125m 4mm DA

$22.95

24,576

$0.00093

650MB CD ROM

2.35

650

0.00360

3.9 times

5.2GB R/W CD

83.00

4813

0.01700

18.3 times

1GB Jaz

99.00

1000

0.09900

106.5 times

120MB Imation

17.95

110

0.16300

175.3 times

100MB Zip

17.95

94

0.19100

205.4 times

2.2GB Orb

29.95

2200

0.01361

14.6 times

2GB Jaz

124.95

2000

0.06247

67.2 times

4.5GB IBM UltraStar 9ES

219.00

4550

0.04813

51.8 times

Quantum 8.4GB Stratus SE

279.00

8455

0.03299

35.5 times

Maxtor DiamondMax 13.0GB

179.00

13020

0.01375

14.8 times

WAP has a huge Mac (Apple II and /// also) library with many free/shareware files that will work on older machines. Cost - even for nonmembers - is minimal.

We don't expect to begin the laying out of the Legacy CD until the new Goes to School CD is completed in September. It is my understanding that the guys will be laying out the Legacy CD in September and October. In other words I would hate for people to think that they can get this CD right away and be disappointed.

I have always found it strange that authors are willing to continually let you have a new version, even if it is years after the original purchase. I don't know if it is just a Mac thing, or an attempt to ensure that there is always good quality, non-Microsoft software available.

One thing that you didn't touch on in "Shareware Trends" is that the user often feels entitled to endless updates/upgrades after paying a measly $10-20 for whatever program it is.

On the other hand these same people plop down hundreds of dollars for incremental upgrades to Photoshop, Illustrator, Quark, and the slew of Microsoft products.

On top of it all Shareware users typically expect the program/software to perform flawlessly and have you (the author, which they can contact directly unlike the CEO or even the lead programmer of say, Microsoft) at their beck and call 24/7 and possibly in multiple languages (heaven forbid you don't speak a local dialect of Portuguese!).

Pricing is very hard to do on Shareware from the author's standpoint. Should you charge more than $20? Will people pay if its over $10 thinking its too high or under $20 thinking if its so cheap it must not be any good?

Will they endlessly send emails saying "If program Y only had X feature, I'd pay for it" or my personal favorite "I am handicapped/disabled/a student and cannot afford to pay $10 one time, can you send me a registration code anyway?" when these people have dual phone lines or cable modems and $3000 computer setups.

 I have bills to pay just like any other company. I had to pay for CodeWarrior before I could use it, I did get a good price on it though at around $350. I have to pay for the web hosting, I have to pay for media if I send out disks and a ton of printing supplies and postage/shipping.

Charging for my software is how I pay these bills, and if I am really lucky, maybe I can upgrade a computer once or twice to keep it running so I can implement "X feature" so people will pay the $10 one time fee.

I was the "computer" person at my public school for several years before I left to join the education department of a small college. In the college someone decided to put the first lab of Apple]['s in our department with a local area network, and I inherited it. What an interesting thing. Right outside our upstairs window were telephone lines dangling from building to building that linked us to our wide area network. This made a great target for electrical storms. They always zapped the network boards and put the network down so often that I really learned how to patch things up, test boards by the process of elimination, and rewire the network. My assistant, Carol, and I usually had to take it apart and put it together at least once or twice a month. Those old monitors with the plug-in cables would be shoved against the wall until the connections would break or were damaged, so you had a really weird flickering off and on effect, depending on how hard the printer was shaking the table.

Recently I was observing in a second grade class with those same old computers and monitors and that same old problem. The teacher didn't know what was wrong and would give it a slap from time to time which sometimes worked, but mostly not. You know, the old kick it into action reaction. The kids were getting frustrated, and I said, "Let me take a look." Same old loose connection problem. I squeezed it together and the kids loved me...at least for 2 minutes. This shows that disaster work experience will always come in handy if you wait long enough.

Everything I have learned about computers was learned from the school of "discover for yourself because there's no one to help you." When I was in the public school, we got hold of 12 Commodore 64 machines. Hot dog! We had a lab. I made tables by laying boards across some students desks and we were in business. One computer we reserved to send to all the different classrooms. We had about 900 kids at that time in the school and only 12 computers. One day a kid came running into my office. "Come quick!" he said. "The computer is swarming." I went, and he was right. It was swarming.

I just loved it when I managed to figure out how to solve little problems like this and worked my magic and was the "fixer." The kids fixed me too sometimes. One thing about those Commodores. They had a cartridge dock on the right side, and naturally, the kids just had to put their hands there. It was very exciting when they put a metal object in there and shorted out the keyboard.

When we finally got the go ahead to build a new lab, we were going to have outlets where we needed them. The construction crew poured a solid concrete floor and failed to lay the conduit. Guess who got to saw up the floor. They paid me back by putting wall outlets on the floor. I complained. Funny looks came my way until the day a kid put the metal leg of their chair in one. Hot stuff. Sparks were flying and it got very exciting. This attracted the attention of an administrator who said, "Maybe we need floor outlets with covers."

"Great idea," I said.

In college it is really the same--a very old building complete with one 2-prong outlet in each office, whether you need it or not. Under my desk is a Christmas tree of things plugged into that sucker. There's no surge protection. I can't move anything, because if I do, my 3-prong adapter will come loose and everything will go down. It is like riding a wild horse to work at that desk wondering what might happen under your feet. My theory is that perhaps it will catch on fire and burn down. Maybe we will get a new building with real electrical outlets. Very unlikely.

This is not to say that we aren't making progress. We are--just not under my desk. When they decided to have a new lab in our department, they asked a colleague and me to design it. Wow! How exciting! After months of careful research and work (even a little drafting), we presented our ideas. It was totally rejected, so I said, "Maybe it's time for me not to be the computer person anymore." Now I never go into the lab to find out why the scanner doesn't scan or help a student who has lost their document. I never lay cable or rewire. I have taken up watercolor painting instead. I teach my classes, do my share of complaining, and generally be what all my colleagues were when I was the computer person. It is so cool to be the former computer person, as I relax on weekends instead of spending it rewiring the network. "LET THEM EAT CAKE," I yelled over the ramparts, as I stuck my artbox and sketch pad under my arm for a little "plein aire" experience.

This article is dedicated to all the kids who helped me learn and all the administrators who said, "Yes, go ahead," even when they didn't know what I was doing. It was great fun..but I am glad it's over.

Dr. Nedra C. Sears
New World Software
Ada, Oklahoma