Apple will be charging $49 for owners of its Pro applications (Final Cut Studio, Aperture, Logic, etc.) to crossgrade to the universal-binary when it comes out in March.
Do you think this sets a bad precedent or amounts to highway robbery? Adobe, Microsoft, FileMaker, Extensis, Symantec, Prosoft, Micromat, Quark, Discreet, Avid, Corel, Wolfram, etc. might also charge more than just shipping and handling for a crossgrade.
To some degree this makes sense if you are getting a second license so you can use both the PPC version on existing hardware and the Intel version on new hardware. Some may see this as a cheap way to obtain new licenses for new machines. However, if you aren't granted a new license and are instead required to use either the PPC or Intel version but not both at the same time, then does it make sense to charge extra?
If Wolfram was able to port Mathematica to universal binaries in one week, does it justify charging $50 for a crossgrade?
While today most Mac owners will continue to run PPC binaries and will NOT be in the market for a crossgrade, and new Mac users have the option to wait and buy universal binaries from the start, eventually existing Mac owners will transition to Intel-based Macs in large volumes. At that time they will feel the pinch. But if they wait until the next major upgrade is released, they can just pay the usual upgrade fee for *new features* and get universal binaries for free.
So I tend to think that vendors who charge a nontrivial fee to crossgrade have no short-term plans for a major update. Aperture 1.0, for example, might not get a major update for 6-8 months. Final Cut Studio, however, may well get an update at the next NAB Expo (National Association of Broadcasters). But NAB runs from April 22-27, only a month away from the March availability of the crossgrade.
So perhaps the crossgrade issue is a moot point...some vendors will offer free crossgrades, some will offer universal binaries in tandem with their next major release, and some will just charge a fee.
Do you think this sets a bad precedent or amounts to highway robbery? Adobe, Microsoft, FileMaker, Extensis, Symantec, Prosoft, Micromat, Quark, Discreet, Avid, Corel, Wolfram, etc. might also charge more than just shipping and handling for a crossgrade.
To some degree this makes sense if you are getting a second license so you can use both the PPC version on existing hardware and the Intel version on new hardware. Some may see this as a cheap way to obtain new licenses for new machines. However, if you aren't granted a new license and are instead required to use either the PPC or Intel version but not both at the same time, then does it make sense to charge extra?
If Wolfram was able to port Mathematica to universal binaries in one week, does it justify charging $50 for a crossgrade?
While today most Mac owners will continue to run PPC binaries and will NOT be in the market for a crossgrade, and new Mac users have the option to wait and buy universal binaries from the start, eventually existing Mac owners will transition to Intel-based Macs in large volumes. At that time they will feel the pinch. But if they wait until the next major upgrade is released, they can just pay the usual upgrade fee for *new features* and get universal binaries for free.
So I tend to think that vendors who charge a nontrivial fee to crossgrade have no short-term plans for a major update. Aperture 1.0, for example, might not get a major update for 6-8 months. Final Cut Studio, however, may well get an update at the next NAB Expo (National Association of Broadcasters). But NAB runs from April 22-27, only a month away from the March availability of the crossgrade.
So perhaps the crossgrade issue is a moot point...some vendors will offer free crossgrades, some will offer universal binaries in tandem with their next major release, and some will just charge a fee.
