““The behavior of retailers when a vendor folds is very revealing. It tells us that they know something the vendors don’t. What they know is this: the price a consumer will pay is effectively capped by the expected future value of vendor service (where “service” is here construed broadly to include enhancements, upgrades, and follow-on projects). In other words, software is largely a service industry operating under the persistent but unfounded delusion that it is a manufacturing industry.””
