Well said Bill. This is a great example of why free market should
prevail. I do like the idea of manuals being included with the
vehicles, I just think making it a law is a bad idea.


On Tue, 07 Dec 2004 19:38:24 -0500, Bill Putney >
wrote:

>Nomen Nescio wrote:
>>
>> I'm waiting now for the complaint even $1.50 is a lot on a $30,000 car.
>> Okay! Then we need a quick and dirty FEDERAL LAW MANDATING CD-ROM manuals
>> in the interests of public safety. Improperly repaired cars are dangerous
>> to your health and painful to your pocketbook as well. Let them charge
>> $30,001.50 after the passage of this badly needed law...
>
>You are ignoring an important factor. The $1.50 number you are giving
>is the **recurring** cost (how much $$ it takes to procure the blank
>disc and burn and pacakge the finished product or contract someone to do
>same on a mass scale). You have failed to factor in the non-recurring
>cost of creating the information and formating that goes into the manual
>(the up-front development cost that comes right off the corporate bottom
>line before the recurring cost of the first unit is recovered).
>
>Pass a law that the manual has to be supplied with each vehicle, and the
>development cost of the manual amortized over each vehicle will be a lot
>more than $1.50 - and a lot less than the $100 that you pay for a
>typical FSM now on an individual basis. But at least now, that moderate
>per-unit cost is not being forced on those who have no desire or use for
>it. It is being borne by those who both want it and are getting value
>for what they are paying. Mandate it with every car, and the person who
>can't even spell FSM will be forced to pay for something that is useless
>to them.
>
>IOW, pass that law, and the person for whom the manual is a useless item
>is subsidizing the one who will really use and benefit from it. As it
>is now, the total cost is carried by those who are getting something of
>value that they, by their freedom of will, are willing to pay for.
>
>One other aspect: The information that the manufacturer puts in the
>manual is intellectual property. They can charge big bucks for it or
>give it away. The customer has the right to buy the competitor's
>product instead if they choose to punish the manufacturer who they think
>is gouging them. IOW, if one manufaturer wants $600 or $700 for an FSM,
>which some in fact do, and another wants only $92, I can make that a
>zero, small, big, or sole factor in my decision on whose product to
>purchase. It's called a free-market system.
>
>Bill Putney
>(To reply by e-mail, replace the last letter of the alphabet in my
>adddress with the letter 'x')