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In 1982, Mrs. Borzelleri noticed her computer password had been stolen. One of the students had acquired it to gain access to "Hunt the Wompus" and she would have to make an example of him. With only two days left in the school year, Robert was drummed out of "Introduction to Programming" and in a moment of mercy, received a "C" as his final grade.
Mrs. Borzelleri would be proud to know that Robert Mathews grew up and founded "Tiger Technologies", developing Window Monkey, Holiday Lights, and several other popular shareware titles.
After spending a little time with the original IBM PC, Robert purchased a used 512k Mac and began devouring any programming material he could get in his hands. Three years later, he released his first product, SpeedBeep.
"When I saw the Macintosh, I knew that's what I wanted and started programming it right away, teaching myself out of books and writing silly little programs that did nothing useful. I wrote shareware as a hobby until early 1997. I didn't get my first professional programming job until 1994, and I hope I've had my last, too."
For more than a year, Tiger Technologies has been Robert's sole source of income. He recently moved the business out of his home and into some nearby office space. What path does someone take to become shareware author?
"Well, I first started doing it for fun, writing software and giving it away over various BBS networks and CompuServe. But people started telling me Speed Beep was worth charging for, so I started asking for $5.00, which is ridiculous, really -- I was spending $3.00 mailing them back a disk in return, as well as at least $2.00 of my time to process the orders."
'Eventually I started counting on receiving a couple of hundred dollars extra income a month from shareware. With the growth of the Internet as a distribution medium, more people started seeing the programs, and it eventually got to the point where about a third of my income was coming from shareware without me even trying very hard. I was tired of working for other failing companies at that point, so in early 1997 I thought I'd live off my savings for a few months, write a new program (Window Monkey), and see if I could support myself, and it worked."
As a shareware author, Robert enjoys the freedom of working only on projects he enjoys. But there are still bills to pay, so how can a programmer encourage people to pay for a product that is distributed on the honor system? Is a simple request enough, or do Nag screens really work to increase registrations?
"Yeah, they definitely work. I've tried it both ways, and far more people pay with nag screens. I don't agonize over it -- the screens go away when people pay, and they only have to press "OK" when they see them."
"In fact, if anything, I think they aren't annoying enough -- I generally don't even bother entering the serial number on my own copies, and I don't find myself annoyed by them. But the system basically works as is, and I'm happy with it."
This Wednesday, June 3rd, in Part II of our interview with Robert Mathews, read more about the nuts and bolts of running a shareware business, the revised Apple Developer Program, and Robert's views on Steve Jobs.
Visit the Tiger Technologies web site to see their selection of software. |
