RE: [Slightly OT] Shareware donation collection
RE: [Slightly OT] Shareware donation collection
- Subject: RE: [Slightly OT] Shareware donation collection
- From: "Josh Ferguson" <email@hidden>
- Date: Fri, 20 Feb 2004 14:47:41 -0600
- Thread-topic: [Slightly OT] Shareware donation collection
Now you bring support into the equation. If your company chokes on resetting the serial number limit or helping a person register your application, then you have bigger problems then your registration scheme. A person will feel better about a company after receiving good support than they would not needing support at all.
Extending your logic, it's usually easier for a person to find a cracked serial number than it is to actually go to a webstore and purchase the product. Hence the reason most people don't pay for shareware. We did all the registration for a game called Eggsucker (which has since been bought by popcap games). I think registration was something like $7 (I know it was under 10), and the game was awesome! It became very popular, but you wouldn't believe the number of warez sites that had cracks or serials for it. Money is not always the motivator! Who can't afford $7? People don't usually pirate software because they can't afford it or because they're upset about your registration scheme...they do it because finding a serial number on a warez site is easier than purchasing your software. Plain and simple. Now, take that idea, and apply product activation - all of a sudden, you've made purchasing the easiest path to registration. There will still be cracks, but then you actually have to find a site that will host the crack file (much less common), and you have to be brave enough to download an executable off of a warez site (always dangerous).
My point is that somebody isn't going to go out and find a crack after they've already made the decision to purchase. It'll be your application, not your registration scheme, that compells a customer to purchase. Once they've made up their mind to get their wallet out of the pocket, get their credit card out, and purchase your application, it takes a lot to push that customer away. If you recapture 1% of the 10,000 people who'd normally pirate the software because it's easy, then you've just got 100 more sales than you would've had otherwise. If you lose a couple of sales because the customer felt "hassled" by your registration policy, then you've still got a pretty good margin.
For those of you who have their software up on version tracker - compare the number of downloads from version tracker to the number of registrations you've received. Without product activation, you can bet at least half of those non-registered downloads (probably more) were registered with stolen serial numbers.
-----Original Message-----
From: cricket [
mailto:email@hidden]
Sent: Friday, February 20, 2004 2:15 PM
To: Finlay Dobbie
Cc: Josh Ferguson; CocoaDev List; Charles Srstka; Mark Eissler; Mike
Brinkman
Subject: Re: [Slightly OT] Shareware donation collection
I'd consider any customer that has to struggle with serial numbers in
ANY way to be a lost sale. It reflects badly on you, and makes the user
less likely to recommend your product. Next time, they may decide to
look for a cracked serial number because it's easier than waiting for
support from a company.
- cricket
On Feb 20, 2004, at 11:19 AM, Finlay Dobbie wrote:
>
> Josh brings up a really good point: a legitimate user would have no
>
> problem contacting the developer/vendor if they run into issues with
>
> the serial number. A pirate user would have a lot of....courage....to
>
> call up the vendor and complain. And if they do it, well kudos to
>
> them, they deserve an A for having the guts.
>
>
OTOH it's hassle for the user, and what happens if the vendor goes out
>
of business etc?
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