I read a news announcement about a new freeware program that does some cool stuff. I check it out and it is vastly superior to an existing freeware program. Yet when I read the comments, the new, superior freeware program is being flamed. Why? Because the guy making it also offers a for-pay version that has more features.
I check out the forums of a game I enjoy playing. Normally people are singing the praises of this game. Now, the forum is full of flaming and angst. Why? Because the developer started offering optional premium content for players if they want.
Let me tell those complainers a truth about life: Money is exchanged for goods and services.
Before the current generation of l33t-speaking complainers became the norm on the net, we had a concept called shareware. Someone would make something cool and offer a version of it to try. This version might time out or it might have fewer features or it might just work on the honor system. If users liked it, they bought it. End of story.
Nowadays, we have it better. People make free stuff and release it. No nags. No missing features when compared to other "free" competitors. No time outs. But the developers will also release an even better version. And the complainers get vocal.
What annoys me is that the whiners are attempting to bully people from making stuff that many people like me want. I don't live with my mom in her basement. I don't begrudge paying a few dollars to someone who made something I want. I recognize that I already pay $80 a month for my cell phone and $60 a month for cable so bitching about paying $9 to $20 for something I want is pretty ridiculous.
And I certainly recognize that the mere existence of premium stuff doesn't hurt me. If I want it, I'll pay for it. If I don't, I won't.
Let me give you two examples:
The program ObjectDock is the best dock out there. We make it so I'm biased but it has far more features than any dock out there. It's also free. You want a cool dock on Windows, this is what you get. But there is also ObjectDock Plus. It's $20 but adds a ton of features like tabbed docks. And so what do people say? They'll say that ObjectDock is "payware" or "crippleware". Why? Because a non-free improved version exists.
Similarly, I love Team Fortress 2. It is a great game. And you know what? If Valve created a new character I could play as for say $10 I'd buy it in an instant. I want more characters in TF2 to play as. But you know the reaction they'd get. They'd probably get flamed because the parasite-class would argue that they should get that for free because buying something once to them means that the developers are perpetual slaves to them after.
I understand that we all want to keep from getting nickled and dimed but one assumes that we can make our own judgments as to whether something is worth it or not and allow others to make the same judgment.
It's a false hope. However, when they grudgingly come to this realization they storm off with the opinion [they always had, really] that they are right, and everyone else is wrong.
Gump got it wrong. Life ISN'T a 'box of chocolates'....it's more a box of chocolates from which several are missing....and as luck/life has it, the ones you'd REALLY prefer just aren't there.
You learn to 'take it on the chin', and deal with it....
You can't?
You have an issue with your business-model then.
I've been a professional for 34 years....and if a client wants an extra drawing/detail he pays for it....irrespective of whether he paid for the 'initial' bit or not....
So people are forced to buy optional content?
I take it you don't eat out much then. One Long Island Ice Tea can cost $7 and it lasts (for me anyway) about 20 minutes and it's gone.
But you'd be "pissed" if someone made a character that you might spend weeks, months or years enjoying because they charged a whopping $10 for?
Video games aren't food, clothing, or shelter. You don't have to purchase them. The mere existence of stuff you aren't willing to pay for doesn't hurt you in the slightest.
Don't you remember the part where you held the gun to my head and made me input my Paypal information? Or did that slip your mind?
Well yea but I don't do that to every user of course. We have goons for that...
So you lose respect for me because I object to people who try to bully companies into taking away options from customers?
That was, after all, the 1 sentence summary of the article.
You don't want to pay $10 for some extra content, that's your right. If it doesn't meet your needs, then don't buy it. But that's not what happens. People will create such a public uproar that it causes companies to simply not release anything at all.
It is unfortunate that Oblivion started with the Horse Armor thing because I could see where people might have been willing to pay $10 for more content as long as the content was sufficient.
And my example of being willing to buy more content for TF2 or some other game is still valid - if *I* as a gamer want to buy something, why shouldn't I be able to simply because there are people who don't want to pay for it?
In the real world, if someone puts out some widget that I don't like, I don't buy it. On the Internet, people not only don't buy it but take it on themselves to try to force the product off the market at the drop of a hat.
Your analogy is flawed.
No one is stopping you from TRYING to charge extra for providing additional paragraphs. If people think those extra paragraphs are worth it, they'll buy it. Otherwise, they won't.
By contrast, to use your analogy, in the software world it is more like I write an article that I give away for free but then people scream that I also sell a book that expands on the topic covered by the article.
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