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Shareware and Unix?

Posted by Cliff on from the forgotten-niches dept.

McDoobie asks: "Is there a market for low cost shareware in the Linux/BSD and Unix market in general? Would it be worthwhile to have a small home based business next to ones regular day job producing well made, but small, shareware for an environment that is dominated either by large corporations or Open Source developers? If so, what should a potential developer/publisher focus on to make their products/price range attractive to customers? What type of customers are most likely to look into such software? SOHO? Small Enterprise? Home users? In a nutshell, where should one begin when investigating the potential of the Un*x (and perhaps Apple) environment for the small time developer who's interested in earning a few dollars on the side?"

4 of 62 comments (clear)

  1. I think it is going to be hard. by Xner · · Score: 5, Informative
    If you want to actually make money from your programs, I believe it might take quite a large effort. You are going to operate in a world where most software can be had for free. It is rather hard to beat that price.

    Furthermore, people are really used to not paying for software. If you want them to register you'll have to be very annoying about it (risk losing users/customers due to percieved harassment), implement some technological countermeasure (also very irritating, and potentially useless against technologically sophisticated people) or just be nice and hope for the best (with the risk of people not really noticing/caring caring that your application is not BSD/GPL licensed.)

    You best bet is probably giving registered users small benefits and services that others do not. How you would implement this exactly depends on your line of business.
    Just remember not to piss off your userbase with too many nags/copy protections/long serials/spyware etc.

    --
    Pathman, Free (as in GPL) 3D Pac Man
  2. No by WasterDave · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Basically, no. There was something on here a couple'o'months back about ... ahhh ... some text editor or something, can't remember. Anyway, the point is that the author had sold 'n' thousand copies for the mac, ported it to Linux and sold something like four copies.

    So, quality shareware for Linux? F*ck that.

    Commercial, expensive server software may have a market. Particularly if it enables interoperability with Windows (-1 Unfashionable).

    Mac OSX? Now that's a different question. Here we have a target market that we *know* pays for things, otherwise they wouldn't have macs. The big danger is that whatever you write will be released at macworld as iWhatever three days before you release it and the market will be dead. Witness OmniWeb and Safari -> owned. Imagine making photo editing software for the mac now. Or an MP3 player. Or some presentation software. Or an email client. Or calendaring. You get my drift?

    Shareware for Linux? Do get a grip :)

    Dave

    --
    I write a blog now, you should be afraid.
  3. What about... by RyoSaeba · · Score: 5, Insightful

    a kind of 'service' company, instead ?
    As pointed out, shareware on a free os doesn't sound that great. On the other hand, wouldn't people be ready to pay a small fee for having their database / browser / random application correctly installed & configured ?
    Using SSH/Telnet, you can easily hop over that person's box, and do stuff directly. Of course that requires some trust between you & the user, since you'd prolly be able to trash the whole system ^_^

    Another suggestion which comes to mind: develop software on-demand, and release the source as Open Source. Like, someone says 'ok, i need a small app that does this thingy, can't find it. i pay you some price, you make it, and release sources under an Open Source license.'
    This has the advantage to ensure you do software which'll actually be used (even if by only one user !), and people will less likely be afraid of the 'company goes boum, source lost, money lost' scenario, since sources will be available...

    Just me 2 cents of euro...

    --
    Tsuyoikoto ha taisetsu da ne, dakedo namida mo hitsuyousa (Strength is an important thing, but tears too are necessary)
  4. Sad.. by Aknaton · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I think that it will be hard to do. The free-Unix crowd is used to having their cake for free and even if you came up with something unique, some developer would probably create a free clone of it.

    Since you mentioned MacOS X, I would suggest developing for them as your primary audience. Offer a version for Unixes as well, provided you can do so without killing yourself, as paying users on those platforms will probably be few.