The software glut

It might come as a surprise to some readers, but most of the software you find sold on the net sells no more than a few dozen copies a month. It doesn't make enough profit to be a full time living for its author, at least not if he lives in the USA or Western Europe. Yet more and more new software titles pour on to the market daily, making the slice of the cake they can expect to earn even thinner for existing authors.

For several years it has been noticeable that many new independent software vendors (ISVs) come from Eastern Europe, where the few hundred bucks a month most products make is still enough to live on. Most of these products are very good indeed. There is something about the Russian or Slavonic intellect that makes them exceptionally good at technical matters. And some of them have become successful by any standards, like Kaspersky Lab and DiskInternals.

But most of the new product releases now are coming from China. This isn't often spelt out on the vendor's website, but the usual giveaway is loads of spelling mistakes and hilarious grammar. Screenshots where the window title bar text is in a fixed pitch Courier New font is also a sign that a Chinese version of Windows was used.

Now I'm not saying that there is anything wrong with software just because it comes from China. But, just as decades ago the Chinese had a reputation for making cheap copies of Western products, so most of the software Chinese developers are releasing are "me-too" versions of products in already overcrowded categories, with not a single feature to distinguish them, and often with the major disadvantage of barely comprehensible instructions.

There are more different brands of video conversion tools than anyone could possibly want, and nearly all of them come from China. I just wonder how much profit the developers make, especially when they are forced to offer websites 70% or more commission on order to promote their product above all of the others. When will Chinese software developers realize that in order to make products that are commercially successful they must a) be better than all their competitors in every aspect, including the website and documentation, or b) be completely innovative, something the rest of the world hasn't thought of yet.

We do not need any more video to iPod converters!

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