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I want to pay for TextMate 2

marco.org

21–30 of 233 posts

Re: I want to pay for TextMate 2

#21
post #16
post #13

I have a lot of trouble understanding this mentality. I totally get paying when you don't have to in order to support fellow developers. I've got a nice collection of apps on my phone and desktop, all purchased, that I've acquired over the years to support my friends' development efforts. So if Marco wants to help out Macromates, that's fine. More power to him. But I don't understand this mantra of, "We'll forgive yo…

> I have a lot of trouble understanding this mentality. Like, say, tipping at a nice restaurant. You may not like the food, but it seems others did, and they want to demonstrate that to the chef.

As I said: I can understand Marco wanting to pay. I didn't like my meal, Marco did, and he should feel free to give a great tip.

I'm focused on the people who are saying that Macromates should charge users for the upgrade they said would be free. This would be equivalent to someone saying that, because they enjoyed their meal at the restaurant, the restaurant should charge a mandatory 25% tip to all current patrons of the restaurant. That's a very different situation.

Re: I want to pay for TextMate 2

#22
post #14

"Given the value that we get out of TextMate, it’s already grossly underpriced. Please let us give you more money" The value for you isn't probably the same for all the customers. Some people make millions from the work of the Apache Foundation for example but others use their web server to run little websites. Some would probably pay tons of money for it, others won't. I am not saying that a upgrade fee for TextMate…

"The value for you isn't probably the same for all the customers" Definitely right on. If this person is so set on paying for this product the creators of TM should just have a donate option. Then he can pay all he wants.

Re: I want to pay for TextMate 2

#23
Several commenters here, and on other threads and across the web have complained about no progress since forever ago. And while the core product may not have changed, bundles and plugins have continued to be created/updated, so it's not like things have been completely stagnant all this time.

Sure, there's angst at a lack of communication, but that doesn't mean the TM community has stagnated the entire time.

Re: I want to pay for TextMate 2

#24

Paying for a text editor . Boggles the mind.

I've never used it; is it really /just/ a text editor? Edit: to clarify, my use of "just" wasn't meant to be dismissive or diminutive in any way...

It sure is no Vim/Emacs, if that's what you're asking.

Re: I want to pay for TextMate 2

#25

Paying for a text editor . Boggles the mind.

I've never used it; is it really /just/ a text editor? Edit: to clarify, my use of "just" wasn't meant to be dismissive or diminutive in any way...

Given the relationship that coders often have with their editors, this is like saying to some parents "It's just a boy"… If you spend a lot of time in one program voluntarily, it's hard not to develop some feelings for it, beyond pure utilitarian reason.

TextMate is certainly one of those programs. It embraced the programmability of a Unix-based environment, coupled with a very simple design and actually introduced some new concepts (or at least made existing ones more prominent and/or easier to use). It also came at the right time, filling a niche for developers that wasn't satisfied by the pure-Unix breed (vim, emacs), nor by the entrenched MacOS editors (well, BBEdit mainly). Being introduced in a quite hip Ruby on Rails screencast didn't hurt, either.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not even a hardcore TM fanboy, as I switch a lot between editors, while secretly regretting that I can't just stick to emacs…

But I certainly understand the appeal, and if a bit of money (that most developers who buy Macs certainly can afford) helps keeping the momentum of a resurrected application, I'm all for it. Whether I'm buying it, is another matter. Right now, it doesn't fill an interesting niche for me, and I'd much rather spend the time customizing my .emacs file. Never mind that where I'm really missing good editing functionality isn't HTML or Ruby, it's Objective-C (or Java, when that was still job-relevant), where an IDE really helps. Well, let's see what AppCode[1] can bring to that particular table…

[1]: http://www.jetbrains.com/objc/

Re: I want to pay for TextMate 2

#26
post #13

I have a lot of trouble understanding this mentality. I totally get paying when you don't have to in order to support fellow developers. I've got a nice collection of apps on my phone and desktop, all purchased, that I've acquired over the years to support my friends' development efforts. So if Marco wants to help out Macromates, that's fine. More power to him. But I don't understand this mantra of, "We'll forgive yo…

It's very likely that the original promise ("upgrade to version 2.0 will be completely free") was a huge factor in 2.0 shipping delay: Allan would need to invest a lot of effort to ship the new version to get only marginal return, as TextMate penetration of the relevant market was already high at the time the promise was made.

