When I read some comments regarding the level of salaries considered here for programming a payware , I'm wondering if our world is not going crasy and forgets what are the priorities of life!!!!200 $ per hour for an addon for FS?!!!!600000$ per year salary supposing you work 10 hours per day for 300 days per year!!!!

It seems that you are having a difficult time following the conversation. Let me make the points more clear:1. I don't know for certain, but would not be surprised that my income level is likely about average for others working in the flightsim cottage industry.2. the industry standard pay scale for non-FS CAD designers and/or programmers ranges from $65 to $200 per hour, based on skill/knowledge levels.

No one said any addon developer either earns or is worth $200 an hour.However, can you say we're worth only $3 an hour?

Ed it has been written here by Ubersu yesterday

Actually, according the outfits that I've worked for, the value of a senior programmer is around $200 US per hour...DJ

I don't know what is the fair wage for a developper of addons. But it's neither 3 nor 200$ per hour. Both figures derives form the exageration of our way of thinking today.I just observe what has been going on in the economy worldwide for the last 35 years:A/ A general tendancy to think the younger you are the more efficient you are with the result of lay offs of seniors and a dramatic consequence for companies : THE LOSS OF ITS MEMORY!!!Try today, facing a specific case turning sour, to find how the original contact was taken with the customer 10 or 15 years before? This kind of information is essential if you want to understand the way the relations have deteriorated. Most of the time the germs of the problems were laid at the beginning of the relation. With the employee management we observe today, you will not find the sources of the difficulties you are facing, because the guy who lead the negotiations is no more in the company. He was thought too old and pre-retired taking with him all his knowledge of the file and the important facts are not written anywhere.B/ Competence and youth are not synonyms! Neither seniorship!TIME, DURATION, continuous TRAININGS to reactivate ones knowledge, are synonyms of competence or more exactly the FOUNDATIONS of competence.Today everyone wants everything immediately: high wages, directorship in companies. This is not realistic, this is suicidal. And if you have the misfortune to live in a country like mine where people think that the less you work, and the longuest are you day offs, the more you will earn, then you face catastrophy in a very short term!C/ A skyrocketting tendancy of salaries.It's only recently that companies have been realizing the danger of such an attitude and not in all the sectors of the economy.The Pavarottis or Jessy Normans of the traders in the financial markets are numerous. Their appreciation of their own values are in 6 digits bonuses! And if you refuse to grant them, they go crazy and stamp the floor with their little feet like spoiled children they are....Oh they have competence but also they all jump at the same time in the pool before they use their brains and realize they are in front of a crook! The courts have recently sentenced one of those crooks who was praised a few years before like a genius and followed in all its ventures by the financial markets actors and their clients...The result today of such a situation is de-locating a huge number of jobs in countries where salaries are not so high as ours in Europe as well as in North America. At the same time China is climbing the ladder at full speed with growth rates we envy them! And level of salaries ridiculous compared to ours.Beware I do not wish our countries to go back to such levels which to me resembles slavery and nothing else. But there is a midway, "un juste milieu".

It seems that you are having a difficult time following the conversation. Let me make the points more clear:1. currently I average around $3.12/hr for my work as a 3d modeler and/or gauge-systems programmer. I don't know for certain, but would not be surprised that my income level is likely about average for others working in the flightsim cottage industry.2. the industry standard pay scale for non-FS CAD designers and/or programmers ranges from $65 to $200 per hour, based on skill/knowledge levels.NOTE: I also do occasional contract work for other companies at a flat $75/hr rate.

Bill I do follow the conversation. And I think that 65 to 200$ per hour is not reasonable and neither is 3.12/hr too which is the other extreme of the scale. And I have tried to view the problem on a wider perspective because as I've just said in my last post the pendulum has gone totally too far during the last 20 or 30 years and in many aspects of the problem. Even my own field of job "financial analysis" is overpaid today. I left my company for retirement in 2001 with a yearly salary of 121000$ . And I was not in the topmost salaries of the profession because money was not the primary incentive from my point of view in my job. Restated in per hour salary as a comparison of the US way of computing this is 66.5 $ per hour on 35h weekly working base in France. Of course guys at my level are not tied by the 35 hours and work probably twice that duration each week.

