Noyce liked to use a book-printing analogy. The first copy of a book, taken by itself, is extremely expensive because the printer must buy equipment, typeset, proof, and otherwise ready the document for printing. Once the process is in place, however, every additional copy is relatively cheap because the investment in materials and equipment for the original printing is fixed. Moreover, the more copies made, the lower the per-copy price, since the original investment can be amortized over more items.
