Hi all,
I noticed that as of (today?) Digitool CL 4.3.1 is $95 and there is no
longer a subscription model. This is a major change, making a Mac a far
more attractive choice than it was just yesterday.
Have fun,
Eric
Eric Moss <········@alltel.net> wrote in message news:<··············@kirk.localdomain>...
> Hi all,
>
> I noticed that as of (today?) Digitool CL 4.3.1 is $95 and there is no
> longer a subscription model. This is a major change, making a Mac a far
> more attractive choice than it was just yesterday.
>
> Have fun,
>
> Eric
Questions remain. What becomes of upgrading? And will this price
structure be maintained when MCL 4.4 (or is that 5.0?) hits the
street?
Also, is this downward pricing the byproduct of market pressures
initiated by the Open Source/Free Software bandwagon? ;-)
>Questions remain. What becomes of upgrading?
At that price, upgrading is still a *little* cheaper, isn't it? Assuming 3
updates/year, that's $300 vs. $675 or so, IIRC.
>And will this price structure be maintained when MCL 4.4 (or is that 5.0?)
>hits the street?
I would assume that this is the new policy, from this day forward. Until
they change their minds. ;)
>Also, is this downward pricing the byproduct of market pressures
>initiated by the Open Source/Free Software bandwagon? ;-)
Well, I was going to mention that "commie" influence, but thought someone
else should take the heat. ;)
Eric
Eric Moss <········@alltel.net> wrote in message news:<··············@kirk.localdomain>...
> >Questions remain. What becomes of upgrading?
>
> At that price, upgrading is still a *little* cheaper, isn't it? Assuming 3
> updates/year, that's $300 vs. $675 or so, IIRC.
>
> >And will this price structure be maintained when MCL 4.4 (or is that 5.0?)
> >hits the street?
>
> I would assume that this is the new policy, from this day forward. Until
> they change their minds. ;)
>
>
> >Also, is this downward pricing the byproduct of market pressures
> >initiated by the Open Source/Free Software bandwagon? ;-)
>
> Well, I was going to mention that "commie" influence, but thought someone
> else should take the heat. ;)
>
> Eric
Now donning asbestos suit...
Eric Moss <········@alltel.net> writes:
> >Also, is this downward pricing the byproduct of market pressures
> >initiated by the Open Source/Free Software bandwagon? ;-)
>
> Well, I was going to mention that "commie" influence, but thought someone
> else should take the heat. ;)
If I were to speak ignorantly on the topic, which I will, I'd say that
Free Software probably had very little to do with the decision.
$375->$95 is a big drop in price, but $375 wasn't very much to begin
with -- they were obviously selling volume &/or support. As a way to
increase volume, though, I know 3 people so far who've decided to get
the current MCL becuase of the new lower price ... and they'll all
probably get the OS X native version, too ... and if I ever get myself
a Mac again, I'm sure going to. So I'm guessing they're trying to
move more units. Of course, this is 100% pure speculation.
--
/|_ .-----------------------.
,' .\ / | No to Imperialist war |
,--' _,' | Wage class war! |
/ / `-----------------------'
( -. |
| ) |
(`-. '--.)
`. )----'
>[...] probably get the OS X native version, too ... and if I ever get
>myself a Mac again, I'm sure going to. So I'm guessing they're trying to
>move more units. Of course, this is 100% pure speculation.
But darn good speculation. I had (as had many other NeXT programmers over
the years), moaned to Steve Jobs that if he would reduce the (over-)price
of NeXTStep/Openstep, he could sell a zillion more copies. He never
believed that, or didn't care, or had a master plan, but now at <= $129,
OSX is doing just that.
Eric
"Eric Moss" <········@alltel.net> wrote in message
···················@kirk.localdomain...
> >[...] probably get the OS X native version, too ... and if I ever get
> >myself a Mac again, I'm sure going to. So I'm guessing they're trying to
> >move more units. Of course, this is 100% pure speculation.