...with a yearly salary of 121000$

in 2001 that salary is ~280% greater than the average income of a US family.--

Hmm, salary discussions in a piracy thread...We all really do know how to go off topic do we not? :(

Hello,

Hmm, salary discussions in a piracy thread...

Very important item .. the salary.Do you believe Mr Rockefeller will buy a false Rolex ?I don't think so .. :)So if all have high salary .. piracy is doomed :)Regards.Gus.

Hello,Very important item .. the salary.Do you believe Mr Rockefeller will buy a false Rolex ?I don't think so .. :)So if all have high salary .. piracy is doomed :)Regards.Gus.

Huh? :( Sorry but I'm unable to make the leap from a developers compensation package, to an individual or groups personal decision to steal and distribute software.?? :( That logic somehow escapes me....

I think Gus' point was that this planet of ours operates on the Scarcity Paradigm and as a result a (significant?) portion of "pirates" are simply people who could not ever hope to be able to afford any of it anyway...

I think Gus' point was that this planet of ours operates on the Scarcity Paradigm and as a result a (significant?) portion of "pirates" are simply people who could not ever hope to be able to afford any of it anyway...

Ha Ha, I'm aware of the scarcity paradigm.A high school summer Greenhouse job included my tending to Orchids. After seeing their costs I asked the owner why they were more expensive than the other flowers.His answer was that their seeds take years to germinate and it can be eleven years before they bloom then die! The scarcity factor became clear after his answer.The same appears to be true with gold, diamonds, and oil. :( While I am unsure about folks stealing Orchids I am quite sure that people steal gold, diamonds, oil, and software...I still do not see a connection to a given developers compensation package as justification for theft. :(

in 2001 that salary is ~280% greater than the average income of a US family.--

Scoob I would be very cautious in comparing revenus between France and the USA. Are we talking of income before or after IRS? I can't remember for instance if in the US the IRS is deducted at the source from your salary? In France it is not the case. The figure I gave is gross income that is before deduction of social security, unemployed fund paid to the government, retirement plans (social and cie specific retirement plans offered to the worker), etc... approximately 25 to 30% of the gross income is deducted each month. Add to this 2 major taxes which are the real estate tax and a specific tax related to the different towns expenses to keep them clean etc...They reach approximately 2 months salary for a household per year. It varies according to the number of people in the household, the rental value of the flat and its surface and of course the budget decided by the town for the incoming year. During the last two years, there has been an increase of about 10% per year due to the transfer from the State to the town of important expenses; in Paris it varies from district to district...Another aspect of the comparison to take into account is the fact that the census published here speaks of medians and relies on a sample from the population of the USA. Is it significant? We don"t know.. We only do know one thing, governments around the world can manipulate statistics like they wish. As an Italian friend of mine said one day, "we [italians] are champions in the manipulations of statistics on a large scale"!!!! Sometime I wonder if they have the monopoly of it!!!!!Belga the discussion about salaries is not at all unrelated to the piracy problem. To buy you have to have a stable income . Then you have to pay for the mandatory expenses: food, lodging , personnal insurances which I'm aware are huge amounts in the States...etc.. FS9 or FSX is a luxury compared to those and will be the last item to be thought of unless you live on a huge revolving credit card balance with enormous interets charges which as everyone knows is one of the major problems in the USA and is becoming one of European countries and France in particular. It is a major source of what we call here "overindebtness" which results in the obligation to be negociated between Retail Banks and their customers via a special court dedicated to that to settle an agreement between the parties.So the comparison with Rockefeller has no real sense because if he wants a Rolex he can also simply buyout the company and get them free afterwards!!!Claude

Scoob I would be very cautious in comparing revenus between France and the USA. Are we talking of income before or after IRS? I can't remember for instance if in the US the IRS is deducted at the source from your salary? In France it is not the case. The figure I gave is gross income that is before deduction of social security, unemployed fund paid to the government, retirement plans (social and cie specific retirement plans offered to the worker), etc... approximately 25 to 30% of the gross income is deducted each month. Add to this 2 major taxes which are the real estate tax and a specific tax related to the different towns expenses to keep them clean etc...They reach approximately 2 months salary for a household per year. It varies according to the number of people in the household, the rental value of the flat and its surface and of course the budget decided by the town for the incoming year. During the last two years, there has been an increase of about 10% per year due to the transfer from the State to the town of important expenses; in Paris it varies from district to district...

