Proprietary Software - Pricing and Economics

Pricing and Economics

Proprietary software is not synonymous with commercial software, though the industry commonly confuses the term, as does the free software community. Proprietary software can be distributed at no cost or for a fee, and free software can be distributed at no cost or for a fee. The difference is that whether or not proprietary software can be distributed, and what the fee would be, is at the proprietor's discretion. With free software, anyone who has a copy can decide whether, and how much, to charge for a copy or related services.

Proprietary software that comes for no cost is called freeware.

Proponents of commercial proprietary software argue that requiring users to pay for software as a product increases funding or time available for the research and development of software. For example, Microsoft says that per-copy fees maximise the profitability of software development.

Proprietary software is generally creates greater commercial activity over free software, especially in regard to market revenues.