Legitimate reasons people get mad at commercial software companies

from WinCustomize Forums
http://draginol.stardock.com/Articles/Madatcommercialsoftware.html


One of my beefs with Microsoft is that they have the rather nasty habit of blunding things into the OS that essentially squash smaller software developers.

Each new version of Windows seems to eliminate more and more potential aftermarket software products. And sometimes it seems almost unnecessary.

Did Windows, for instance, really need a skinnable media player bundled? Or was this really just to zing Winamp? What about disk compression? ZIP?

The biggest criticsm (one that I too tend to make) is that Microsoft's stuff isn't that great. Office includes a mediocre grammar checker for instance. The problem is that the software tends to be "good enough" to discourage third parties from entering that field where they could perhaps make much better versions.

But bother investing the money in a state of the art grammar checker when the market for it is so small and the average user finds the one in MS Word to be "good enough"?

This is the same criticism people make of our company, Stardock. It is not a boast to say that Stardock owns the desktop enhancement market. On Download.com, Stardock has 4 of the top 10 most popular desktop enhancements (link) including the most popular one (WindowBinds).

In the "old days" desktop enhancements were primarily the realm of hobbiests developers. In 1998, Stardock was just starting out in the Windows desktop enhancement as it was clawing its way to safety from the disintegrating OS/2 market. On OS/2, Stardock was the premiere software developer (which is like saying we were the tallest man on Mars!). But by the end of 2000 we had established ourselves pretty firmly and that's where the criticism really began to come in.

As our software reached into some new area, we would effectively discourage freeware developers. This wasn't intentional, but it is very hard for an individual developer, working in his spare time, to compete against a company with a full time dedicated team. You see this in the game industry all the time. Who wants to try to create a fully featured game when you're up against Blizzard with its staff of dozens per game?

So the net result was that freeware development dropped off and hence, users who wanted to customize some part of Windows was increasingly facing either having to pay for a commercial product or use a freeware alternative that was no longer actively being developed and vastly inferior in features (if they could find even that).

This is particularly galling to those who were around from the beginning since they saw all the developers who were busily making various programs only to get "squeezed out" by Stardock. This wasn't intentional, it was just a side effect of creating software that was "good enough".

My particular solution is the solution I'd like to see others do and that is make sure that those making management decisions avail themselves to their critics. Respond to them. Not so much to win them over but so that you recognize the responsibility you have in writing commercial software extends beyond making money. Just as the Walmarts of the world have a moral responsibility to be sensitive to local concerns after they've essentially driven all the mom and pop shops out of business, software companies need to listen to their critics and try to make sure that they stay on top of their products and ensure that it is worth it because of what it does rather than because there's no other alternative.

7,279 views 19 replies
Reply #1 from WinCustomize Forums Top
I think there's a strong truth in what you say. Example: MS Active_Synch ( Acive Stink) works just well enough to discourage some smaller competition. Your willingness to confront moral responsibility while holding aces is unusual, to say the least!
Reply #2 from WinCustomize Forums Top
i hope you are not referring to LiteStep. harder to use for point and click people for sure, but vastly inferior in features ... naah, rather superior
SoundPackager - Customize the Windows sound scheme
Reply #3 from WinCustomize Forums Top
btw: this was not meant as a rant, i would consider all the time i invested and i am still investing in learning LS being worth much more money than the price of Object Desktop, but i do not regret, learning LS is fun for me.
Reply #4 from WinCustomize Forums Top
I agree with your MS comments, and their application to SD. MS has hedged in a bit onto your terrain, but it is the same thing others have said about SD, no? I would also, hesitantly, say that in addition to doing it 'better', Windowblinds kind of negates the need for other skinnable apps. I mean, why buy or even download an alternative notepad when WB skins the standard one? For a while windowblinds was not really for everyone (i.e. took a lot of resources). Now, WB takes less resources and the average system has far more to spread around.

I'm not gonna run it into the ground here, but I have always felt that while WB and other SD apps are very well-made and worthy of their cost, the only reason people use them are the skins. If Stardock was left to itself to produce UI, they would be very nice, no doubt, but the immensity of the options for the end-user wouldn't be there. I have found it difficult to skin SD apps simply because my labor is what amounts to advertising for an application that I have to buy... in order to donate free advertising...

I know that SD has been generous to some who have asked for help, but I would really, really like to see some tangible recognition of how much SD's success has to do with the skinners who have filled the database with nice skins and themes. I know that I have worked on several payware applications simply because people have said, "We really appreciate your work and would like for you to have a free copy of our new software. We'd love to see what you could do with it."

