David, I tested the Journal software and it looks very nice. Is it possible to live from this software, how did you get customers to your site? Regards, Spikey

I''m not sure this is appropriate in this forum, even if it is my software, since it''s not game-related. We''ll see how it goes. If the thread wanders too far afield, I''ll delete it.

The Journal is my primary income generator, currently. Originally released in 1996, The Journal''s sales have grown steadily (if not rapidly) since then. The recent release of a major upgrade has helped bolster sales considerably (though it''s *still* not making me rich ).

Most of my customers find The Journal by doing a search for journal or diary software on Google or other search sites. I get a fairly decent rating from search engines because of the number of (primarily software) pages that link to The Journal''s page, as well as from the volume of journaling content (mostly from The Journal''s monthly newsletter) that has accumulated at The Journal''s main page over the years.

Nearly as important are the software listing sites like download.com, TUCOWS, ZDNet, and so on. Most of those sites list The Journal because I went there and added the software listing. Some software sites "scrape" listings from other sites, so that helps push things even further. Software listing sites used to be the most important step, but as more Internet users have become comfortable using the various engines, their importance has diminished somewhat.

While a mild "shareware success story", I''m not sure The Journal will be useful as a model for game developers. Though maybe it shows how to make money with general purpose software to help keep a game development hobby afloat, in the same way some people use contract/consulting work.


DavidRM
Samu Games

Thanks!

I am wondering how did you start to make Artifact and how wa sit made??


-Knight Killer-
Artifact Player

And have you ever had problems with people flooding the server and stuff like that ?

Could you post a screentshot from Paintball.net ? I think I entered the site once (before I knew you were hanging around here at GameDev.net) and I would like to see how it looked.
[EDIT]: Only if you have a screentshot lying around and it is not too much trouble...



[edited by - granat on March 30, 2002 9:51:32 AM]