According to recently-released market data, retail software sales have decreased by 4%, or by 10% by units sold. That difference in numbers is a telling fact. Though demand is slackening, prices are rising. And this does not include mail order or download sales. Should it be any surprise that people are not buying software at their local Wal-Marts anymore? And the growing disaffection with the upgrade treadmill and the increasing availablity of free alternatives may be having an effect too.
Maybe it’s because you can generate a serial number so easily nowadays… Even downloading full versions for free has become very widespread. Could well be responsible for that 4% drop.
Yeah, serial numbers are too easy to find. I can download the trial version of Dreamweaver and find a serial number for it within 30 seconds. Why bother to go to a shop and buy it when it’s so easy?
isn’t it just becouse of the economic slowdown and in particular the it-sector ?
We are really just seeing the tip of the iceberg here, and its about more than just software upgrades.
What we are witnessing is resistance to the purchase of technology that is unecessary.
It used to be that every upgrade introduced necessary or very desirable features but this just is not the case anymore. Many users are happy with what they have and unwilling to spend more just to get an “upgrade.”
The same problem applies equally to chip makers.
Well, before i really got into linux, i was into warez quite a bit, and let me tell you, you have ALWAS been able to get full versions of software for free, at the latest when its released to the public.
I think that the decline in commercial software sales is simply because people realise that just because there is an upgrade, doesnt mean you have to buy it. we still have quite a few old NT4 boxes kicking around the office, the only people who are running xp are people whose computers came with it pre-installed.
I wonder how much of that drop could be attributed to open source?
Desktop linux has come a long way, and many apps have too…..like OpenOffice.org, and Mozilla / Firebird / Thunderbird which can reduce sales of add on software like pop-up blockers and spam filters.
Too bad it doesn’t get into more detail….
The ethical issues with casual software piracy are similar to those with digital music. With Broadband and the internet, it’s laughably easy to just download and activate most software from the convenience of your desk chair. Software companies expect you to schlep over to CompUSA or wait five days for them to ship you a CD containing a 10MB file. Why is it so damn inconvenient to be law-abiding these days? And the prices for software stay high, and even keep rising, as software production and distribution costs decrease. And the software isn’t getting better, for the most part. It’s just that the software industry is incredibly spoiled at the easy money that’s been available over the past 20 years. The party’s over, folks.
Aside from gaming, it’s hard to find what I want in stores. A few weeks ago I wanted to get the latest Easy CD Creator from Best Buy and all they had was the “deluxe” (or special edition, I didn’t pay attention) which rang in at like $80+. I didn’t want all the bells and whistles- just something that allows me to burn ISOs and such. No dice. All of their CD/DVD burning tools were above $50 save one that didn’t do what I wanted it to do.
Stores in my area are carrying less and less PC software as time goes on. Oh sure there are a buttload of games but the days of more choice of apps and such are gone in the storefront. I even miss the $5 to $10 peg hook shareware days that had no frills software that just got the job done.
I definitely believe that the availability of full-version software one the web is mainly responisible for this decline. Finding a s/n is so easy these days, and with the introduction and rise of BitTorrent the availability of rarer titles has increased. As with the Music industry, this affects sales.
But the no-reason-to-upgrade is also a large factor, I think. Take Office 2003 for example. It’s a pretty good piece of software (judging by my own expirience, and reviews and such) but if you have Office XP or even Office 2000, you actually don’t need Office 2003. It doesn’t offer that much extra.
On the other hand, I don’t believe that Open Source software contributed a whole lot in this decline. Of course it did, but not in the rate the other two causes i mentioned did.
As always, that’s just me though!
google Burn4Free. It does exactly what you’re looking for and is free (as in gratis).
The software giants that account for most of these sales statistics simply aren’t producing products valuable enough for consumers to buy, especially when money is tight and the average American is using his credit card for groceries.
Looking at my own case, I use a lot of software, but I’ve bought very little software recently. What am I using, and why don’t I be a good consumer and upgrade?
– Windows 2000; it does the job, why pay for XP, just so Microsoft can treat me like a criminal (activation)? I’m slowly migrating to Linux anyway.
– Office 2000; really, MS hasn’t added any useful (for me) features since Office 97, and I’ve seen enough Office XP installations that wouldn’t go 10 minutes without crashing.
– Dreamweaver 3; I can’t see any useful difference between versions 3, 4, and 5 (MX). CSS support still sucks.
