soffee83 wrote:
>--- In Homebrew_PCBs@yahoogroups.com, Alan King <alan@...> wrote:
>
>
>>That isn't just you, their licensing scheme is somewhat brain
>>damaged.Creates a sizable gap between needing hundreds of dollars to
>>use it commercially, or only use it for free with no profit..
>>
>>
>
>I've been meaning to mail them about that ever since I started using
>it. This discussion, and hearing from someone who agrees, has
>encouraged me to go ahead and do it (maybe tonight). I guess there's a
>chance that they may have just not really thought about it enough. I
>mean some of us are actually "losing" a bunch of money for our
>interest in electronics, much less having the profits to have our
>tools pay for themselves.
>
>I may also politely suggest that they outsource a writer to finally
>redo that god awful manual. I'm sure they get that one all the time.
> Take Care,
>
>-George
>
>
>
Well I was thinking more from the commercial aspect. As it is, you
have to come up with $600 from some other source to get the whole
standard package and start making money. Pretty limiting if you're
wanting to make money from it, don't have a spare $600 laying around,
and want to concentrate on using it.. Technically the $49 license says
'non-profit' OR evaluation use now. So you could evaluate it for a
decent period, long enough to make some money and pay for it, doesn't
really specify limitaitons.
But it needs a $100 entry license for the larger size limitation, then
$100/year or per $1000 income generated until you pay the $600, or
something similar. Or a $200 version etc, that has simple limits per
year you can make before you need to pay the balance for the standard
version. As it is now makes it difficult for the very people they
attract with the free version to progressively move to doing small scale
commercial with it. You have to take a huge sideways step somewhere and
come up with the $400 or $600 to start doing more viable larger boards
for profit, at least if you want to stay legal. I doubt even the
programmers or accountants have a serious problem with people breaking
the agreement that actually intend to pay, but it seems rather dumb to
not accomodate that lower scale end of the spectrum in the licensing
possibilities, especially when so many of the free users might move into
that range..
Alan