Newsgroups: comp.lang.dylan
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From: dave@gvls1.vfl.paramax.com (David Lee Matuszek)
Subject: Re: Yes, but how much will it cost?
Message-ID: <1995Mar27.185511.19398@VFL.Paramax.COM>
Sender: dave@gvls1 (David Lee Matuszek)
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Organization: Paramax Systems Corporation, Paoli, PA
References: <gwynne-2403951245370001@tchm04a14.rmt.utk.edu> <3l1rre$f8m@larch.cc.swarthmore.edu> <davidc-2703951108200001@macq106.psy.uwa.oz.au>
Date: Mon, 27 Mar 1995 18:55:11 GMT
Lines: 49

In article <davidc-2703951108200001@macq106.psy.uwa.oz.au>, davidc@cs.uwa.edu.au (David Cake) writes:
|>    
|>    I think that Apple can get away with charging a price comparable with
|> the full versions of CodeWarrior or Symantec easily (around $600 US? $AUS
|> 800-900), quite possibly more. And any developer that is really intending
|> to use it will buy it without batting an eye. Most full commercial
|> development environments are  bought by development sites that are
|> intending to do major (as in months of work) projects using it. Apple
|> should not price the full version of Dylan to suit the hobbyist budget. I
|> mean, sure I would like it if they did, but they wouldn't be making enough
|> money to justify the huge effort, and I would rather see the Dylan
|> development well funded and happy. 

Yes, to a large extent the question is, who do they want to sell it to?

I don't want for a minute to debate the relative merits of programming
languages.  Let's all assume that Dylan is far superior to some nameless
hot OOP language.  Then what?

I'm a hobbyist with a hobbyist budget.  If it's a great language I'd
like to have it to play with.  If it's $100 for a real implementation
(read: one that can use the Toolbox), I'll put it off for a while, but
eventually I'll probably give in and buy it.

If it costs $400, though, who will buy it?  Answer:  development
companies managed by techies rather than by people with good business
sense.  After all, the first thing any decent manager would ask is:
where will I find people who already know how to program this langage?
Answer:  You won't.  Look again in 5 or 10 years and see if there are
any Dylan programmers yet.  Meanwhile, you have all these people already
trained in today's hot programming language, so let's use that instead.

Where will the Dylan programmers come from, if not from techie types
who learn it for their own pleasure, and poor college students who have
a prof that happens to like Dylan?

Merit does count for something, but IMHO the only way to get Dylan into
the mainstream is to make it good AND make it cheap.  If it's good but
not cheap, it will only be of historical interest as other languages
mine it for good ideas.

Disclaimer:  Although I believe everything I said, my motive for saying
it is to encourage Apple to sell Dylan cheaply enough for me to buy it.



  -- dave@vfl.paramax.com -- If my header says otherwise, it lies.

In memoriam:  The Space Age, 1969-1972.