– Photoshop 6; 7 is more of the same, and 8 (CS) is even worse (US gov’t black-box modules, product activation).
– Illustrator 9; even version 7 would do the job. I used 10 at work, and after a few weeks it refused to even run. Why does Adobe keep adding useless web export options, anyway?
– QuarkXpress 5: well, I’ve dumped Quark, anyway. Looks like their product is going nowhere fast. No plans for Opentype and Unicode support? Bah.
So in the above cases, we really have companies trying to repackage the same product, with a few new gimmicks and a lot of new bugs, and they wonder why sales are falling.
A few bright spots:
– InDesign is making wonderful strides in desktop publishing. I expect to buy more upgrades from Adobe in the future.
– Linux and Mac OS X will gradually replace my Windows desktops, since I’ve already succeeded in getting the aforementioned applications running under Crossover Wine. And I *am* spending money on Linux distros.
Paul
You don’t generally have to pay local sales tax, and it’s easier to comparison shop.
I’ve always known i would work with computers. Flash,Photoshop,VisualStudio,Office,Illustrator,Dreamweaver,Windows,Pr emier
I need to use all this software. However, obviously I can’t affort the $5000+. This is all software i’ve stolen at one point. Then I realized that stealing is counter-productive. Companies use this as an excuse to raise prices. In the last year, I’ve been able to get free copies of many of these programs through attending company events, and when i don’t have a legit copy I use GNU software. The day of Photoshop costing $600 is on it’s way out i believe. Developers are going to have to start getting competitive or start finding new jobs.
Just speaking for software on MacOSX, I have been able to find a lot of very good freeware and shareware applications. iPhoto is good but in the future I will just use what comes with my digital camera, forget about iLife. iTunes is still free.
As far as piracy goes I don’t even bother. All the apps I want I can get at a low cost like freeware and shareware. Apps like Photoshop Elements are reasonably priced and usually come with a good scanner or digital camera. Things like Photoshop are “pro-apps” and are usually well worth the price you pay in relation to the money that you make from using the software.
excellent points – i have nearly the same setup as you, and see no need to upgrade.
i use access 2000 a great deal, and have played with access xp, but there wasn’t anything really added to make it worth switching. the same for photoshop 7.
you are right with indesign, that’s pretty good. and my next box will be a mac.
This drives me nuts, why do people seam to think that products used by such a tiny bit of the population will change this. The few main opensource apps for windows don’t tend to replace things people pay for. No one was paying for IE before there was netscape/mozilla/firebird.
The simple matter is the economy sucks, so people buy less. And further more there isn’t anything to buy. Most people can cruise along just fine with the apps they had 5 years ago. There haven’t been any big apps to come out in a long time. Also it seam few people buy software in the first place, most computers come with everything one wants on them when they buy them. I don’t think there is many people who go to the store and buy new software all the time. And few who buy new versions of things cause they are their. Upgrades and new release tend to mean nothing to most people. If it’s a free app you download you probably will keap updated, but people don’t run out and buy the newest version of some program cause its there. i don’t even know what is there for most people to buy, turbo tax, some lame CAD program, MS office. Not much. Most things people buy are games or learning programs for their kids.
I’ve bought one peice of software in my life from a store, a single game. All the programs on my computer are legal, everything falls into the group of included with hardware, or provided by school, or avalible for free. This is how most people would be. Opensource isn’t going to change things much at all.
People can warez stuff, many do. That has become easier with the growth of broadband. Few people care about something like openoffice, they either A) don’t want it and want Word and don’t give a crap B) Have a job so buying MS Office is no big deal C) warez MS Office d) get MS office for free from their school if they are a student and thus are one of the main groups who uses MS office. E) only use MS Office at work were it is needed and have no use for it at home and WordPad works fine for them F) don’t own a computer.
Sales for things change all the time, if there was suddenly some worthwhile app coming out people might buy it.
Surely if you raise prices unit sales must fall?
The drop has nothing to do with low-quality software or open source. It’s because of the widespread availability of warez. It’s become WAY too commonplace amoung kids and college students to download absolutely everything, even Windows XP itself.
It’s the same reason so many companies are moving to consoles now, and so we get dumbed-down versions of our favorite games (i.e., the disappointing Deus Ex 2). People stealing.
