I don't know whether I heard correctly or if the number was accurate, but I heard someone throw out $60k as the amount paid for the app development this morning on the radio.
That sounds like a lot of money to a lay-person, but assuming $100/hr, which seems like at least a reasonable ballpark rate, that breaks down to 600 man-hours, or 15 man-weeks.
That is a very tight deadline to turn out a critical app like this. Especially since I assume it wasn't just a single person doing the coding.
People don't realize that software is expensive and a custom built application is probably not the correct choice for a single-use product. I'm sure whoever was in charge felt that $60k was a quite generous offer to build this. In reality it's basically nothing.
I used to have acquaintances approach me and say, "Hey I've got this great app idea you could help me with."
The response I found shut them down real quick was, "Great. Do you have $100k lying around to get the first beta out the door?"
That sounds like a lot of money to a lay-person, but assuming $100/hr, which seems like at least a reasonable ballpark rate, that breaks down to 600 man-hours, or 15 man-weeks.
That is a very tight deadline to turn out a critical app like this. Especially since I assume it wasn't just a single person doing the coding.
People don't realize that software is expensive and a custom built application is probably not the correct choice for a single-use product. I'm sure whoever was in charge felt that $60k was a quite generous offer to build this. In reality it's basically nothing.
I used to have acquaintances approach me and say, "Hey I've got this great app idea you could help me with."
The response I found shut them down real quick was, "Great. Do you have $100k lying around to get the first beta out the door?"