Johan,
Just to clarify - you say that you can no longer accept new licence applications for GapiDraw 2.0. I applied for a licence for GapiDraw 2.05 a whle back and I've just re-read the licence agreement. It states that I am permitted to use GapiDraw for one commercial product only. I can't remember what options were available to me when I applied for the licence in terms of the number of applications that the licence allowed me to produce, but I assume that this now means I will have to purchse a GapiDraw 3.0 licence for my next product.
Another thing about hobbyist/professional developers. I started a limited liability company here in the UK when my business partner and I decided we wanted to start writing games and applications for handheld devices - so I clearly fall into the professional developer category (a limited company has numerous benefits from a legal point of view e.g. name protection, limited liablity etc). We've released one title for the MS Smartphone platform so far. While its been very rewarding and great fun it certainly hasn't provided enough money to provide us both with a working wage - we have to use other business activities to support ourselves. So a price of over $500 would for us be a big risk. While your statement about the cost of other software packages may well be true for larger developers our first title was produced using:
eVC++ (free) + hekkus sound system (free) + GapiDraw (at the time free) = FREE.
Now, I have no problem paying for GapiDraw or Hekkus for that matter. The terms of the 2.05 licence were great - they offered the Viktoria Institute a way of obtaining income but at no risk to the developer because they could pay a percentage of money earned form a product after a year. It seems that this no risk benefit of GapiDraw has now gone.
So my question is really where does someone like me stand - am I going to be forced to use GapiDraw 3.0 and if so does the new licence agreement allow for risk free commercial application development?
Many thanks,
Gareth.