The cost of the upgrade isn’t just the license fee. It is the time to have somebody to install and test the software, it is the cost of user education, it is the cost of productivity loss due to inexperience of the new software in spite of education. It is the cost of employees playing with new features that is not really needed for production, e.g. a new screensaver.
All of these costs must be balanced by increased productivity you get by using the latest software. And they simply aren’t anymore.
If the software companies can’t invent software that have new revolutionary features that makes life easier, more and more types software will grow into commodities, where the only thing that counts is the price. This will turn out to be an uphill battle for developers of closed source as open source will always beat them on price.
Unless you’re looking for something really high end, most tasks can be done now with freeware that equals (if not surpasses) the quality of payware.
mIRC = vIRC, winzip = 7zip, MusicMatch Juke Box = Winamp + CDex, MS Office = Open Office/Abiword/ThunderBird, Norton AV = AVG, McAfee GuardDog = Tiny Personal Firewall/Zone Alarm, UltraEdit = ConText/Crimson Editor… I haven’t played with it much but even VS.NET can be replaced with Sharp Develope…
list goes on and on… only example i couldn’t think of before was the burner software (thanx for Burn4Free Tim) but that usally comes with the unit when you buy a burner. Other then windows which usually comes pre-installed, what software does the average user need to buy?
Just to verify what’s aleady been said, here is my situation:
* Office 2000 still works great. No reason to upgrade. In fact the office I work for still uses 2000 also. I might have to upgrade if they do… There’s even a copy of Office XP laying around here that wife got for free and never installed.
* I do buy games occationally, but tend to stick with bargain-bin titles. New-release game prices are ridiculous.
* For applications I can always find a Freeware title to do what I need.
* I’m backlogged in games and other software I haven’t even installed yet.
* I’ve recently bought used software at garage sales for about the same price as blank CDs.
* Hardware I’ve bought comes with plenty of software – no need to buy extra.
* When I went to the “city” last month, I visited my favorite place to buy software. The selection sucked and I came home empty-handed.
* I ~never~ steal software or use warez.
Later,
Bob
I use windows and linux both, but I only use windows for one thing. That is recording music, which I do using a program called ProTracks+. I actually went out and bought WinXP just so I could do that, because to me it’s worth shelling out the hundred someodd dollars for XP. I know I could download XP and be fine (or borrow a copy from friends who downloaded it), but that is exactly the same as walking into Best Buy, grabbing it off the shelf, sticking it under your jacket, and walking out. In my mind there is no difference.
That’s why I like linux, because it’s free (legally), and instead of paying money I usually help in smaller ways, like writing documentation or running an alpha or beta to test for bugs. But there’s no good non-linear recording software under Linux, so I shelled out $350 for the USB input box and the software, $150 for windows, and I’m good to go.
There are a hundred different justifications for downloading software, everything from “It’s a big corporation and it can take it” to “I just can’t afford it right now.” But how is it different from stealing from a store? WalMart is a big corporation, they could take it if you went in there and stole a pepsi, but you don’t. At least, most people don’t, and yet they are the same people who download music and software, burn copies of CDs, which is actually worth much more money that the pepsi you payed for. In other words, you’re stealing more than you would be if you stole the pepsi. I think the main reason this happens is because it’s SO easy. People just don’t let themselves think about it, they just do it. But if they did think about it they would realize it’s no different (and probably worse actually) then snagging a pepsi off the shelf at walmart.
If you can’t afford it, just use open source. If you can afford it, then buy it!!
Yeah, I installed Burn4free on both my WinXP boxes, works good. I burned Linux iso’s w/ it amoung other types of CDs.
http://www.burn4free.com/
In a sucky economy, it’s not surprising that people aren’t spending money on software and simply using what they already have. There really isn’t a momumental difference anymore between version X and version X + 1. Maybe some bug fixes and cosmetic enhancements but nothing revolutionary. Nothing that warrants a full version number increase.
I think the only software that I buy are Linux/BSD distros (~$5-$10) because I’m too lazy to download and burn the isos, and TurboTax ($20-$30) because it’s a habit. I really don’t see the need to spend money for the latest office suite because I barely use the one I have (Office 2000). If you’re a mediocre writer under Word 97, then you’re still a mediocre writer with Word.NET. 🙂
I used to prefer XP over 2000 because it was a little faster and the network setup wizards were nice, but with SP1, it’s now slower than Gimli running up a hill. I’m almost dreading what the performance will be like for XP SP2.