>
> But darn good speculation. I had (as had many other NeXT programmers over
> the years), moaned to Steve Jobs that if he would reduce the (over-)price
> of NeXTStep/Openstep, he could sell a zillion more copies. He never
> believed that, or didn't care, or had a master plan, but now at <= $129,
> OSX is doing just that.
Just for the sake of beating a dead horse...
The detail here, of course, is that SJ is NOT selling NS/OS for $129, as OS
was sold on 4 different architectures (Next/68K, HP PA-RISC, SPARC, and PC
x86). The current geek rage is to bitch and whine that OS X doesn't run on
their own hardware.
That $129 is being subsidized by the hardware, I would think.
While many geeks may be buying Macs specifically because of OS X, I think a
majority of new purchases are "real" long time Mac users upgrading (and
either toying with OS X, or just sticking with MacOS 9.x), or new Mac buyers
who like the iApps suite (and/or the style of the new iMac).
Regarding Digitool, they could very easily perform a "bait and switch" and
charge more for the OS X native version when it comes out. To be horribly
cynical, maybe they see that OS X may push into the corporate workstation
market, and they need a bit more cash flow to finish the OS X version, thus
dropping the price on MCL. Also, it's my understanding that MCL does not
work, or at least not work well, in "Classic" mode on the new Mac under OS
X, so if you want to run OS X, you're pretty much obligated to upgrade when
they come out with a new release.
Of course, what would be REALLY spiffy is if they put some nice high level
optimizations into the compiler to leverage the Altivec. Lots of whining and
complaining about the Altivec on the G4's being hard to use, and CL would be
a good vehicle to perhaps make using the Altivec easier.
I don't know if one could look at free software as a culprit. I'd have to
suspect (though I don't know) that OpenMCL was released somewhat with their
consent, so if free software has any effect, it's their own cat that they
let out of the bag.
And finally, it may simply be that their business model has changed and is
drifting away from "consumer" sales and towards industrial sales. Their
website is amazingly quiet, but we keep getting peeps and glimpses that
things are happening inside, but perhaps a lot of the activity is contract
work that never sees the public eye.
Mind you, I have absolutely zero knowledge about MCL, I just go to their
site every 6-9 months to see what's what.
But the $95 price is compelling, and I was considering a purchase of my own
for one of my lingering Macs that I have at the house, if for no other
reason to just see their side of the coin. I've always heard good things
about MCL, but I never bothered with the trial because it dies in some
horribly short time (like 10 minutes), and I never considered it very
usable.
Will Hartung
(·····@msoft.com)
On Fri, 12 Apr 2002 16:56:56 -0700, Will Hartung <·····@msoft.com> wrote:
>Regarding Digitool, they could very easily perform a "bait and switch" and
>charge more for the OS X native version when it comes out. To be horribly
>cynical, maybe they see that OS X may push into the corporate workstation
>market, and they need a bit more cash flow to finish the OS X version, thus
>dropping the price on MCL. Also, it's my understanding that MCL does not
What's cynical about that? Sounds like a better business move, if it
works, than e.g., going out of business, taking out a loan, selling
stock, etc.
Tim
······@sea-tmoore-l.dotcast.com (Tim Moore) writes:
> On Fri, 12 Apr 2002 16:56:56 -0700, Will Hartung <·····@msoft.com> wrote:
> >Regarding Digitool, they could very easily perform a "bait and switch" and
> >charge more for the OS X native version when it comes out. To be horribly
> >cynical, maybe they see that OS X may push into the corporate workstation
> >market, and they need a bit more cash flow to finish the OS X version, thus
> >dropping the price on MCL. Also, it's my understanding that MCL does not
>
> What's cynical about that? Sounds like a better business move, if it
> works, than e.g., going out of business, taking out a loan, selling
> stock, etc.
I wouldn't even call it a bait-and-switch myself ... they're selling
the last of the Mac OS Classic versions really cheaply, if they
switched back to a higher price for the version that will be long-term
more useful again, that's hardly b&s, it's more like charging
different prices for products of different values.
--
/|_ .-----------------------.
,' .\ / | No to Imperialist war |
,--' _,' | Wage class war! |
/ / `-----------------------'
( -. |
| ) |
(`-. '--.)
`. )----'