...however, the percentage of the sale given back to the developer was a deal breaker.When you think of 3rd party developers and product available to users of FLIGHT, think of the ITunes store as a model.

The key word is "micro-transactions." I'd have to be pursuaded that any content I created would sell at a minimum 300,000 "micro-transactions" over a one year period before I'd be willing to invest the time and energy to jump through all of the legal hoops to become an authorized content provider... :nea:I forsee a return to higher sales of FS9 and FSX products for the next few years... :(

The key word is "micro-transactions."

Bill, do you characterize a micro-transaction as a sale price of $10 US or less? If not, how do you define it in terms of sales price?

I forsee a return to higher sales of FS9 and FSX products for the next few years...

...and you might be wrong. Time is running out, better learn new tricks. I'm just speculating Bill.

I think you will see M$ pull FSX from the shelves in short order. They want to completey eliminate the 3rd party addon community. Evil of the highest order.

I'm surprised they are closing up like a clam to third party developers. After seeing the wildly successful mobile app markets, I thought Microsoft might want to encourage third part development with Flight, but channel the third party add-ons through their own web store. Developers could go nuts making scenery and aircraft, consumers would get a safe, centralized place to browse and purchase them, and Microsoft would get a chunk of all the sales.

I think you will see M$ pull FSX from the shelves in short order. They want to completey eliminate the 3rd party addon community. Evil of the highest order.

Good call. Microsoft is also not going to want to compete with themselves by offering a more appealing product that will draw customers away from Flight.

Skip,That's the problem. No third party developers want to give M$ a chunk of their sales.

I'm surprised they are closing up like a clam to third party developers.

You shouldn't be. Microsoft has always been hostile toward third-party developers. Years ago they had the "embrace and extend" strategy which basically amounted to either buying out the competition or crushing them through questionable business practices. Looks like they're still up to their old tricks.

Edited January 4, 201214 yr by Mountain Man

Now we can only hope Flight will sink and it won't be able to sell more than half a dozen of copies.

How much money will Microsoft make by "selling" 15 million FREE copies of "Flight?"None at all. In fact, the way communicate displeasure and to force it to be an EPIC FAIL would be to encourage as many as possible to download the free package, but then just never buy into the micro-transactions... :(

Well, the Lockheed and XP 10 guys must be happy.

You shouldn't be. Microsoft has always been hostile toward third-party developers.

For direct competitors to their products probably, but Microsoft has a long history embracing third party developers: 20 years of Flight Simulator addons, SDK's to write plugins into their popular applications like Office, free development tools like the express version of Visual Studio, .Net framework, c# and Visual Basic for creating full featured Windows applications...

That's the problem. No third party developers want to give M$ a chunk of their sales.

M$ wants to copy the audio cd economy with only 10-20% to the artist, shame on them... :(

Bill, do you characterize a micro-transaction as a sale price of $10 US or less? If not, how do you define it in terms of sales price?

Yes, that would be about the range I'm thinking of. Even being at my most pessimistic, I'd see only a few dollars per transaction net-net. At 100,000 per year, that would be possibly $200,000 to be divided equitably among the five or six team members of any given project.Since anyone dealing with MS contracts would be foolish to not have an attorney on retainer, that would have to figure into the business math as well.

Yes, that would be about the range I'm thinking of.

Interesting... I am GUESSING that micro-transactions will not characterize those for FLIGHT. :(

Yes, no SDK really sucks, but if it brings new blood into the sim world, we all benifit. Right now, we need a infusion of new blood, as the current blood is a little dry and cranky ;)