Saved Altair 4K BASIC - test-drb@ccmp.vtda.org

11 Nov 1998

...
 There is a point at which a lower price has a negative

effect on sales.  People don't take it seriously.  As Allison 
pointed out, there were cheaper BASICs available.  Why did 
anyone want Microsoft's? 
Using a slightly different - and, indeed, almost invisible -
marketing strategy, millions of copies of Microsoft BASIC
were sold - one inside each and every Apple ][+, ][e, and //c,
for example.

...
 I'm sure Bill was smart enough to realize that
gaining 
1,000 customers at $50 leads to quite different administrative
and tech support requirements than 100 customers at $500 each.
And who knows how many copies were sold? 
MBASIC was also commonly bundled with many of the popular
CP/M boxes of the late 70's/early 80's.  This is probably
a couple million more copies.

Tim.