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MBAs literally have no model for providing a stable product. They learn the product lifecycle like a self-fulfilling prophecy: A product goes through the introduction, growth, maturity and decline phases and then it's no longer viable. You better line up new products or you will find yourself in the decline phase of your primary product without something to replace it once it's over. Simply maintaining something "forever" does not compute for business types.

So what's to stop any business owner from incorporating their business? NOTHING.

Nothing? Nothing but state laws. Each state makes their own requirements corporations have to meet. Some states do not allow all of a corporation's stock to be owned by one person. Some states require corporations to have 3 executives. Other states have other requirements. There are also disadvantages to corporate forms of business. Of course you can register an offshore corporation but they have their own disadvantages.

So before you make a fool of yourself again research what you will post about before posting.

Falcon

it's all about elasiticity. anyone who has taken a 100-level course in economics (as have apparently the editors of "the economist". big surprise there) should know. a quick rundown is here:

http://www.quickmba.com/econ/micro/elas/ped.shtml

most software is highly elastic to most people. playing with this or that nifty piece of software may be fun for an hour or afternoon but unless it's a killer app, they would, given the choice, opt to not use the program rather than pay.

it's like the classic example of the pay-for park. a hundred people go to the park on a sunday afternoon, so a government beurocrate determines that if the city charges a $10 admission, the profit will be $1000 every sunday. the toll gates go up but, to the surprise of the beurocrat, nobody shows up to buy a ticket.

Near the bottom is:

Discouraged workers - those who want a job but have given up looking and therefore do not fall within the definition of the labor force. These persons tend to make the reported unemployment rate lower than it otherwise would be.

...give breathing space for competitors to come up with similar products BEFORE we do.

That's a good point which had me thinking about other similar models which have been done like this.

Other Sample Models/Studies
SWOT analysis can be used for internal projects and whole companies. It doesn't provide a final number like this study but it would at least require someone to think about the project from and may help align the sales and development teams. It's a rather simple model and has been developed further by many others but it was sort of like the grandfather to this type of qualitative thought.
Porter's Five Forces model again although primarily considered for whole companies or departments could be applied to projects and was created in 1980. Threat of New Entrants could be threats of external companies instead doing the job before you do, or other internal departments/teams doing the project, etc. Power of Suppliers may be other departments or other projects which may change requirements or require extensive red tape slowing the project down. Etc., Etc., Etc.
Six Sigma used for project time estimation (which looks like it could be useful for determining if a project is on track and if not if it will then create other problems?
A study on Identifying Best Practices in Information Technology Project Management.

...give breathing space for competitors to come up with similar products BEFORE we do.

That's a good point which had me thinking about other similar models which have been done like this.

Other Sample Models/Studies
SWOT analysis can be used for internal projects and whole companies. It doesn't provide a final number like this study but it would at least require someone to think about the project from and may help align the sales and development teams. It's a rather simple model and has been developed further by many others but it was sort of like the grandfather to this type of qualitative thought.
Porter's Five Forces model again although primarily considered for whole companies or departments could be applied to projects and was created in 1980. Threat of New Entrants could be threats of external companies instead doing the job before you do, or other internal departments/teams doing the project, etc. Power of Suppliers may be other departments or other projects which may change requirements or require extensive red tape slowing the project down. Etc., Etc., Etc.
Six Sigma used for project time estimation (which looks like it could be useful for determining if a project is on track and if not if it will then create other problems?
A study on Identifying Best Practices in Information Technology Project Management.

Good advice overall, but your comments on which state to incorporate in are off. Delaware also charges a franchise tax, albeit not as large as the one in Texas. The most business friendly and economical state to incorporate in right now is Nevada, particularly in regards to corporate taxes, although there are some substantial credibility and auditing issues with that state you should consider.

Good starter references on Delaware vs. Nevada:

Quick MBA

Entrepreneur's Library

SCORE

Congrats on lousy linking. There was not one link there of any real value. Here is a good link. Either way you don't need to "pierce the corporate veil" when there is fraud. Piercing the corporate veil helps shareholders recover directly from the directors of the company. Fraud is just plain illegal.

It's really all a matter or price elasticity. Pricing isn't quite as dependant upon production costs as most people believe.

I'm no economist, so maybe I'm wrong.

If you've taken collegiate level economics then you're aware of the elasticity of demand.

When CD's first hit the market and went past the early adopter stage in to critical mass, CD's were priced between $16 and $20 with replication costs just under $2 (and CD players were $300-$400). Within my first year of buying CD's, the pricing seemed to reach equilibrium at roughly $16.

The kicker? As hardware prices have continued to plummet the CD pricing itself has remained relatively constant. All the while the prices of CD replication have continued to fall and are now under $ .25.

It's no wonder that my 14 year old daughter refuses to spend her babysitting money on music. She has an iPod and we have been in a constant struggle over piracy as I refuse to allow her to use Kazaa, copy friends CD's or make CD's for others (from the music she *does* buy). She views me as the "tough unreasonable Dad" and she truly doesn't understand why she should throw money away and why, "...the record companies are so lame and don't get it".

In the next breath she says, "...I'd buy all day long if CD's were under $10" and she does buy frequently when on sale or on mark-down at retailers. Also, in two seconds she'd sign up for a music service *if* it had all her favorite bands and she could buy songs one-at-a-time (not yet available though some services getting closer).

Makes me wonder if the record company executives slept through Econ 101 in college?

This section prohibits any entity that owns radio stations, and concert promotion services or venues from acting in an anti-competitive manner.

and to consider a number of strategies to use the US government's purchasing power to promote competition and make Microsoft behave;

But this, no no no. This is still a judicial matter, and any penalty against MS is going to be determined in court. An executive agency would be way overstepping its bounds here.

1. Supplier Power (can affect anyone who builds their technology on top of Microsoft's proprietary technologies)
   
2. Threat of substitutes (Microsoft's fear of Linux will increase as the cost of switching to Linux decreases)
   
3. Barriers to entry (usually pretty low in the tech industry generally, but companies can build these over time by having better technology (cool) or by lobbying for laws that make it harder for companies to compete against them (not cool, unless you own stock in the current market leader))
   
4. Rivalry (how fiercely the existing firms compete -- the bursting of the tech bubble cut the number of competitors, but those who are left are fighting hard ... although it sometimes seems that Microsoft is escaping this effect)