Re: What is wrong with Ada?

[Markus E Leypold <development-2006-8ecbb5cc8aREMOVETHIS@ANDTHATm-e-leypold.de>]

Georg Bauhaus <bauhaus@futureapps.de> writes:

> On Wed, 2007-04-25 at 11:57 +0200, Markus E Leypold wrote:
>>  On two requests for a
>> price list only one vendor bothered to answer and he didn't send a
>> list but wanted to know more about me/us (obviously they don't have a
>> standard package, but take what you can afford, a particularly
>> unsympathetic approach). 
>
> Maybe they don't publicly announce prices to make sure
> they can provide affordable solutions? 

The mirror side is: Charge what you can get. That is something
people^Wcustomers don't like.

  http://www.joelonsoftware.com/items/2006/07/31.html
  http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/CamelsandRubberDuckies.html

And as far as affordable goes: I think I don't need to go into that (again) :-).

> Who knows? 

Yes, who knows. That's why my car vendor doesn't have a price list
... not. Also why Microsoft doesn't have a price list etc. I think one
can well see there my argument what is going wrong with some Ada
vendors -- no need to elaborate.

> Once the price list is out, the rich and/or big profit customers
> might start arguing that they do no longer see a reason to pay the
> larger sum adequate to large scale use of the tools.

Hardly. Just differentiate service contracts and license to use and
structure the service into different levels.

 - Level 0: Only right to use.
 - Level 1: Right to access a ticket system.
 - Level 2: Right to browse a bug database / knowledge base about
   fixed and open bugs.
 - Level 3: Guarantee response times and quality.

This is one option and I think others will turn up. Or if you really
think that the cheap licenses are actually under price and not worth
the time and effort, then don't offer them. But if the cheap license
is still something you earn money with -- don't you think the "big
customer" will be somewhat pissed off to discover he pays more than
_you_ need, just because he can afford to.


> "We heard from this developer that he got ... Then why should we
> ...?"

I wonder: Do they actually write in the contract that you aren't
allowed to disclose you price? Since it is the current setup that
incurs the risk that somebody who got a special deal will be blabbing
and it will haunt you in your relationship to another customer.

> So customer investment in the tools might need more arguing
> given a comparatively small customer base;

> when MS was smaller they charged $$$$ for MS Word alone.
> Suppose they would have tried to prevent copying...

If you mean they didn't charge for DOS -- you're wrong.

> MS now has a huge market share, they do not seem to abhor a
> monopoly, and they can easily afford making developers and
> their customers depend on MS offerings. Lamps and oil,
> printers and ink, Developers and office solutions.

> Of course, I'm just guessing.

Well -- you can go on guessing. I'm almost sure that your thoughts to
a certain extend agree with those of certain Ada vendors and the spin
-- "to make sure they can provide affordable solutions" -- is
certainly identical.

But that proves in my eyes exactly that they are absolutely clueless
about marketing and customer psychology -- if they really think like
that.

Regards -- Markus