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This article has some misleading wording. It constantly refers to web browsers as billion-dollar programs in the sense that the total cost of all development, b

by tgb 13y ago

This article has some misleading wording. It constantly refers to web browsers as billion-dollar programs in the sense that the total cost of all development, both intrinsic-to and inherited-by, modern browsers is in the billions. Yet it does this adjacent to comments on the unreasonableness of expecting new software for cheap. But new software isn't built in a vacuum - it's built on the existing technologies that already have the billions of dollars invested in them. The author might still be right, but the point is exaggerated to incorrectness by such juxtapositions. For a post all about not being off by orders-of-magnitude, I find this misleading and inexcusable.

wmf 13y ago
Given that Mozilla's budget is over $10M per year and Firefox has been under development for over 10 years, saying a browser costs $1B is off by less than one order of magnitude. Considering that the author is complaining about confusion of 5-6 orders of magnitude, I find this simplification excusable.
- ankitml 13y ago
  Mozila didnt start from scratch. It started by open sourcing what netscape was. So you need to add those costs/ years in the calculation. I mean even if they rewrote it completely, these man years should be added in the estimation of cost.
gavinpc 13y ago
> inexcusable Ask for your money back. Surely there's a writer out there who will meet your requirements at your price point.
pjmlp 13y ago
Yet those numbers can be easy to achieve. In many European countries, developers make between 1500 euros and 6000 euros a month. The amount per year additionally depends on how many salaries one gets (12 - 14). So using the lowest value for salary and months, results in an amount of 18 000 euros a year. Now one just needs to multiply this value by the amount of developers in the team and how long the software has been in development. I am disregarding consulting rates, which tend to be higher. Not to forget the extra costs of non-programmers in the company, taxes, office rental, water, electricity and all the other expenses business related.

by tgb 13y ago

wmf 13y ago

Given that Mozilla's budget is over $10M per year and Firefox has been under development for over 10 years, saying a browser costs $1B is off by less than one order of magnitude. Considering that the author is complaining about confusion of 5-6 orders of magnitude, I find this simplification excusable.

ankitml 13y ago
Mozila didnt start from scratch. It started by open sourcing what netscape was. So you need to add those costs/ years in the calculation. I mean even if they rewrote it completely, these man years should be added in the estimation of cost.

gavinpc 13y ago

> inexcusable Ask for your money back. Surely there's a writer out there who will meet your requirements at your price point.

pjmlp 13y ago

Yet those numbers can be easy to achieve. In many European countries, developers make between 1500 euros and 6000 euros a month. The amount per year additionally depends on how many salaries one gets (12 - 14). So using the lowest value for salary and months, results in an amount of 18 000 euros a year. Now one just needs to multiply this value by the amount of developers in the team and how long the software has been in development. I am disregarding consulting rates, which tend to be higher. Not to forget the extra costs of non-programmers in the company, taxes, office rental, water, electricity and all the other expenses business related.