It was not expensive compared to other commercial Lisp implementations. But the world has moved on and compared to other languages, the prices are unfortunately

It was not expensive compared to other commercial Lisp implementations. But the world has moved on and compared to other languages, the prices are unfortunately eye-watering for hobbyists/enthusiasts. Whichs is sad, as Lispworks is a nice environment. I was several times close to getting a personal license, but I just cannot justify it. I can understand that they need to make a living and I am very happy that they are still around. But on the other side, they never managed to get any money from me with their pricing scheme. I would happily pay the 500 - well at least after a deep breath :p - for a non-commercial license without limits and cross platform, as I would like to use it on the Mac and on Linux, but afterall, I would just use one seat at a time. At these prices, a subscription model might make sense too. But, as you wrote, there is SBCL+Slime, which is a great environment too. SBCL is even the better compiler.