Originally posted by RobA_Oz One of the reasons for Apple's recent surge in Mac sales has been the free OS upgrades they've offered. Now, I'm not suggesting that Nikon or any other camera maker (except perhaps for Fuji) is in Apple's happy position, financially, and I'm also acutely aware that nothing is actually free of payment somewhere, but it's the perception that matters, particularly when new features are added for zero incremental cost to the user.
New features are also regularly added to commercial software, at no extra charge, up until a major re-write or revision occurs, so why should it be any different for cameras? Camera-makers are actually more like the Apple model than stand-alone software companies, in that the hardware sales can subsidise the software provided, and its upgrades.
Apple's surges are generally driven by either a new OS iteration or new models with dramatic improvements. A couple years ago, when Apple made only slight upgrades to the Mac line, sales dropped significantly, and the "Tim Cook doesn't have the mojo" talk really took off.
"...and I'm also acutely aware that nothing is actually free of payment somewhere..." That's the key right there, IMO. Do you want to pay for the "enhancement implementation team" upfront, or when new features are released?
Updating software is different than updating a camera. If a software patch doesn't work well, the company can push out a fix pretty quickly. If a camera firmware update doesn't work well, the camera is likely bricked... at least the way most camera software is currently implemented. I suppose when we reach the seemingly inevitable collision between camera and mobile OS, enhancements and new features will be rolled out more frequently.
---------- Post added 01-17-15 at 07:30 PM ----------
Originally posted by rawr But they are hardware vendors. Features should, as much as possible, be included at design stage and be available to customers out of the box, not turned on [or off?] for a price.
I agree. But if a company comes up with a new idea after the model is released, I sure as hell appreciate the company following through with the idea instead of saying, "let's wait until the next model". I mean, if I buy a camera, should I have an expectation that the manufacturer will strive to improve it, other than fixing bugs?
I bet there's a few grumpy old photogs who would pay a nominal fee to have "superfluous" features disabled on their cameras!
Quote: In the days when computer rooms were the equivalent of voodoo temples, IBM would sell customers a $200,000 upgrade to their mainframes which they presented as a very complex and sophisticated operation, but which actually involved an IBM on-site technician merely flicking a switch to turn on extra hardware that was already present in the installed computer. Needless to say, (if they ever realized what was actually going on) customers were not impressed by such sharp practices.
These days, we have a similar fiasco with CPU's. Many top-of-the-line CPU's are deliberately crippled in order to fill lower SKU's.