Insisting that a software vendor use escrow is laughable.
My insistence is not due to the fact that this is a software vendor. It is due to the fact that at least the last three in a row software vendors that offered similar software for similar prices and had similar new members aaying how good it looked took the money and never gave a product (or even proved one existed besides screenshots). Given that back-drop, I highly disagree that it is laughable. And I know John K (who is well respected in this forum) would do so. Plus MANY software development sites enforce a type of escrow prior to releasing payment.
So, I repeat my offer, full price, escrow thru John K and I will report back to all whether it works or there is malware involved. Can't see the downside here to the developer - he gets paid in full and a respected forum member here handles the escrow, more sales will come if I report it is legit. Really only reason to worry is that the legit part is absent - hopefully not.
That being said, firefops proposal would also work.
I'm inclined to agree, I don't really see a reason for being resistant to escrow... it's not like we're asking for all orders to be escrowed, just the first one. Sure that's a delay of a week(ish) on the first order. Bid deal, you've already designed the software. The only other reason I could see for this resistance is that if he's actually getting orders already AND has some sort of malicious aspect to his software - that or it's a straight up scam, the software doesn't exist and he's just hoping that he'll get a 1 or 2 btc off his effort through the binary+source sale.