In a way, a bad economy has some good points: people will really take a hard look at what they have and what they want, or think they want, and make better spending decisions. The biggest enemy of major software companies isn’t Open Source but plain, simple economics: they’ve priced themselves out of what the market is willing to spend.
-d.
some of the best and most popular games came out already:
bf1942, 2002.
wc3, 2001
diablo2, 2000
c&c generals 2002.
about the clearest explanation i’ve read on it.
Matt Haughey, posting on Metafilter, about the difference between stealing and copyright infringment
<em>Stealing is walking into a Art Gallery and taking a painting under your arm and leaving.
Copyright Infringement is going to a national gallery and taking a digital photograph of a painting, then going home and printing it for placement on your wall.
One involves the theft of property, making it so there is 1 less painting in a gallery, the other does not. In either case, no money exchanges hands with the gallery, but in the second case there was potential for a sale of a painting.
It’s a thorny issue, and neither side is completely in the right, but there is a difference between “stealing” and “copyright infringement” that is worth noting, and perhaps, worth thinking about when drafting new laws to deal with it (please, please, please don’t use old property laws for copyright infringement).</em>
Linux users comprise 1% of all desktop users according to Google Zeitgeist (which I trust more than any other rating system). About 90% of all desktop users (and I can say desktop users because if you’re hitting Google, you have a web browser) use MS Windows in all its various flavors.
Open-source software simply is not popular in Windows. No machines come preloaded with Open Office, most come preloaded with Office 2000. When people need AntiVirus, they always think Norton or McAffee, not avast!.
I track the changes in retail software to two things: (1) the fact that download purchases aren’t counted, because I think download purchases are becoming very popular and (2) the general rise in software prices and the update-cycle which locks users into to upgrading after a year. As a third factor you could say the economy, which I’m sure has its effect.
But let’s not pretend this is “free software overtaking non-free software.”
Warez has been around since commercial software was introduced. As the number of computer users goes up the amount of warez goes up. But, it isn’t easier to get then before. It’s actually pretty much the same.
What has changed, though, is software and its prices. There comes a point in software’s life where its “good enough.” That point is different depending on the person who uses it, but it gets to that point for everybody someday. For most people Office 97/2K is good enough. Windows 98 or 2000 is good enough. Photoshop 6 is good enough. It does what they need it to do in order to get the job done. Combined with the increase in software prices ($200 for XP upgrade?!), you see people say “no thanks” to the upgrade. Their software is good enough and pricing it too high will just make them ignore it. It’s the weakness of the software field.
People realize this now, and aren’t willing to spend as much. Nor do they need to. Not to mention most added features are fluff these days anyways for major established software.
That’s actually a really good way of putting it. But in either case, money which would go to the person who painted/wrote/programmed the thing is not going to them.
Sales might also have gone down because of MS licensing rules which now say you can use your companies copy of office at home for the cost of the media, no need to buy it anymore, certainly no reason to steal it.
And for those who say no new features, please look again a little closer. I use office 2003 now and went back to office 2000 the other day and lots of stuff was missing, not to mention all the spam getting into my inbox (outlook 2003 is pretty good :o)
if the software industry would turn out a good final product people might buy more.. but with the ‘net every company thinks they can turn out crap and just put out a patch or update, I for one am sick of this path of software creation.. every single company does it now days.. i rember buying doom 1 when it came out, and there was never a patch or anything needed, pop the disk in, install and go.. now you have to update 100+mb files (or you can order the CD for $10!) just to start installing software you just bought for $60..
Yes, but with stealing, you’re looking at definitely 1 less sale because you’ve got one less unti to sell, as well as the loss of the investment which went into making the product (materials and time). with infringment, you still have all the untis for sale that you had initially, and nothing in the way of investment has been wasted either. In the case of infringment, the loss is that your market to sell to is 1 person smaller and yet they enjoy the benefits of the product you sell.
why i usually get suspicious when companies attribute losses to infringment for the simple reason that there’s no evidence people would have bought the item otherwise, and there was no loss to the company otherwise.
That really is nothing is a recession. Maybe people don’t have as much money to spend on software as they had threee years ago. No big deal.
A lot of these companies have been making the money back in the business sector with support contracts (which is really where a whole lot of the industry is moving). For a monthly fee, you can get upgrades sent to you via mail/email or by logging in to the companie’s website.
