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Oh I get that’s the market, I just hope said market is large enough for them.


The market is huge. There are quite a few programmers, and they are more willing than most to spend money on software. Graphic design is probably bigger, but other than that? I know accountants and lawyers that are fine with Google Docs and Sheets these days.

As another datapoint, I seem to remember IntelliJ doing >100 Million € in revenue p.a.


Considering that for iOS/mac/apple platforms devs will probably chose xcode, and given the premium one has to pay for mac computers these days (justified or not, I'm not saying either), I fear the answer is no.

Most devs that do _not_ make native apple apps (e.g. web devs) do not need a Mac, so the market of devs that do not use xcode, that prefer a Mac and that are willing to pay for a proprietary solution, over other proprietary solutions, is likely not that big.


There are still a lot of web developers who choose a Mac even if they don't need one. Nice hardware running unix with a decent UI is worth a premium price to lots of people.

I think you underestimate how many developers are willing to pay for their tools proprietary or not. We know better than most how difficult it is to make software and so I think as a group are more willing to support each other financially.




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