What makes software valuable? Quality. Why quality? Because quality generates The Experience which in turns drives value to both the consumer and the business. So why focus on a point in time when the quality may low or moderate and the value less than acceptable? That’s the point of my statement regarding independent software. Software that isn’t life critical, not related to another major software release, and is for all matters completely independent should not have a firm release date. Instead, it should have a soft release date. Soft release dates are starting to be more common, such as in hardware releases and some online software (i.e. Google, Basecamp). The soft release date is not focused as much on the point in time of release, but rather the quality of the software.