My two cents.

I run a service based business. I am a dentist. We responded to the
huge push to go on-line to answer customer's questions and provide a
point of contact other than the customer coming to the office. Of
course, coming to the office almost always involves at least a charge
for an office visit or consultation. People responded very well and
my mailbox had ever increasing volumes of mail. To the point that it
was taking first 30 minutes, then an hour, and finally almost two
hours A DAY to answer the mail. Multiple people trying every which
way to avoid coming to the office and trying to get me to diagnose
their dental problems via E-mail. Essentially all I have to offer the
public is my time. THis is not / was not a viable business model.

I don't like what DG is doing but I understand from a business point
of view. The ever expanding size and demands of their produced
products dwarfs the time and effort it takes to produce current
products. The staff has to expand to service the existing client base
while the current production staff stays the same or shrinks due to
the sales of new products at the moment. Then you add in the efforts
by all government agencies to charge for their services as if they
were a private business and you have a very rapidly increasing
overhead expense as a business.

I think the two tiered approach of charging a modest annual fee to
gain discounted and preferred pricing on products versus charging
inflated prices to one time services and products makes sense.
Essentially that is the business model of virtually all the computer
products I use in my business.

In the USA, those of us with Experimental Airworthiness Certificates
used to be able to thumb our noses at the factories because we could
repair our planes anyway we wanted as long as an inspector would sign
off the repair as being airworthy. The wording of the current
"conditions and limitations" attached to the Experimental certificate
and the litigious nature of aircraft repair in the USA is making it
more difficult to be a "lone wolf" in maintaining our aircraft. We
need manufacturer's support.

I am sure Mr. Weber is ****ed off at the hostile attitudes of many of
the people who call him. The 80/20 rule is based on human nature and
the 20% who eat up all his time and refuse to pay for any services
just wear you down.

Having owned a glider where the manufacturer just stopped providing
any support (Grob 104), I can tell you that the price charged for a
replacement part provided by the manufacturer looked pretty reasonable
after getting various quotes on re-engineering and producing a custom
replacement part. Some people love re-inventing the wheel and that is
their recreation. They probably have a full machine shop in their
garage or a friend who does that stuff for fun. But for most of us,
we just want to get the part and fix the problem so we can
fly....tomorrow.

I just hope Mr. Weber reads all of this...has a couple of stiff
drinks...and mellows out with a more reasonable and balanced business
model to provide support for all of the wonderful LS and DG products
that are flying in the world.

My two cents.

Guy Acheson