Every computer I've bought had only one line item with a price on it; the rest of the lines list the components that come with your package, to show you what you bought. You bought a system "package", get it? Just because your "101-Key Keyboard" doesn't have a price next to it on your invoice, doesn't mean that Gateway got it for free, and therefore is passing on the freebie to you.
As for MS-Office, I read once that the OEMs pay MS about $65 per copy shipped. Retail price is significantly more than that, as you may know. The reason the OEM gets it cheaper than you is because they are buying in volume.
Now let me ask you, do you think that $65 is below the cost to produce the CD? Do you believe that Microsoft "dumped" their software at below cost at some point, to gain market share? If so, please provide dates, prices, and customers. If you can't do that, then you are making gross assumptions.
Re "If it's because it has patents, as in Qualcomm's case, or efficiency, or superiority of product, then there's nothing wrong with that."
Let me see if I've got this straight: In your mind, if a company has "patents" then it's free to use the free market to set its pricing. If it only has a lowly "copyright" (yes, Win95/98/NT/2000 etc are copyrighted products, which you pay a license fee to use), then it may not profit unduly, and must use some other form of pricing mechanism, one which doesn't allow much if any profit. |
