Cale Bruckner had an interesting post over the weekend, tracking an open discussion between Joel Spolsky, of Fog Creek, well-known blogger and software author, and the developers of BaseCamp. It is about software developers trying to figure out the future of software. These are tough choices.
I’m sure Joel – like a lot of software publishers is feeling vulnerable. Maybe that’s why he lashed out. Technical barriers to entry are coming down – it’s getting to the point where it’s pretty easy (and inexpensive) for a few kids and an iguana (Joel’s words) to reverse engineer a software application and drop it on a server somewhere. Fog Creek is better off if their customers think "installable" is a requirement – that’s harder to copy – there’s a barrier there. These days, it’s less about the software and more about marketing. That’s a hard thing for some software publishers, especially the veterans, to get their head around.
I think that software developers should listen to their users first of all, otherwise who they develop all their software for? Basecamp guys don't pay any attention to what their customers are asking for most of the time, that can be a road to failure. I say so, because I've tried Basecamp and their support equaled to the single phrase: "No, sorry". Now I'm with Wrike http://www.wrike.com/. I like this tool much better and they do offer a very personalized support.
Thanks for that important information, it really helpful..Interesting article