Financing filePro (was: Desperate ...)

[Lerebours, Jose]

Stanley posted:

> 
> 
> >> The point to remember is that Bud controls the product, so 
> if he decides
> >> he needs something for his own business, that pet feature 
> will find its
> >> way into fP whether anyone else needs/wants/asks for it or not--
> >> overriding more crucial things like, say, addressing 
> screen real estate.
> >> And no, I don't think his needs necessarily mesh with the 
> userbase's much
> >> more than I think they did when it was FiServ or 
> Administar holding the
> >> reins.  Maybe slightly more, but not much.
> 
> And that's fine by me, but if he allows his proprietary 
> features in over
> ours, while ignoring our other must-haves, then the answer is 
> clear, we as
> developers using filepro need to find a development package 
> that address our
> concerns and not the authors.  If he is willing to fully 
> finance it himself
> for himself, then great, but do us the courtesy of letting us 
> know with
> certainty how decision are made and that he owns it to propel 
> his other
> ventures.
> 
> If what Mark says is correct, then that explains a lot of 
> what has been
> happening in the past with no real concern for us the paying 
> userbase.  And
> to that end, there is probably no concern if the userbase is 
> lost or not.
> 

I so much agree with both Mark and Stanley here that it is almost
as if we were triplex  (I know, God forbid).

So long as a "small business man, running a small business operation"
is on the driver seat, focus on his own race, there is little or no 
chance that the rest of us will get the fair attention we think we 
deserve.

If Bud is happy with his $_______ ROI, how then are we going to 
motivate him to lean in our direction?  Is it perhaps the other way
around, he is not happy with his ROI and refuses to continue to
take the risk as a financier?

If they raise their price, they would put themselves out of business
simply by overpricing their product.  Today, with $5,000 you can 
buy Enterprise versions of business applications (by this I mean
no limit to how many users you can have on it).  fileProGUI, in the
other hand, is at $5,000 (give or take a few dollars) and it is just
for the development version; and this version may not include some
"add-ons" I believe you need to purchase separately.  

I know I paid $4,500 or so for a linux version of fileProGUI which
to this date I have not used.  I installed it, looked at my application
in it and instantly felt that I had burned $4,500 in less than a
week.  I normally do not mind to spend money to learn something
(continuing education), but to spend this kind of money to realize
I cannot use the product - or - that the product is not what I
expected, was a bid too much.

It is this kind of experience that widens the distance between one
and the prospect of upgrading.  Do I feel like spending another
$4,500 for their next version?  Hell no!  Do I want to pay for an
upgrade?  Hell no!  As far as I know, I was had.  The product is
no where near what I expected.

I would much rather have fpTech come out and say, we need your
support, we need you to help us out with the development cost and
consider $50 monthly fee towards the purchase of future upgrades.
Disclose a full list of features intended to be released to 
entice us all into helping out.  I am sure that most members of
this list, if only as a show of loyalty and as an effort to keep
filePro from dying a slow death, will step into the plate and
deliver.

I know they have a yearly support program which should be a
revenue source.  Lets face it, their support is not exactly what
we expect in return for a fee.  If any one of us ran a business
with same level of support as fpTech, we can see an impact in
our "customer satisfaction".  Ray Hoover is the only support
technician they have (is Ray still with fpTech?).  One person is
not enough for a large clientele base.  Don't get me wrong now,
Ray is and has been a great guy and hard working individual, I 
had the pleasure of working with him, and I know that once he gets
on a case, he sees it through - But, in all fairness, filePro runs
in multiple platforms and if you take into consideration all that
could go wrong, to expect that one person to cover everything, it
is just not fair and potential breaking point for the company.

It all comes down to these (add more if you wish):  

Q. How much is filePro really worth when compared with Enterprise 
   Applications available out here for same or lesser price?

Q. How can one trust that new versions have the features one expect?

Q. Why doesn't fpTech offer a 30/60/90/120 days money back guarantee?

Q. If a feature is bugzie (memo), why should it take 5 years to fix?
   Should fpTech give credit back to customers for paid and not
   delivered goods?

Q. Should fpTech consider an offering to developers to own the
   company as an effort to finance future development?

Q. Is filePro destined to die a slow death?


Regards;



Jose Lerebours