Unrestricted vs. Limited Shareware, In Dollars

mklopez writes "There is a belief in the online world that people will be more willing to compensate an author for a downloaded program that has full functionality, versus paying to unlock features in a shareware version. Someone actually put this idea to a test with surprising results."

Comments

Surprising?

[Anonymous Brave Guy]

I don't find the result surprising at all. In the real world, there are more people who will pay up if it's directly in their interests than will pay up simply out of respect/gratitude/charity/whatever, not least because one set is likely to be almost entirely contained within the other.

What's really suprising...

[Chris Pimlott]

The result of this study is rather unsurprising to me. What is suprising is that this fairly trivial piece of software, created entirely for the purposes of this experiment, earned its author $34,075 in one year. Wow. And there was probably a good deal more money to be made if it always ran in restricted functionality mode.

Now, granted, he has an established company, so he probably has some good connections with download sites and magazines to get his program included, but that's a tidy sum for "a couple of days" of work.

Test? What test?

[Anonymous Coward]

Summary links to some guy's blog who briefly mentions the test then explains how he cripples his software.

The actual test is here

I prefere timed limits over feature limits...

[jbarr]

...because you get full use of the application. This is important if you are doing serious evaluation. And let's be realistic--if you are seriously evaluating a program, you should be able to effectively do so within the time limits as long as the time limits are reasonable. And if you really need to run over the time limit, Try contacting the company and ask them to extend it. Many (but not all) companies are more than willing to work with you if you are serious about evaluating their program.

I think we can all admit that we have, at one time or another, used a less-than-legal copy of software. Many times, it's a one-shot "need", but in many cases, it's to evaluate a program that's otherwise crippled. And for me, there are many, MANY times when the ability to have unrestricted use led to purchases.

-Jim
http://jimstips.com/

Re:I prefere timed limits over feature limits...

[Daniel_Staal]

If you want to actually make money, the best is probably a combination. When first downloaded you get full functionality, for a time. This gets you hooked on all the features. Then the trial period runs out and the features are limited. You know the features are there, and you can still use the program, but to reactivate all the features you need to pay.

Simply shutting down the program at the end of the trial period, for me at least, means I will stop running the program and thinking about it. I'll probably check to see if there is another way to do what I need, without using your program. If you want me to pay, you need to keep me using it, but disable enough that I think paying is worth it.

Re:I prefere timed limits over feature limits...

[Yer Mom]

I prefer time limits that actually time how long you use the program, rather than how long it's been since you first ran it.

If I install something with a 30 day trial, have a quick fiddle, and then get distracted by Real Life[tm], those 30 days could have run out by the time I find the program in /Applications and remember that I hadn't finished trying it out. Now what?

A program that lets you run it on 10 separate occasions would have been much more useful, because I'd still have 9 shots left at evaluating it. Even better would be changing the 30 day limit to a 10 day limit, but only counting days that you run the program - that way, if you accidentally hit Quit and immediately restart, you don't get dinged for it.

Link to experiment program

[Chris Pimlott]

Here's SmartDoc, the actual program used in this experiment, and a screenshot It certainly looks pretty basic.

Re:Paying for crippled software

[eln]

Sure, but everyone says "I'd rather donate money to a worthy Open Source project than pay for crippleware," but how many of those people actually do? I'm guessing that a very small fraction of the people that claim to be willing to monetarily support Open Source software actually do so. Most people will download and use the software, and maybe post something to the effect of "I'd have no problem paying for this." But along with that statement is the implied "...but I don't have to, so I won't."

Is crippling wrong?

[truthsearch]

I don't find the results very surprising. While he's trying to prove to Slashdotters the reasons for his methods he only responds with the financial ones. The reason developers on /. are generally against crippling software is because it just feels wrong to do it. If we can write software to perform a task then want to do it and give it to those who want it. The method of profit becomes secondary to the functionality of the software. Therefore we feel slightly better offering a trial period because the user gets to really use the software in all its glory. But we'd prefer to pass out our software fully functional and hope some who like it offer us something back.

I think figuring out the way to profit is a difficult problem. Not because it's hard to pick between trial periods and crippling. But because we want to feel good about the software we write and at the same time make a living from it.

Parent Contains Useful Information

[patio11]

(It was my blog, incidentally. I don't know why the submitter had interest in a days old blog about a years old experiment, but eh, I'm happy you found it interesting.)

Slashdotters will almost certainly find the original article at http://hackvan.com/pub/stig/articles/why-do-people -register-shareware.html as or more interesting as my blog summary of it, which strips out all the detail in favor of talking about another example (Movable Type) and two current programs (one mine, one somebody else's) and their different crippling strategies (features vs. time).

(I would have modded the parent up but I get 2 points for free and modding only gives the AC 1. Sorry, AC.)

I'm not *allowed* to donate!

[Saunalainen]

I work in the public sector, and I have a sizable budget for IT expenses. I can justify expenditure on just about anything simply by saying I need it. However, the purchasing department wouldn't let me give money to a project if I can get the same software free of charge. We're very carefully audited to make sure our software is licensed, but if the license permits usage at no cost then there is no way we can justify giving a donation. We would be in big trouble if we were found to be `wasting' taxpayers' money in this way.

Even in the private sector, a corporation has a legal responsibility to its shareholders to reduce costs, and runs the risk of being sued by them if it donates money unnecessarily.

Neither public nor private organizations are allowed to be charitable with their patrons' money.

Here's a link to my F/OSS Competitor

[patio11]

(Hiya, I'm the author of TFA and Bingo Card Creator). Here's the closest OSS program to my software: http://sourceforge.net/projects/bingo-cards/ . Feel free to use it if it fits your needs better. (I'll be perfectly honest: I think I do a much better job. For example, I have features such as "actually runs on a Windows PC instead of crashing on install" and "prints without leaving the program". If I didn't think I could do a better job than what was available for free, I wouldn't have invested my time and money into the project.) If not, you can do things the traditional way by paying your educational publisher of choice $15 a bingo card set. If you plan on doing this activity twice, ever, I really do save you money.