From: falavi@bach.mth.kcl.ac.uk (Farrukh Alavi)
Subject: Re: Another slap in Commodore's face
Organization: J. Random Misconfigured Site
Date: Sun, 13 Dec 1992 12:48:02 GMT
X-Posted-From: bach.mth.kcl.ac.uk
NNTP-Posting-Host: sol.ctr.columbia.edu

In article 39260 andyp@admiral.uucp (Andy Patrizio) pokes the following  
fun:

>Gail Wellington, leader of CATS and other CBM special projects, has 
>resurfaced with OptImage, a publisher of CD-I development tools. She's 
>Vice President of Marketing. It's almost comical

Whose laughing?

>Uncle Irving pushed her out, and she goes to the 
>competition. I find it hilarious, actually...

History is often the best indication of the future. Jack Tramiel went to  
the competition as well. Over at Apple, so did Steve Jobs. Which of these  
two gentlemen are laughing today? (Note that this is in no way a comment  
on the effectiveness or otherwise of Philips' marketing prowess). 

This post of yours ranks with your previous long-winded piece "Why my  
Amiga is gone" as yet another attempt to publicly ridicule Commodore. All  
it manages to achieve is to show that your remarks are superficial in the  
extreme (if Ms. Wellington is indeed trying to get her own back after  
several years' service with Commodore, then that is a matter of hurt  
pride/anger/revenge, not humour).

I will substantiate this further by taking this opportunity to replying to  
your above-named article. I would have done so earlier, had that thread  
not been hijacked into talks of other things by a certain gentleman who  
believes that PCs have custom video and audio hardware, too, gosh, just  
like the Amiga. So here goes:

--------

>The reason I post this is to try and change the course of so many 
>arguments on all of the c.s.a.* groups. 

Do you really believe that this one post will convince Amiga users to  
change their views?

>Let's talk industry acceptance and perception, something you guys avoid 
>like the plague.

So many posts here discuss things like C= advertising/lack thereof, no. of  
machines sold, how NewTek has cheesed off people by covering up the Amiga  
name, etc. etc. None of this sounds like avoiding the issue of industry  
acceptance and perception like the plague.

>But they are all businessmen, and they are interested in making money. 
>And, frankly, there is no money in the Amiga.

For the companies you have in mind, there _is_ money to be made in the  
Amiga market (in fact great opportunities exist, since there are no  
`big-name' competitors) - only that the money to be made may initially not  
be of the same order of magnitude as in the PC market. Broad, sweeping  
generalisations like "there is _no_ money.." only draw a superficial  
conclusion.

>EA, Sierra, WP, and SSI have all abandoned Amiga in the past few months. 
>Origin is wondering whether they should bother releasing "Wing Commander" 
>in the U.S. or just Europe. LusaArts is still up in the air. No AGA 
>support, that much we know.

EA is just finishing off DPaint 4 AGA. In the latest Amiga Format, they  
say that they are firmly behind the Amiga for future work. Sierra has  
decided to continue support for the Amiga. 
No AGA support? Read my earlier post entitled "AGA games announced".

>Consider: to get the full usage from the Amiga, you need to utilize the 
>custom chips. Most software publishers won't bother with an esoteric 
>chipset unless they're going to make money on it to begin with.

And those who take the trouble to utilise the chipset will reap the  
benefits. NewTek, GVP, ASDG, Psygnosis, etc. have all done so. Of course,  
any developer who treats the Amiga as just another clone doesn't deserve  
success.

>These publishers also need programmers. Commodore has been NO help at 
>all. That came right from WordPerfect and Lotus. People from both 
>companies (no names) said right out CBM didn't lift a finger to assist 
>them in Amiga development.

That's simply not true. Commodore, in many cases, approached the big-name  
companies to convince them to write for the Amiga. The only reason we  
don't have Lotus et al. developing for the Amiga is the fact that they  
demanded an impossibly large sum (in the millions, literally) to do it.  
That came right from someone I know who was involved in the discussions.

>And when I posed a challenge to the 
>complainers in c.s.a.games to start sending their resumes to these 
>companies, so they can have an Amiga programmer in house, everyone 
>clammed up. So how are these companies going to develop for Amiga?

They could try advertising for programmers in Amiga magazines. Firms like  
Psygnosis, Argonaut, etc. do it all the time, asking for resumes, examples  
of work done, etc. They also get responses.

>Scratch most 1000s. They are gathering dust, broke, dead, or otherwise 
>out of usage.

Would you like to back that statement up with some real figures? It is  
possible to bring the A1000 up to ECS/Kickstart 2.1 level quite easily. In  
fact, this is exactly the configuration of one of my machines. I run it  
with the A570 CD-ROM drive and multiple hard drives without any problems  
whatsoever. Everyone who has seen my A1000 setup has either expressed  
interest in acquiring an Amiga at some stage, or has actually bought one  
(and this includes PC users).

>The 4000 is too new, but from what I've seen will probably belly-flop. 
>Everyone who bought one had to return it because it broke. CBM, ever 
>heard of quality control?

Ever heard of the Gold Service? Just because everyone _you know_ had a  
defective machine doesn't automatically imply that all production 4000s  
are broken.

>Cross Europe off. Only domestic sales count.

Cross the US off as far as Amiga sales are concerned - only the rest of  
the world counts.

>Commodore has proven 
>itself ineffectual at any kind of advertising, promotion, or grabbing and 
>holding market share.

Only in the US.

>What's worse is the way its leadership hides in an ivory tower. I've seen 
>Dave Haynie and George Robbins catch many grenades from Amiga users over 
>hardware decisions, like IDE in the 4000. I've also heard what they 
>wanted to do, only to have the honchos nix the idea. It's ridiculous that 
>they and other CBM employees on here have to take grief for someone 
>else's ineptitude, but that's how it goes, I guess.

Just in case you didn't know, that `someone else' was none other than Bill  
Sydnes, the man behind the PCjr. Everybody else at C= engineering was  
against IDE, and most certainly the `leadership in the ivory tower' had  
little say in it. Sydnes is no longer there, and SCSI-2 is on the way.

>I don't want a PC, I want to stay with my 3000.

You know, you could have got a 386/486 Bridgeboard, and had the best of  
both worlds.

>But I'm a realist. I see where the industry is going, and 
>it's pointless to stay with a machine that has no industry support.

You're a realist insofar as you've allowed yourself to be convinced by the  
marketeers. The stars of the PC/Apple world are the marketing men (Messrs  
Sculley, Akers, Dell, etc.). The stars of the Amiga world are the  
engineers.

>I did this once before... in 1989 I waved farewel to my four year-old 
>Apple II computer, because I felt Apple was letting it die in favor of 
>the Macintosh.

You should have got an A4000, since Commodore is going to let the A3000  
and other ECS machines die eventually in favour of AGA machines.

>And I'll bet if I come back here in 
>three years, you guys'll all be here, still trying to convince yourselves 
>how much better the Amiga is to the686 or whatever the hell Intel calls 
 ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>it, or Suns, or SGI, or... 3DO.

"I'm none too pleased, either...one bad experience with it [OS/2] left me  
cold...I do know that the Amiga has spoiled me". You say precisely what  
you accuse Amiga users of.

We don't have to `convince ourselves' of the Amiga's technical excellence.  
In three years' time, it isn't just Intel/Sun/SGI who will have improved  
their machines.
Xref: sparky comp.sys.amiga.advocacy:31773 comp.sys.amiga.misc:18837