ROI in OSS (was: GIMP 2.2 splash screen ...)

[Benjamin Scott]

On Sat, 4 Dec 2004, at 8:07pm, puissante at lrc.puissante.com wrote:
> I kinda like Gimp's GUI the way it is and would not want to see it changed
> just to win over a handful of Photoshop lovers.

  A "handful" of Photoshop users?  Heh.  When it comes to graphics on
desktop computers, there's Photoshop, and then there's everything else.  
It's the Microsoft Office of desktop graphics.

> Of course, someone *could*, if they wanted to burn the energy, create a
> Photoshop-looking front-end for Gimp. But I don't see the cost/benefit
> advantage here.

  Hmmmm.  Cost/benefit analysis.  Return on investment.

  With a commercial product, you estimate cost, you estimate resulting
sales, and subtract the latter from the former.  If the result is positive,
you do it.

  It's much harder to quantify things when it comes to a community project
like GIMP.  Most or all of the labor is unpaid volunteerism; most of the
development cost is picked up by individuals.  There are no sales figures.  
Many of the developers are also the users.  I'm pretty sure we're either
gonna get a "Divide by zero" or "Stack overflow" error trying to evaluate
that equation.  But if your goal is to get as many people as possible to use
GIMP, then introducing UI elements designed to aide Photoshop users in a
transition would be very valuable indeed.

-- 
Ben Scott <bscott at ntisys.com>
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