I agree with Linwood (above). The quality of a lot of software is just awful. Bakers, auto mechanics, plumbers and just about anyone else must produce a product that works. Imagine if your auto mechanic told you:
“Yeah the brakes don’t work that well; I can send you a patch”
Somehow it’s perfectly acceptable for software to be shipped with known defects. I don’t want to hear the excuse that software is intrinsically complicated and that it will always have bugs. That just shows the entitlement mentality that shrinkwarp vendors have. Suspension bridges and high rise buildings are complicated too and they don’t have all those defects.
I tend to but a lot of things off of ebay and yahoo auctions, and i gather so do many other people.
The reason is that the economy hasn’t recovered yet, people lost their jobs and companies are reluctant to invest. Period.
I think there is a clear trend that shows within a few years, retail sales of software just will not be necessary. Downloading from the internet is simply more conveniant for shopping for software than going to a store and buying the product (I’m talking about legal downloading, of course). This is not a bad thing for big software companies, it is a huge benefit. Selling through the reatil channel is more difficult than selling from the internet.
It is my prediction that in some years (as broadband reaches critical mass everywhere) software developers will abandon the retail channel completely because the costs will exceed the benefits.
For instance, to me Word 2000 is the last decent word processor from Microsoft. Working with comments and change tracking has become simply inconvenient and slow since XP (and I use those features a lot)… And I hate sidebars!!!!
Consoles don’t really have anything to do with Piracy initially. I buy console games because they a) WORK without crashing and b) don’t IMMEDIATELY require 27 patches plus the next patch-of-the-day for the next 2 months. Anyone remember Tribes 2???
The cost for a console is what? 200$? Less now? How much was a decent gaming PC when the PS2 first came out? When Gamecube or XBox showed up? It’s only recently that the price of a somewhat gameworthy PC has come down. I can point out that Halo on XBox plays fine. I need a machine in the 500$ range to play it on the PC without issues. That’s a difference of 300$ and then we have to get a monitor and other stuff. That’s a WHOLE other price factor you’ve missed. People game on console systems because the are CHEAP compared to buying a PC.
Yes, it’s SOMEWHAT harder to pirate on a console. But not enough that it matters. ANY burner that can do bit for bit like CloneCD gets you where you need to be. Sony knows this firsthand.
It’s a crappy economy and and I can barely afford rent, let alone 16$ a CD or 20$ DVD, or the ridiculous price of 60$ for a brand new PC game. So yes, I wait until the price drops to something ~30$ or less. It’s so much easier to deal with a console game that just works, doesn’t need patching, and has far less issues with cheaters because the systems are so locked down.
I think it’s because software is so expensive!!!
Have you noticed that even the most stupid little shareware apps cost at least $30?? I downloaded this hardware monitoring program last year and loved it. But the guy wants $30 for it?? I’m not paying $30 just to see the temp of my processor.
I ended up finding a freeware program that works just as well.
I don’t think piracy is the issue here. I think the prices are. Look at how much Microsoft wants for even just an XP upgrade. It’s insane!!!
I’d much rather choose open soruce and freeware over overpriced commercial software any day.
And the drop in retail sales can also be attributed to the fact that you can save a lot of money buying software online. It’s way overpriced in the stores.
So when it comes down to it… They’re being too greedy and now they’re getting burned by it by losing sales.
The most profitable software market will be high end enterprise software. Is open source causing this? probably a little. I’m all open to not paying $50 per little application that I need and I need thousands.
Yeah, Burn4Free does what you need, but it installs adware. My ZoneAlarm firewall caught it trying to phone home. A LavaSoft AdAware scan then detected the adware and deleted it.
Free is nice, but a lot of it comes at some other cost, like adware, spyware, even keyboard loggers.
Caveat Cheapskate.
Free firewall:
http://www.zonelabs.com/store/content/catalog/products/sku_list_za….
Free version has exactly the same firewall as the pay versions, just without the bells. And whistles, there’s definitely no whistles.
Lavasoft AdAware scanner
http://www.lavasoftusa.com/
free version has to be run manually for each scan, pay versions watch on the fly.
Yeah, they’re both “free” ware, but that’s to promote their pay versions. I’ve liked them both for years.
Can you spell troll?
