He He. imagine if all the people in this thread were all face to face in a room together? Hmmmm.... :-lol

Can you imagine when it came to the bar bill.....

But surely, it's called, old fashioned common respect ? Dosn't cost anything to have manners and show your appreciation. That's not greed, but shows you must have brought up in a proper manner.RegardsAsh

what I find amusing is to that folks think this is only happening now. this transition to payware appears to be the natural progression, at least to my observation. Treat this observation as a theory and lets test it.The theory holds that authors share freeware while they build their skills. Top of the line software is paid for. Once the authors skills reach top of the line (in their mind) they go payware.Not all, but enough to establish a natural order to things. Are there exceptions? Sure...but on the whole, this appears to be the order.The cool thing is that as long as folks are just starting out (at all times), this order will always be filled with offerings of all quality, and much will be free.Ok...lets compare my theory against statements made here...perhaps the "good ol days" when all was free, fs98 and before- well, of course if we go too far we'll find NO freeware, cuz it only started with fs4.0, and there wasn't a lot of that....but anyway, to point: theory would predict a VERY high percentage completely free while the time between starting to learn design and the time in question is less than a couple years.Then the theory would predict the fastest learners would be the early payware folks. My personal mentor, Justin Tyme went payware sometime around 99 or 2000. We had freeware from Richard Goldstein, but then it was payware, and sometime around 2001. You can see my focus is on scenery, I'd be interested if any other objective thinkers to fill in my theory with other forms of freeware-payware transition.Now, would there "seem" like a lot of this going on now...well, sure. By now the bulk of folks that started around fs98 would be reaching top of the line skils by now, regardless of their learning rate. Why, if the new learners are starting all the time, would this feel so significant now...its cuz the natural tendency of folks to pay most attention to the best of the freeware. As more and more folks reach maturity with their freeware, the average user pays less and less attention to the lower level stuff.I bet the rate of freeware to payware transitions will stabilize.Anyway, I see this as natural order, nothing more. I think understanding this is a far more powerful notion than being upset by it.Bob Bernstein

Bob, Got to go feed the cattle, but I'll come back to you in detail to your post. Sadly...(joke) I too remember way back to Fs3 -4, damm I still have it somwewhere here and the stuff that was available. All in all, yes your right and could quote many, as I've no doubt you can.Catch you later, could turn out very interesting.Ash

Just got back, I'll do it in the morning now, afternoon for you.

i agree Bob,look at fi PSS,and what about Paul Golding(isn't he working for dreamfleet now?)let's not forget Eric Ernst and company,who brought us the 767 PIC addon...i heard nobody complaining then ;-)it's as you say just natural progression:guy/girl(you cannot be too careful these days ;-) ) builds a nice panel...builds an even nicer panel...goes on to create top of the line stuff...and goes payware.what's wrong with that?regards