Marketing (Was: Will Free Axiom change our world?)

An important part of a marketing plan is figuring out the competitive
landscape and where we want to position ourselves in it.

What do we have that Mathematica and Maple and Axiom don't have and vice
versa?  The most obvious thing we have that Mat and Map don't have is $0
price.  Compared to Axiom, we are apparently easier to use and in
general more pragmatic and less pure.

What group of users can we serve better than them?  Do we want to
present ourselves as the best solution for undergraduate physics
teaching (maybe)?  For researchers in pure math (probably not)?  For
light users of CAS (maybe)?  For Linux hackers?  etc.

When we figure those things out, we will know what areas of the system
are in most critical need of work.  We will also begin to have some
ideas about how to raise awareness of Maxima and get it into the hands
of people who can benefit from it.

For example, if we decide that undergraduate physics students are an
important user group, we might want to encourage those who have already
used Maxima in their physics classes (e.g. Nikos Ioakimidis) to write up
their experience in physics teaching magazines as well as usenet groups.

I have more thoughts on these issues, but I've got to run now.

      -s