P3D Re: 3-D CD project

[roberts@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx (John W Roberts)]

>Date: Sun, 10 May 1998 05:28:48 -0600
>From: "Dana Nibby" <dnibby@xxxxxxxxxxx>
>Subject: P3D 3-D CD project

>30 clams? Ouch. I thought this was a not-for-profit project. Is it or 
>isn't it? I'm assuming it is if a large number of people are 
>contributing material to it. 

>Is there a web page for the CD detailing its contents? It'd be fun to 
>see a price break-down as well; hours of labor - although as evidenced 
>here and on the net, many people donate their time for the art for free; 
>and that's to be lauded. Ok, it costs a buck per CD itself in quantity 
>(including jewel case) - not sure how much it costs to have a CD duped 
>in quantity. Shipping in the U.S. would be: 2 bucks? That's a $3 total. 
>Maybe $4 including the cost of a mailer. I wouldn't bother 
>designing/paying someone to print, a fancy insert/cover. Where does the 
>other $26-$27 bucks go? I'll assume that if it's for profit, you're 
>paying contributors a percentage of the profits. 

Dana, I would urge you to learn more about the financial aspect of design,
production, and sales - you'd be doing yourself (and us) a tremendous favor.
Knowledge of these issues (for example, market research, the cost of design
and tooling, advertising, economies of scale, and so on) are vital to
understanding issues such as production of new stereo equipment.

The cost you're discussing in part is *marginal* cost of production. Sure,
Dan could probably have an extra disc printed up for a dollar or two more
than what he currently expects to pay (prior to placing the order for
production of the disks), but this ignores the tooling, production of the
master, and the enormous amount of work that went into designing the CD.
Why should the rest of us bear the entire burden of these expenses, just
so *you* can get a bargain? Next time somebody wanted to produce a disc,
everybody would want to be the ones to get the bargain price, and nobody
would want to pay for the initial production cost, and the project would fail.

If Dan were able to produce and sell a million of these discs, those other
costs would be spread out among a greater number of discs and would therefore
be less per disc. (Of course, he probably *wouldn't* be able to sell a
really large number of discs without expensive advertising, which would have
to be factored into the price, and which would mean much greater financial
risk.)

John R


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