Author: Dann Corbit
Date: 11:10:24 03/30/99
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On March 30, 1999 at 12:50:02, KarinsDad wrote: [snip] >I do not follow your logic Dann (I could just be dense). > >If Mindscape can put out an extremely strong engine (regardless of whether CM6 >stays at the top of the SSDF or not) at a reasonable price, then it seems >reasonable that other commercial manufacturers could as well. I agree that Mindscape's software is a very good buy. They have a volume (if reports are to be believed) several orders of magnitude larger than anyone else. That gives them a sizeable edge in abilty to reduce margin. >Taking the opposite extreme of your example, there are a lot of luxury cars and >SUVs on the market that could be priced at 2/3rds or even lower of their current >market price. However, since they are considered prestigious (i.e. near the top >of their equivalent SSDF list), the market will bear a much greater price. The >improved feature set of these luxury vehicles is basically irrelevant in regard >to reality (it is the perception that counts). > >I think the same could be said with the chess program manufacturers. They are >priced at what the market will bear and if a significantly lower priced set of >software is rated by the industry as "just as good" or "better", then it should >start taking a larger market share (and the other products will either have to >lower prices, improve their products, or take a market share hit). Which is what we are seeing. Chess software prices are tumbling, and yet they are tiny in volume of sales for most manufacturers. If you only sell a few thousand copies, and you must cover the salaries of all your employees, how much can you plow back into R&D? >Finally, I have purchased a few chess programs and databases over the years and >have been EXTREMELY disappointed with the feature set. And this has been with >the current model of high price for the "strong engines". Although the engines >analyze fine, the concept of a high margin to improve research and development >has applied mostly to the engines and only marginally to the rest of the >product. So, maybe what the computer chess community really needs is some true >competition to make the commercial manufacturers hungry again. The competition that is purely price based drives features down. If I cannot make you see that, then I don't know what else to say. >KarinsDad :)
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