Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!att!rutgers!mailrus!ames!killer!tness7!tness1!flatline!erict From: erict@flatline.UUCP (j eric townsend) Newsgroups: comp.misc Subject: Re: Free Free Flow (was: Re: Intellectual property/copyrights) Summary: Why people *want* to pay a lot of money for something. Message-ID: <1084@flatline.UUCP> Date: 10 Jul 88 18:32:47 GMT References: <9160@cisunx.UUCP< <1801@uhccux.UUCP< <807@netxcom.UUCP<Organization: a flat near the Montrose, Houston, Tx. Lines: 34 I think part of the "why does this stuff have to cost so much" can be answered by looking at some of the people that buy it. For instance, my last company: They paid around $27,000 for a LAN. They paid a lot of money for the software, then bought increadibly overpriced hardware from the same company. They never did any market research to decide what their customers wanted in a LAN (we were going to VAR whatever LAN we got in the office) and they never asked the development team what they though the LAN should have/be. Instead, they went out and bought the flashiest, most expensive LAN. Then, they could brag to their business friends about "the $27,000 LAN we just picked up on a whim". These people also believed LANTimes (put out by Novell) verbatum. They didn't believe me when I told them who produced it. So, in one since, having expensive soft/hardware is good, it takes money away from dumb people (businessmen/scam people) and gives it to people that are *doing* something (programmers/engineers). Btw: the company I worked for is now out of business. They were having problems so they fired half the staff: the programmers. They finally gave in and fired the salesmen, then the secretarial staff. They spent over $3 million on hard/software over about 3 years. Ever work for morons? :-) -- Skate UNIX or go home, boogie boy... [Obscure joke goes here] J. Eric Townsend ->uunet!nuchat!flatline!erict smail:511Parker#2,Hstn,Tx,77007 ..!bellcore!tness1!/