[Info-vax] VMS Software, Inc. Acquires All OpenVMS Support Business from Hewlett Packard Enterprise

[Phillip Helbig undress to reply]

In article <qovdgc$5he$2 at dont-email.me>,
=?UTF-8?Q?Jan-Erik_S=c3=b6derholm?= <jan-erik.soderholm at telia.com>
writes: 

> Fully agree. Periodical support fees is the future. Large license fees
> belong to the past. Same thing with Office and other popular packages.

Word is $69 per year or whatever, right?  But how many users does it 
have, compared to VMS?

In other words, a yearly fee cheap enough for hobbyists would not 
generate enough revenue; one which brings in enough revenue would be too 
expensive for hobbyists.

DEC's (and Compaq's, and HP's) mistake was neglecting the low end: 
universities, very small businesses, hobbyists).  At first it was OK 
since there were enough people who knew VMS and wanted to work with it.
Now, there are people who would be happy to stay with VMS (whether or 
not porting to x86), but are moving off solely because they cannot hire 
people familiar with it to replace those who die or retire.  Yes, they 
could be trained, but this is an additional cost.  Also, many young 
people don't want to be trained in something perceived as a dead end 
except perhaps if they were offered a life-long contract which continues 
to pay even if they can't work with VMS anymore without requiring them 
to learn anything new, which in most situations is just not realistic.