Software should be designed to last
I would like to answer the question &quot;Why is software so frequently disappointing and flawed? &quot;<p>As a developer, there is nothing I would like better than to turn out the highest quality software, as long as I could be compensated for it.<p>Does anyone really think that the millions of lines of code that went into Windows is worth the piddling $100+ the consumer pays for it?<p>Let&#x27;s start with a basic premise: quality is worth money. I&#x27;m sure we agree that a Hyundai (or whatever passes for a cheap car in your neighbourhood) costs less than a Porsche or BMW because the Porsche is better designed and better built. Better design means more experienced and brilliant engineers, more talented designers; better built means more skilled and dedicated assembly-line workers. All these people demand more money. Hence the Porsche company commands a higher price for their Carreras, 911s, whatever.<p>The same should be true of software. If a company invests great care in designing a better operating system, or a better word processor, that never crash, and always have helpful help and meaningful error messages, how much do you think that would be worth? I&#x27;ll give you a hint: the military do in fact get top-quality software for their jets and rockets. They get software that almost never fails, and does exactly what it is designed to do.<p>Do you know how much this software costs? $50 per line of code.<p>Translating into everyday terms, a bullet-proof operating system would cost you, at a rough guess, $5,000 per copy.<p>Now I have no doubt some people would be happy to pay $5,000 for a stable OS. However, there are many people who couldn&#x27;t afford this amount.<p>So what would happen? In any other field (automobiles, stereos, TVs, restaurant meals, housing) people who can&#x27;t afford quality just put up with less and shut up.<p>But in the software field... well, they just make a copy of someone else&#x27;s software, and enjoy the full benefit of top-of-the-line quality, without paying for it. I wager even you couldn&#x27;t resist obtaining a $5,000 OS for free.<p>How long do you think a software company would last if their product cost millions to make, and they only sold a few copies at $5,000? Why they would go broke, of course.<p>This is the crux of the software dilemma: except in a few specialized cases (commercial or embedded software), the maximum price for software is the monetary equivalent of the nuisance value of duplicating it.<p>In consumer software, this is in the range of $19-$29.<p>The digital world turns the economics of quality upside-down: in traditional models where quality is supported by price, the market pays the price if it wants the quality.<p>In the digital model, a perfect copy of the merchandise costs virtually nothing, and undercuts the legitimate market, putting a cap on the maximum that can be charged for a product.<p>There is a built-in limit to how much time, effort and expense a company can invest into a mass-produced product. This cap is equivalent to the &quot;nuisance value&quot; defined above. It is not reasonable for the consumer to expect warranties and liabilities that go way beyond what the manufacturer receives from sales of the product.<p>The music and movie industry are wrestling with the consequences of easy digital duplication. They have taken a different route to protecting their intellectual property.<p>I challenge anyone to come up with a business model where the software developer that invests great expense in building a quality product, can obtain full compensation from the market segment that values his quality.<p>Whose fault is it anyway? Simple: it&#x27;s the consumer who copies and pirates software that forces the price down and therefore the quality to remain low. Any analysis that does not take this into account is simplistic.<p>It is naïve to think that most developers are not struggling to make ends meet and stay in business (Microsoft notwithstanding).