[gnaritas]

> They can't really expect to get much software made for the product when it's released if developers have no obvious way to make money from it.

Sure they can, people don't just work for money, they work for notoriety or fun. Money is the most popular incentive, it isn't however, the only one.

[k-mcgrady]

That's true and there will probably be some cool software built for it but there is a limit to the amount of investment people will put into developing software for it for free. There will be people with great ideas who need VC backing to turn them into products but they won't be able to get it without an obvious way to create revenue.

The problem will be even greater for Google when another company (Apple or Microsoft presumably) comes out with a simliar product which runs incredible new software that just isn't feasible on the Google Glasses due to this policy.

[gnaritas]

Surely you're joking... you act as if great software only comes from paying people, that's simply not true. Sure, some developers will avoid the platform because they can't make any money "directly" from it; others will be smarter and see there are many ways to make money indirectly via reputation as the guy who did X on glass.

[k-mcgrady]

That's not what I'm saying. You can build great software for free. However there are certain things that need money thrown at them, things which require a lot of R&D (e.g. Siri). Unless you have a way to gain financially from the software you won't get the money to put into the R&D and the product won't get built. Basically I'm not saying that great software won't be built for free but that there are taking a risk as there is are a lot of things that can't be built for free.

[gnaritas]

And those things will be done by big established players with deep pockets who see advantage in being on glass.