Textures/sounds/anims vs scripts/prims

Why are scripts and prims free to create in world when textures, sounds, and animations are charged for? Does it not create another item on the asset server regardless of where the item was made? Or is it more bits and bytes for the textures, sounds, and animations?

It's possible, but when you factor in the scripts resources used, does it not balance out? Why is it set up so a great scripter make more money than a great texture artist? Level playing field has a thumb on one side of the scale, don't you think? Or maybe I'm getting my metaphors all metamixed.

It can't be just me thinking this, but I can't find any other threads on the subject. Someone point me in the right direction? Has there been a debate, with solid answers, on this in the past?

Thanks.

A

IIRC the earliest versions used to charge your per prim rezzed (with no parcel prim limits)... they also had taxes....

I would guess that because a prim is a built in function, it has a custom format that is smaller than the average texture... but also doesn't need any extra archetecture to upload store, or stream, similarly scripts are compiled to byte code saving space....

but what it really boils down to is that LL needs a way to pull L$ back out of the system (because they give it away in stipends) otherwise it'd flood the market and end up worthless very quickly

Fun Trivia:

* Kelly Linden, 5/12/06: "...when a prim is saved (as an asset) in text format it is about 3k uncompressed and about 1k compressed."