If you were an author, which language would you write about?
Writing developer books are one of the easiest ways to get rich.
Your reviewer looks at some statistics sites:
http://radar.oreilly.com/2009/02/state-of-the-computer-book-mar-22.html
http://www.idpf.org/doc_library/industrystats.htm
There were millions of developer books sold.
Where does Delphi books stand in?
Quoted from LineList Programming Languages:
Lastly, the following languages sold fewer than 1,000 units in 2008. Here is the list in alpha order: ... delphi, ... pascal.
Now suppose you are a budding Delphi developer thinking of getting rich writing a 200-page (approximate) book.
Which language would you pick?
You would pick the language which is most popular (from that list, either C# or Java or Php or JavaScript)
Why would you pick those languages?
1) C# is mostly free. The C# Visual Studio Express edition is reliable and US$0/-, and there are hundred of thousands of ISPs that hosts millions of C#/ASP.NET sites.
Java is mostly free. The Eclipse/NetBeans IDE is reliable and US$0/-, and there are hundred of thousands of ISPs that hosts millions of TomCat/Java sites.
ditto with Php, JavaScript, Python and Perl...
Since C# and Java is free, that means that the developers get paid a little bit more for their productivity rather than costs being eaten-up by hungry licensing costs.
Let me prove a point:
See ElevateDb/DbIsam a respectable Delphi-based database. Goto Elevatesoft's site, under Partner section. You won't find any ISP which they would recommend to host ElevateSoft Dbisam/ or ElevateDb databases. Look at MySQL and MSSQL. There are plenty of ISPs which hosts MySQL, MSSQL, Java Databases.
2) The extra pocket money saved means more money for Developers to spend on things. It seems they can spend on Magazines, ISP Hosting fees, Books and time to help others out.
Take a look at existing Delphi magazines... Did you see Delphi Developer Magazine? The Delphi Magazine, Coralis group which used to write Windows Developer Journal (with some Delphi articles?) They closed down because of poor sales.
To be fair, there is an existing Blaise Pascal Magazine. Under the commercial section, there is Frequency of publication, once every quarter, 40 pages, with 12 pages of advertisements.
To end off,
"Delphi had a Developer population of approximately 1.75 million users worldwide in 2006." (According to Michael Swindell, VP of Marketing at CodeGear).
How many of them have money to buy your book, deducting the cost of Delphi and absolutely essential libraries?
Suppose you are the author of such a Delphi book and want to write a second edition. Will the peanuts you earned pay-off all the effort you took to write the book?
Feeling lucky?
:)
Writing developer books are one of the easiest ways to get rich.
Your reviewer looks at some statistics sites:
http://radar.oreilly.com/2009/02/state-of-the-computer-book-mar-22.html
http://www.idpf.org/doc_library/industrystats.htm
There were millions of developer books sold.
Where does Delphi books stand in?
Quoted from LineList Programming Languages:
Lastly, the following languages sold fewer than 1,000 units in 2008. Here is the list in alpha order: ... delphi, ... pascal.
Now suppose you are a budding Delphi developer thinking of getting rich writing a 200-page (approximate) book.
Which language would you pick?
You would pick the language which is most popular (from that list, either C# or Java or Php or JavaScript)
Why would you pick those languages?
1) C# is mostly free. The C# Visual Studio Express edition is reliable and US$0/-, and there are hundred of thousands of ISPs that hosts millions of C#/ASP.NET sites.
Java is mostly free. The Eclipse/NetBeans IDE is reliable and US$0/-, and there are hundred of thousands of ISPs that hosts millions of TomCat/Java sites.
ditto with Php, JavaScript, Python and Perl...
Since C# and Java is free, that means that the developers get paid a little bit more for their productivity rather than costs being eaten-up by hungry licensing costs.
Let me prove a point:
See ElevateDb/DbIsam a respectable Delphi-based database. Goto Elevatesoft's site, under Partner section. You won't find any ISP which they would recommend to host ElevateSoft Dbisam/ or ElevateDb databases. Look at MySQL and MSSQL. There are plenty of ISPs which hosts MySQL, MSSQL, Java Databases.
2) The extra pocket money saved means more money for Developers to spend on things. It seems they can spend on Magazines, ISP Hosting fees, Books and time to help others out.
Take a look at existing Delphi magazines... Did you see Delphi Developer Magazine? The Delphi Magazine, Coralis group which used to write Windows Developer Journal (with some Delphi articles?) They closed down because of poor sales.
To be fair, there is an existing Blaise Pascal Magazine. Under the commercial section, there is Frequency of publication, once every quarter, 40 pages, with 12 pages of advertisements.
To end off,
"Delphi had a Developer population of approximately 1.75 million users worldwide in 2006." (According to Michael Swindell, VP of Marketing at CodeGear).
How many of them have money to buy your book, deducting the cost of Delphi and absolutely essential libraries?
Suppose you are the author of such a Delphi book and want to write a second edition. Will the peanuts you earned pay-off all the effort you took to write the book?
Feeling lucky?
:)
1 comment:
I write Delphi books, published on Lulu.com as well as my own site as PDF files (with free updates and e-mail support) not to become rich, but to support the Delphi developers, by showing 100+ pages of coverage about a single topic. It's not a way to get rich (and not even an easy way), but it sure beats writing a Delphi Hater's Blog in my view ;-)
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