World of Goo’s pay-what-you-want report has some great statistics about the average prices people paid. This one was surprising: I expected Windows users to be the cheapest, but I didn’t expect Linux users to be the most generous.
I can’t say this surprises me. Linux users pay the least (i.e., $0) of a premium for the software that the use everyday, so spending a few dollars for a good piece of software is no big deal to them. When you’re around the Linux and open source world, you’d be surprised to see the generosity of people, whether that generosity is with money, as is the case here, or with their time and effort, in helping others troubleshoot their problems on mailing lists.
It also reminds me of stories I heard from friends who worked at very high end restaurants and inns through high school and college. In general, the clientele of these places were incredibly rich individuals, but when the time came around to leave a tip, they rarely, if ever, left above 15%, no matter the level of service. But when those less well-to-do came in (usually only on special occasions), the tips were generally much higher than the tips left by the rich. Same principle here, really…