Charging for 2.0 would seem like a breach of contract for people who only bought TextMate 1.x because they were expecting 2.0 soon. But for people who thought that $60 is a fair price for 1.x (I myself belong to this group, and so seem Marco), it's just a promise of a generous gift that was taken away.

I for one would gladly pay for all hard work that went into rewriting TextMate.

Re: I want to pay for TextMate 2

#27
post #16
post #13

I have a lot of trouble understanding this mentality. I totally get paying when you don't have to in order to support fellow developers. I've got a nice collection of apps on my phone and desktop, all purchased, that I've acquired over the years to support my friends' development efforts. So if Marco wants to help out Macromates, that's fine. More power to him. But I don't understand this mantra of, "We'll forgive yo…

> I have a lot of trouble understanding this mentality. Like, say, tipping at a nice restaurant. You may not like the food, but it seems others did, and they want to demonstrate that to the chef.

This is exactly what I was thinking. If Macro wants to give someone more money than power to him. There are developers who I've bought additional licenses for friends in the slim hope that they would use the app but worst case I supported the developer.

Forcing everyone to support your love for a developer is asine. Macro may be head over heels for TextMate but there are a lot of people who are extremely frustrated with broken promises from MacroMates. Forcing them to pay more is a slap in the face.

Re: I want to pay for TextMate 2

#28
post #16
post #13

I have a lot of trouble understanding this mentality. I totally get paying when you don't have to in order to support fellow developers. I've got a nice collection of apps on my phone and desktop, all purchased, that I've acquired over the years to support my friends' development efforts. So if Marco wants to help out Macromates, that's fine. More power to him. But I don't understand this mantra of, "We'll forgive yo…

> I have a lot of trouble understanding this mentality. Like, say, tipping at a nice restaurant. You may not like the food, but it seems others did, and they want to demonstrate that to the chef.

I believe (and imagine this is what grandparent meant) that this looks more like a case of "every table will leave a tip, so just charge more than the original menu price when the bill comes".

IMHO If Mr. Pink does not want to tip he should have the right not to do it, since that was the original agreement.

Re: I want to pay for TextMate 2

#29
post #20

Contrast the TextMate situation to that of Sublime Text. Jon Skinner has done an amazing job of shipping something compelling early, updating it often, developing out in the open and giving his customers a good reason to buy the product even though it's still in beta . Allan Odgaard has made promises as to the quality and ship date of his product, and that's about it (to be fair, there have been 1.x updates). At this…

[deleted]

Re: I want to pay for TextMate 2

#30
post #21
post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I have a lot of trouble understanding this mentality. Like, say, tipping at a nice restaurant. You may not like the food, but it seems others did, and they want to demonstrate that to the chef.

As I said: I can understand Marco wanting to pay. I didn't like my meal, Marco did, and he should feel free to give a great tip. I'm focused on the people who are saying that Macromates should charge users for the upgrade they said would be free. This would be equivalent to someone saying that, because they enjoyed their meal at the restaurant, the restaurant should charge a mandatory 25% tip to all current patrons o…

I think you're right that everyone shouldn't be charged because Marco and others think the product is worth it. Some bought it on the promise of a free upgrade.

An upgrade to version 2 wasn't part of the "value" I attributed to TM when I bought it years ago, so were it not free, I'd seriously consider buying anyway (even though I do little coding nowadays, and am impressed with SublimeText2).

So, count me as mixed on the whole thing. I wouldn't balk at a nominal upgrade fee, and don't begrudge those who want to pay more, but sympathize with those who bought on the promise of an upgrade years ago.

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