#1 2013-05-25 21:47

den4b
Administrator
From: den4b.com
Registered: 2006-04-06
Posts: 3,367

Discounts on commercial licenses 25-50% off!

The cost of commercial licenses has been lowered by 25-50% and even higher discounts available when you buy more licenses!

Cost of a single commercial license:

  • €14.95 for ReNamer, Shutter.

  • €9.95 for Colors, RandPass, CPUMon, Hasher.

Organizations or individuals who are involved in a commercial activity and wish to use these products in a commercial environment must obtain this license, which grants them a permission to use a specific product for commercial purposes. The duration of this license is indefinite. Software updates are available free of charge for a period of 1 year.

To obtain a commercial license please visit the Purchase page.

Offline

#2 2013-06-06 04:31

Nighted
Member
Registered: 2007-10-28
Posts: 19

Re: Discounts on commercial licenses 25-50% off!

Please consider a "home user license" or something similar.

I don't like the fact that something is free for personal use yet certain features are restricted to licensed users only.

I don't mind paying to support developers. Unepic (a game I purchased) and tinySpell have very flexible options for purchasing licenses, basically you decide from a list what price you want to pay. I think this would be fair for den4b apps as I would pay more for Renamer than I would for Shutter for example.

What do you think?

Offline

#3 2013-06-06 09:53

den4b
Administrator
From: den4b.com
Registered: 2006-04-06
Posts: 3,367

Re: Discounts on commercial licenses 25-50% off!

I've been thinking about this for a while and I'm starting to lean towards Lite vs Pro versions, rather than Commercial vs Non-Commercial.

The idea is that Lite will still be free for non-commercial purposes, while Pro will still be required for commercial users but it can also have benefits like direct support line with developer, a way for users to support the future development, etc. Possibly, some commercially orientated features could be locked to Pro version, but this I know is a slippery and dangerous slope and really not looking forward to such approach.

Regarding pricing of the products. I basically created two bands of pricing, as you have seen in the previous post. Selection of a band for a product was determined by the development efforts on that product. If I was to rank the development efforts it would look something like this: 1) ReNamer; 2) Shutter; 3) CPUMon, Hasher, Hooker, Colors; 4) RandPass. Perhaps there should be 4 price bands, not 2 as it is currently.

I am very interested in opinions from potential paid users. So could you let me know the price bands with which you would be comfortable with?

Offline

#4 2013-06-07 05:23

Nighted
Member
Registered: 2007-10-28
Posts: 19

Re: Discounts on commercial licenses 25-50% off!

I'll be honest. My personal opinion about "shareware" or registered software is that more often than not too much is being charged. Why? Because if you have a genuinely unique product you can expect a certain premium fee...BUT my personal experience is that most developers are out of touch with reality when it comes to individual software licensing.

Why you might ask? I know there is a insurmountable amount of time and effort that goes into development and the developer expects a certain amount in return...which is fair I suppose...but what many developers seems to forget is that "shareware" or whatever you want to call it now costs nearly nothing to replicate and distribute. It's not 1996 anymore and packaging, distributable media and printed documentation are not part of the cost of software distribution/sales anymore. So basically to ask $20 or more for one program is a bit excessive in my opinion.

For Renamer, I would happily spend $10 US. Shutter, (which I use every day), $5, but there are other alternatives out there or I can script these events myself with little effort. RandPass I also use and love because I can quickly generate a password from my keyboard using command line without ever reaching for my mouse. But, if I must take time out of my day I can create this behavior myself. Most users aren't programmers, those that are are lazy/time restricted who look to others for a solution before committing the valuable dev time when others have done the work already.

All in all I would say that for personal use $10 for a premium app like Renamer is fair and $5 for the rest. It may be hard to hear as I understand the time and effort that goes into development, but when you consider the zero cost of distribution and the potential market of people (1000's or 10's of 1000's) that have no problem shelling out the price of a beer or two, then it starts to make real sense and you see your revenue stream begin to flow as premium software can be had for the price of a tip at some restaurant.

This "$20" for shareware thing is a dinosaur from the shareware.com days, for personal use anyway. It's more than fair for commercial use. If I had to pay $20 for every app I use, I would be living in a cardboard box and the developers producing these apps would be eating even less than me. I'm also sure that you, like me, are most likely using a few open source apps that you find indispensable and have likely not contributed. (there are just so many good ones and we have only so much money to pass around and times are just going to get worse before they get better).

I don't know everything, but I have been developing code for over 30 years. I love den4b apps as they are almost perfect and I believe with a smart pricing scheme can actually generate revenue.

My personal belief is that when it come to software user fees, less generates more and users can walk away with that warm feeling of having contributed.

So for personal licensing I would charge $10 max. I also consider a fee of $30 fair for a universal license that would span all den4b apps.

Of course, this is all just my opinion and I would be happy to hear any other opinions/criticisms.

Last edited by Nighted (2013-06-07 05:34)

Offline

#5 2013-06-07 22:39

den4b
Administrator
From: den4b.com
Registered: 2006-04-06
Posts: 3,367

Re: Discounts on commercial licenses 25-50% off!

I agree with you. It all rotates around a fair market value. There is of course the cost of development and efforts that go into support, maintenance, etc, but that won't matter much to a common user who's main question is "how much am I willing to pay for this software".

I've been thinking about this for quite some time now, reading various research articles and comparing to similar software vendors. I came to a conclusion that €14.95 and €9.95 are fare market rates which are often below the rates of similar vendors. The $5 price tag for a software has been brought up by the AppStore culture, where a single product, no matter how useful or useless, can be developed in little time and distributed to millions of people within days or weeks. It makes sense to lower down the price to even $0.50 when you have such an immense exposure. However, I am not sure whether this strategy will be effective in my case. I might try a pilot run with prices lowered further down to evaluate the effects.

Anyway, I appreciate your thoughts and will take them into consideration.

Offline

Board footer

Powered by FluxBB