First of all, although I sell aftermarket styles for BiaB, I have no professional experience with PG Music except for a friendly one, and no 'inside information' so everything here is guesswork.

1) It takes thousands and thousands of hours to write software.

2) If you look at my style/fake business for BiaB and if you look at the average number of people reading the forums, there are 20 BiaB users on PC to 1 on Mac.

3) Therefore for the programmer spending thousands and thousands of hours writing code, for ever one dollar writing Mac code brings in, the PC brings in 20 dollars.

Fortunately style and song data are cross platform, so at Norton Music, I release Mac and PC versions at the same time and they are equal.

But put yourself in PG's shoes.

Say you are on your job and you had a choice at work to work on Project A and Project B. Both projects are time consuming and would take about the same amount of time to complete. Project A pays you a bonus over your regular pay of $1 per hour and Project B pays a bonus of $20 per hour. Which would you take?

The problem with Apple is that they make their products non-compatible with the rest of the computer world. Even in the early days by using screws that needed a patented tool to open the cases so a non-Apple computer tech couldn't even fix them because they controlled to tools.

They use proprietary jacks (like the lightning) that they keep the patent on, and as soon as the patent becomes PD, they will introduce another patented connection.

Why?

Steve Jobs' philosophy. Keep the Apple people from straying to another platform by making the switch either difficult or costly.

Now I can't say whether that is a good business plan or not, because I'm not in their shoes, but it does make things difficult for the cross-platform software author.

Getting paid 20 times more for the same amount of work on the PC is very tempting.

But of course, that leaves an opportunity for another to write exclusively for Mac and take the lower profits because the competition in the Windows arena is also very fierce.

And Apple isn't the only one that does this. I had a minivan that I need because I'm a gigging musician. After about 90,000 miles the transmission oil needed changing. My mechanic explained to me that it needs Mopar oil which costs $85.00 per quart. He said they change the specifications a tiny bit, that doesn't really matter, but if I put anything else into it, it will void the 100,000 mile warranty. The car gave me good service so I paid $85.00 per quart. It was OK, the van lasted about 200,000 miles before I wore it out.

Because of these fairly common business practices, Apple people sometimes have to wait or settle for less in the software arena, but on the other had, they also get exclusives.

And I do freelance recording as 'sax for hire' and every studio I've been in for the past 20 years has had both Mac and PC computers in it. Probably for the same troubles you are going through.

Insights and incites by Notes

Last edited by Notes Norton; 12/08/17 04:01 AM.
Bob "Notes" Norton smile Norton Music
https://www.nortonmusic.com

100% MIDI Super-Styles recorded by live, pro, studio musicians for a live groove
& Fake Disks for MIDI and/or RealTracks