I have a lot of gripes with software companies, Adobe is probably one of the most arrogant next to MS, and i have given them lots of my cash over the years. I think that the whole idea of 'Service' is being lost. Customers aren't people to please, they are people to manipulate and protect yourself from. In their minds I should feel lucky that I have the option of paying them 600 dollars for software that could be better, simply because nothing else *is* better.

I don't currently have any animosity for Stardock. If I haven't skinned their apps it is because I don't use the them, and don't really want to buy applications I don't use. I have mentioned this before and when I state the above point about 'appreciation' the enevitable answer is:

"I think Stardock has shown skinners a lot of appreciation by making great applications for them to skin..."

IS this any different than MS or Adobe's perspectives? Even more so because because there is independant usefulness to Adobe and MS's apps, whereas without the free UI made by paying customers, there would be no reason to buy SD products at all. I dunno. I have been very tempted to dig into skins for SD apps, but I'm not gonna use warez, and I can't rationalize donating my time.

I DO NOT MEAN ANY OFFENSE! Frogboy opened a channel and offered a perspective. I offered mine. I'm not even gonna answer the kind of flames I have gotten before, and I hope no one is offended by what I say. In light of my experiences recently on other *cough* sites, I appreciate this place and its users, and I'm not thumbing my nose at it. I simply feel it could more elegantly synch its commercialism with the artistry it depends on.
Reply #5 from WinCustomize Forums Top
I think you make a lot of valid points, Bakerstreet.

I try to publicly show how appreciative we are fairly often. Sometimes we try to do so in the form of real deeds. For instance, that was the primary point of the GUI Olympics. With WB having thousands of skins, giving away $10,000 wasn't a marketing thing, it was a way to try to find an unbiased way of thanking the community in a tangible way.

If I may actually add to your assertion - the importance of skinners, there is an actual real world example of doing it the other way:

Neoplanet. Remember them? I visited them and they had literally a dozen full time graphics designers whose jobs were to make skins. These costs plus others are what ultimately spelled their doom.

What companies like Stardock have to make sure to do is make it *apparent* that they recognize that their success is dependent on the skinners. It's already been demonstrated in the Neoplanet example that paying people to provide most of your skins is not a viable business strategy. There's just not enough revenue available to do that (just think of the math: If you have to pay 10 people full time at say $40k per year to make skins, that's $400,000. If your program is $20 you have to sell 20,000 just to pay for them. It can't be done. Shareware programs measure their sales in dozens or hundreds per month usually). Another exaple was Thematic (Chroma). Great program but for whatever reason didn't get the support of skinners.

So at least we actually have a situation in which we know what happens to skinnable software that doesn't have the support of skinners. It's doomed. You can't make enough income to pay people to do it all and you can't just expect it to happen.
Reply #6 from WinCustomize Forums Top
I hate Microsoft! HATE it! If it wasn't such a b*tch to install, I'd go for Linux in a heartbeat. Hey, free programs, free OS, beautiful look...

Anyway, I'm stuck with Win98, and I'm NOT upgrading to Win2K or ME or XP. Not if I can help it. In fact, I'm trying to find alternatives to Microsoft programs, like AbiWord instead of Word, Opera instead of Internet Explorer, Notetab instead of Worpad...

Oh, and have you guys heard about the Dell/Microsoft thing? The one that Microsoft wanted to prohibit Dell from selling computers without an OS? That was hillarious, but Dell's comeback was even better. For those of you who don't know, the story is this: Dell was selling computers without an OS, and Microsoft was enraged because they were losing customers that way (since anyone can install in a blank computer a PURCHASED copy of, say, Windows 95 or Windows 98, and that would be LEGAL--unless you had it in more than one machine--but Microsoft wanted to sell new versiosn of their OS to those customers who had previous versions), and they made a contract with Dell that prohibited them from selling computers without an OS.

What a jack*ss Microsoft looked like when Dell started selling their computers with FreeDOS instead of Windows. Hehehe. Good one, Dell.
Reply #7 from WinCustomize Forums Top
Frogboy: I appreciate the things you point out and agree that Stardock is showing more differentiation between end-users and contributing skinners than they used to. I think that what has most contributed to this is accepting the semblance of 'business', and acknowleging the symbiotic, mutually-beneficial relationship. It's hard to put into words. Many times, I felt that the perception of Stardock as a 'member' of the skinning community removed some accountability, as though we would be betraying our own to differ, or even show interest, in Stardocks monetary benefit from our labor. I feel that much less now.

I'm positive that buried in the mess-that-is-the-internet, there are immense business opportunities that hinge upon the fact that there is no division here between the service and the served. Self-interest has always spawned opportunity, and if a good, shared-interest can be found, as has been found with Stardock and artists, success can be had. Many skinners that I have known for a long time are spawning new and interesting enterprises. I'm really, really impressed with the thought going into Deskmod at the moment. There's absolutly nothing wrong with openly serving ones own business-interests, and I hope I haven't given the impression that I feel otherwise. The best way to share that success, imho, are not paychecks, but tangible benefits to the craft itself, such as the availablility of software, tools, education, etc.

