to complete and the computer's power supply unit draws 400 W of power during that 1 second. How much does it cost to complete that copy? Hawaii has the most expensive electricity¹ in the United States, averaging at 29.23 cents / kW * h. Let's use 30 cents / kW * h. If we have 400 W sustained for one second, that equals 0.000111111111 kW * h. (400 Watt * second) * (30 cents / kWh) =…

This is a very large strawman you've constructed.

Please explain what the problem with what I wrote is.

Re: On paying for software

#103

Post by rootlocus »

mathgeek wrote: post #96
rootlocus wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You would probably pay for: the replicator, the recipe,the ingredients and the energy used by the replicator. However, Star Trek has a different economy from ours.

Star Trek has no economy except for its fictional one. Their economy of fabricators is itself a fabrication. At best, it represents an ideal.

Which is why the original argument is pointless.

Re: On paying for software

#104

Post by TimJYoung »

justinclift wrote: post #97
TimJYoung wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Again, donations, etc. may work for some creators, but they will not work for all. There are always going to be products that are "Wow, I'm donating to her !", but the vast majority are more of the "plumbing" variety that are much, much harder to monetize in ways other than "pay me".

Sure. But the original statement was that it does not work . eg 0% success Whereas clearly it can, as there are the occasional success stories. So, it's more than 0%. Maybe not a high percentage yet though. ;)

Yes, but that statement was followed by more details as to exactly what I meant. A model that only works for a small percentage of people does not work.

My point is that you can't start a business based upon some vague hope that someday, somehow, someone will possibly choose to donate money to you. You need a reliable stream of income, and one that will keep coming long after the shine has worn off the original product and now you're slogging through complicated maintenance and upgrades.

You want to know why the JS ecosystem keeps suffering from the "shiny penny" problem ? This is one of the reasons.

Re: On paying for software

#105

Post by mherrmann »

leesalminen wrote: post #92
mherrmann wrote: post #9

As an indie dev of desktop software, I have grown tired of complaints that my products aren't free as in speech and beer. I now reply to such criticism by linking to this post: https://fman.io/blog/dear-comrade/

I love that post. Also, just bought a license (and subscription for updates). Product looks awesome. Installing right now and am going to use it today!

Wow. Thanks!!

Re: On paying for software

#106

Post by jrs95 »

ropeadopepope wrote: post #71
wazoox wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I use Linux and most free software projects allow donations. I even donated to projects I don't actually use, like FreeBSD. I donated money to many free software projects, Ardour, Mozilla, LibreOffice, OpenBSD, etc. This is clearly a false dichotomy.

The problem with open source is, for some reason, the developers feel no sense of obligation to the end users or the people who donate to them. MacOS devs do and will go out of their way to make sure their software is not just usable, but a sheer pleasure to use in every way possible. Yes, there are exceptions (I'm looking at you, Apple, with your Xcode and your Finder) but for the most part that's just the way thing…

Speaking of exceptions to this...they really need to fix their damn multi monitor support. It’s one of the few things Windows is far better at. I get that a small number of Mac users are even affected by this, but man would I appreciate that a lot more than Dark Mode. And I love Dark Mode.

Re: On paying for software

#108

Post by justinclift »

TimJYoung wrote: post #104
justinclift wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure. But the original statement was that it does not work . eg 0% success Whereas clearly it can, as there are the occasional success stories. So, it's more than 0%. Maybe not a high percentage yet though. ;)

Yes, but that statement was followed by more details as to exactly what I meant. A model that only works for a small percentage of people does not work . My point is that you can't start a business based upon some vague hope that someday, somehow, someone will possibly choose to donate money to you. You need a reliable stream of income, and one that will keep coming long after the shine has worn off the original prod…

Ahhh. Yeah, now I understand what you mean.

For an already successful OSS project though, it might be a way to turn that into an ongoing income stream to then continue improving the software.

Re: On paying for software

#109

Post by matheusmoreira »

Torwald wrote: post #101
ttoinou wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Marginal and transaction costs are very low. But you are right on the principle : storing, copying and transferring data always costs energy (in physics, temperature, energy and change of entropy are linked together)

OK, maybe you still have a point. What then, would be the threshold for saying: now, at this point, the costs of X are not marginal anymore but substantial enough to be taken into account?

According to Wikipedia, the best selling video game is Tetris: it has sold approximately 170 000 000¹ copies. If copying Tetris takes 1 second, the computer draws 400 W of power and electricity is rated at 30 cents/kWh, it would cost approximately $5667 to create 170 million copies of Tetris.

¹ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_best-selling_video_gam...

Re: On paying for software

#110

Post by dragonwriter »

Torwald wrote: post #101
ttoinou wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Marginal and transaction costs are very low. But you are right on the principle : storing, copying and transferring data always costs energy (in physics, temperature, energy and change of entropy are linked together)

OK, maybe you still have a point. What then, would be the threshold for saying: now, at this point, the costs of X are not marginal anymore but substantial enough to be taken into account?

“Marginal costs” are the additional cost for each additional unit delivered. They can be high or low, but with modern, non-custom software they tend to be extremely low.
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