the stats from which i quoted stated income as gross.--

If I may throw the cat in amongst the pigeons a bit...In my opinion this whole statement that piracy is killing the FS addon industry sounds like a bit of a cop out. It is oh-so easy and convenient to make this statement but in truth there is so little (if any) evidence that this statement is actually based in any kind of fact. I have seen no evidence in this thread to change my mind. Everything seems to be based mostly on emotions and assumptions and the general implication also seems to be that if you stop piracy the FS addon industry will somehow flourish again. :( Well, in spite of years of rampant piracy, here we all are! Are we not? Over the last couple of years the FS addon industry has literally exploded with new products (some of exceptionally high quality) and as far as I can see there are only more developers today than there were this time last year. How does one explain that?The FS addon industry is microscopic fry when compared to the likes of Adobe and Microsoft whose software is pirated on an epic scale in comparison, and yet here they all are! Which major music label has gone bust due to the piracy of music? I read an article the other day that the British teenager has, on average, 6400 pirated mp3's on his or her system and yet at the same time we have Apple removing DRM from the biggest online music store in history...?

Hello,http://torrentfreak.com/the-pirate-bay-tak...orities-090824/

if you stop piracy the FS addon industry will somehow flourish again

Devellopers benefits will go up ?Regards.Gus.

If I may throw the cat in amongst the pigeons a bit...In my opinion this whole statement that piracy is killing the FS addon industry sounds like a bit of a cop out. It is oh-so easy and convenient to make this statement but in truth there is so little (if any) evidence that this statement is actually based in any kind of fact. I have seen no evidence in this thread to change my mind. Everything seems to be based mostly on emotions and assumptions and the general implication also seems to be that if you stop piracy the FS addon industry will somehow flourish again. :( Well, in spite of years of rampant piracy, here we all are! Are we not? Over the last couple of years the FS addon industry has literally exploded with new products (some of exceptionally high quality) and as far as I can see there are only more developers today than there were this time last year. How does one explain that?The FS addon industry is microscopic fry when compared to the likes of Adobe and Microsoft whose software is pirated on an epic scale in comparison, and yet here they all are! Which major music label has gone bust due to the piracy of music? I read an article the other day that the British teenager has, on average, 6400 pirated mp3's on his or her system and yet at the same time we have Apple removing DRM from the biggest online music store in history...?

I'd rather join on that statement Sharrow. The whole discussion makes me think of the famous debate many years ago about Television killing Movie Making and the cinema industry. What has it killed? big studios with overpaid stars and colossal productions. Today we see numerous films being produced, the colossal stars of the movies are rebirthing from their ashes like Phoenixes and get overpaid again. the industry restructured, it benefits of the incredible technological developpement the computer and the ever miniaturisation of the computer chip and increase of computing capacity and those guys have no problem travelling first Class on AA or AF!!!!For the addon developpers it is also a road to explore and show their competence too. And actually they have explored it and are more and more inventive and creative from one movie to the other.The cinema shouts at piracy also. Instead of shouting it should quickly adapt its way of distributing films in the theaters with the digital transferring systems which already exist (there is one theater in Paris which does that and receives electronically the movies without having to load fragile film on its projectors. Its name is Max Linder a tribute to one of the movie pioneers ). The era of the DVD will come I think, quickly to a downfall in favor of digital download and probably with a rebirth like the LPs do today versus the CD, as a collector's object which will be priced consequently. People have a tendancy to see things from a short term perspective and get frightened for nothing! They should have a long term perspective and educate themselves to increase their imagination and creative capabilities.France has a famous french author who has been and still is a mine for scriptwriters in the movies, the tv and why not the videogames: Jules Vernes!Just read his last novel found by miracle in an old safe by his grandson Jean Vernes. The manuscript was said to be lost. In fact it was in that safe in Jean Vernes garage!!! To open the safe which combination was lost, the use of dynamite was necessary!And there was the book ready for publication.The book presents Paris in 1960 about 100 years in Verne's future, where society has value only for business and technology. How will an artist survive then?Don't you think it reminds us of a certain situation we're actually living!??? Do you think we have not survived and will not survive??Claude

Devellopers benefits will go up ?

Will they though? It will become harder to justify the extra cost built in to most addons which is there to compensate for the percieved loss through piracy...

Do you think we have not survived and will not survive??

No doubt "you" will. I guess the question is how much ######in' do we need to go through in the process?