Hi Maximo,

I agree; this is a really important issue. I don't know the answer. I market a product that easily saves 50% of development time. It costs $695. How do I make it available to developing countries (and thus do my bit for humanity) while making a profit? I thought of using the Big Mac index (bases it on the price, in local currency, of a given number of Bic Macs -- don't laugh, it's on the web). But I'm not sure there would be more buyers. The Malaysian government's director of anti-piracy estimated that between 70 and 85% of the software in his office was pirated. And they are one of the better developing-country governments.

One thing that's happening is that developing countries are moving to Open Source (read: Linux) software. And no one's found a successful business model there. With the open source .net efforts (especially MONO), I suspect there will be even more movement in that direction. But let's say I rewrote my tool for .NET: the same problem would exist. It's a side-effect of poverty, and I find it hard to blame the ones who pirate in order to feed their families. I would like to think I'd be different; and it would be arrogant to think I would be, until I was in that position.

Hank

>So this is my advice to Ken: launch a six months amnesty campaign for VFP around the world, price it at $99.99 -or so-, in order to participate, people must send to the local M$ office the pirated media and/or manuals.
>To be in tune with the actual marketing mantra, the campaing may explain VFP is the perfect companion to .NET, etc...
>Include in the VFP CD a page with links to all VFP related sites; maybe negotiate with Michael a discounted PUTM for those guys too, you-name-here-more-details, etc
>
>I'm sure this effort will be fruitful and that we will gather a huge crowd that now is totally on the loose, silent and not generating a penny.
>
>What do you think? Comment on this please. If you think the idea has value, we can start a new thread in the Chatter section and on the Wiki.