Thanks for the understanding and the reply.

Luke: install? redhat is twice as easy and fast to install as any MS OS, IMHO. THe *only* thing preventing me from using Linux full-time is it's inability to run some of my more expensive apps. If they would make a good emulation to run photoshop and my wacom tablet, I'd toss this copy of 2000 out the window. I guess MS doesn't like the idea, and is making good emulation as hard as possible with their armada of proprietary knowledge and legal protection.
Reply #8 from WinCustomize Forums Top
the ms attitude is a symptom of large business. many people now feel intimidated when they walk into stores, like a car dealership for example. why? their livlihood depends on -us- and they need to re-learn the process of actually taking care of customers.
Reply #9 from WinCustomize Forums Top
Guys, you live in US, your customer service is 100 times better then where I live, in Brazil for you to have some small repair under warranty, many times you would need to go to courts, then it would cost us a fortune, so we just give away....boy! Customer services in a third word are ridiculous.
Reply #10 from WinCustomize Forums Top
It will take me some time to read all the comments here. I have to say at this moment it is refreshing to see responcibiliy among owners of a company.

There is a natural tendancy for any company to squeeze out compatition and get lazy once the compotition is gone. Even lobby the government and hardball small businesses because they DON'T want to change or are afraid of competition. Airliners are a good exaple. Southwest is doing great. And why not? Everybody flies to get to far away desitinations fast. JetBlue or Virgin is great. United is filing for bankrubcy and it is one of the LARGEST air liners.

A great example of industry and free market giants is the auto industry of, I believe 1970's. Not dure of the date. American cars was the most sought after cars anywhere... but where not the best. Could have been cheaper, better made, and created faster... but why change? It aint broke.

Any one with ideas about inproving was snuffed out. There is even a story about that with some car that had a light in the middle... any way... long story short



Japan got the new technology and assembaly plans. The big 3 had it first but why change? Now the big three is no longer that big and tries its best to lobby congress to protect the "american workers" from imports.

Who is going to make the first hybrid car availible for regular consumtion? Japan. Who is fighting California to change its plan to make highway milage lower of rcars and light trucks (SUV's)? The big 3.
Reply #11 from WinCustomize Forums Top
Operating System. The operative word is operating. An OS should only run the applied Software and the supplied Hardware. My 2 cents.
Reply #12 from WinCustomize Forums Top


2 cents well worth using.

/joetheblow thinks its coated with gold... these 2 cents that Old Crab provides
Reply #14 from WinCustomize Forums Top
Meanwhile in Redmond:

"Okay, we now have 99% of the market. We must be carefull not to improve our product too much, or we won't have anything to release in the next version. No, what can we do? Seems these mediaplayers are quite popular. We don't have one of those, do we Steve?"

"Well Bill, we've got mediaplayer"

"Hmm, yeah, but that thing sucks so bad I don't even use it myself. No, we need to find a way to enhance it so that we can lure those clueless users in to using our app instead of third party ones. It'll give us a bigger slice of the pie and you know how I love pie"


Now everyone may bitch about Microsoft and Windows, but then why is everyone using it?
Reply #15 from WinCustomize Forums Top
I use it because my school told me to. They use PC's and AutoCAD uses pentiums so I get a PC with Microsoft OS and a Pentium.

At work they use PC's with Microsoft OS and don't even know about Linux or Unix (or anything)

I didn't even know about Linux until I started coming here and started going back to school for IT training.
Reply #16 from WinCustomize Forums Top
We use it because there is nothing else, period. If you want the broadest selection of software and usability, you have to pick windows. Macs are a close second, but the performance isn't there (though it probably soon will be when they go intel). While more games and apps are coming out for Linux, there is simply no chance that the 'next big thing' in graphics or gaming is gonna be released for it.

Sad to say, until I can buy a boxed OS that runs what I want it to, there'll only be windows. Then again, as long as people feel that way, no one will make apps for anything else. Sounds like a monopoly to me...
Reply #17 from WinCustomize Forums Top
Exactly. I'd switch my OS any day if I could run my favourite apps on it. Trouble is, Apple isn't much better (Jobs is Gates 'creative' twin brother) and don't get me started about Linux' usability.

/me goes dream of the day when app X will run on either OS Y or OS Z or whatever
Reply #19 from WinCustomize Forums Top
I use Windows 2000 at home and Macs at work. I bought the PC for home because of the features to dollars ratio. In opinion my Macs are easier to use and that is a great help when I need to use my brain for other things.