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@remark Converted with HTML2Guide ©1997 Mark Harman
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@{"b"}Magazine Giveaways!@{"ub"}  

I don't know. You get a super 3D program or wordpro on a magazine, complete program, completely free, and people moan. Well I don't... if it wasn't for these giveaways by magazines, I would have lost out on Final Writer 4 Lite, Cinema4D2, Imagine 4, XiPaint 3.2, Personal Paint 6.4, AGA Experience, Scene Storm... and these are just recent ones. And from other 'freebies', I've got Photogenics 1.2, and WordWorth 5 Office.  

Okay, some I rarely use, but others have proved invaluable. The argument against giveaways is that it harms future sales, rather like piracy in a way. But unlike piracy, this is done voluntarily by the companies. Even if it did harm their future sales, then it's up to them to worry, not us receiving the free software!  

And I question the bit about it being harmful to the industry as a whole. Let's say I want to spend some money, say  £50, on my Amiga. Now I was going to buy SuperPaint v5.3, but now that's given away on a magazine I read, I don't have to. Their upgrade offer for  £20 to SuperPaint v6.0++Pro looks good, but I don't really need the extra features, v5.3 is fine for now, so it looks  like the industry has lost out on my  £50... But I would argue that anyone prepared to spend some money will still do so, just on different things! So I might use that  £50 to buy a raytracer, or maybe a game or two, or how about some extra RAM, or putting it towards an accelerator? Okay, if I was really desparate for SuperPaint, and nothing else, then if I got it free then I wouldn't spend it on anything else. But otherwise, I'm sure there  would be other things available to spend it on.  

One thing I heard was that magazine giveaways were okay on the  PC, but damaging on the Amiga in its current state. I can see the reasoning, but consider. If PC Format comes with Lightwave 7 on the CD, where as Amiga Format has, if you're lucky, a registered version of some shareware, then is that good for the Amiga? Or will a load of Amiga raytracers sell up and move to the PC?  

And what do many consider as the Amiga's greatest asset? Isn't  it the vast wealth of freely distributably software? So how can this be if free software damages the sale of commercial software - who will buy it if you can get something nearly as good for free? Amiga PD/Shareware is considered one of the Amiga's great strengths, and not something which is killing off the machine!  

@{"b"}Mark@{"ub"}   
 
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