When it comes to expensive professional products companies has a lot to win on piracy. To quote the head of NewTek when he was asked about people pirating Lightwave “It makes good lightwavers”.
People copy these expensive software titles and use them at home, some of them becomes very good at them, then they go out and get a job. Which software will they use?
I’ve personally never bought any windows software in my life, and I never will even though I sometimes have to use them. I do support software for alternative OS’s because I want that market to grow. If I pay for windows software, then companies are less likely to port their apps to other platforms. And I let them know that if they port it, I will buy it. Because I have no problem paying for software, but I have a problem supporting the Windows market. I know it sounds pretty bad, but it’s the most reasonable choice I think I can make.
For example, I will buy Tracktion the day it comes out on linux, but I’d never pay for the windows version.
There is such a thing as supply and demand.
High demand, prices are lowered.
Low demand, prices are hiked.
Of course you have to take into account softwares shelve-life. For instance most games have a very short life span, between one or two months, before they are tossed into the bargain bin.
About the only software I buy these days is games, or boxed Linux distros for support reasons.
Free software does what I need today.
When I started running Linux, I realized I could just get legal and did. Every last application went through the same test:
1. Do I really need it? (Enough to actually pay for it?)
2. If needed, can OSS do the job?
3. For software I own, how can I best continue to use it?
Running critical stuff in a virtual machine makes it portable across platforms and version changes.
Running the software of today through that filter gets rid of a lot of sales. Now I can buy better hardware!
I agree strongly with others about pricing. It is way too high.
“Copyright Infringement is going to a national gallery and taking a digital photograph of a painting, then going home and printing it for placement on your wall.
One involves the theft of property, making it so there is 1 less painting in a gallery, the other does not. In either case, no money exchanges hands with the gallery, but in the second case there was potential for a sale of a painting.”
That is almost a good analogy, but a gallery doesn’t normally own the copyright in the paintings on its walls.
It would own the copyright in a photo of the painting taken by a gallery staff member.
In many cases the artists are long dead so the paintings are public domain.
“Have you noticed that even the most stupid little shareware apps cost at least $30?? I downloaded this hardware monitoring program last year and loved it. But the guy wants $30 for it?? I’m not paying $30 just to see the temp of my processor.”
That is particularly a Windows problem. Similar utilities for the Amiga are generally free. It is very noticeable to me that a utility which I can download free seems to cost a windows user $70. (If they pay).
OTOH almost all Windows users seem to get everything on CDs full of warez from their friends.
Hi.
I think software prices are too high for what they give you in return. I use Win2K because I do not need Xp. I use Linux too and I do not use stolen software at all.
I don’t want to raise flames but what if your ultimate DVD Player attached to your TV to play your favourite DVD Title needs a patch ? No one would buy it.
I think software industry needs more quality assurance and laws.
Instead of selling pre-releases they could sell the finished product….If quality could be assured people would buy. There seems no to be a ‘return policy’ for software….if found full of defects….Simply you get a PC with an OS installed and you cannot even complain about that.
– later,
– Pasha
So in the above cases, we really have companies trying to repackage the same product, with a few new gimmicks and a lot of new bugs, and they wonder why sales are falling.
I agree with this comment from this thread very much.
Same applies to the music industry, especially modern “music”, if it produced less crap, sales would increase.
One doesn’t need a degree or to be a lawyer to understand those simple facts of life.
I’m not replying to anyone specific, but to the best of my knowledge, MS Office is not free for us college students either. I bought a copy of Office XP Pro a few years ago that now refuses to install itself, so I may end up buying Office 2003. The reason I’m not buying from an official retail store is because I can get it cheaper at newegg, that is if there ever comes a day when I can afford it, even with its academic “discount.” A lot of people have said this and I agree with them: the price of commercial software these days is just too high. If you want more people to buy, lower the price, don’t raise it.
“It is my prediction that in some years (as broadband reaches critical mass everywhere) software developers will abandon the retail channel completely because the costs will exceed the benefits.”
Would that be pre-restrictions broadband, or post-restrictions broadband? i.e. caps, quotas, etc.
Anyway after reading all 51 posts, sounds like we need to simple find out what the percentages are, because a lot of the reasons given are valid (the warez one will generate acres of commentary on slashdot with no resolution in sight. Looks like clear results are the only way to break that gordian knot ‘and some will argue even those’).
the state of software these days sucks!
so angry am I, that I don’t even want to write more!
ARGH