From: barrett@iastate.edu (Marc N Barrett)
Subject: More AmigaWorld Lies
Followup-To: comp.sys.amiga.advocacy
Organization: Iowa State University, Ames, IA
Date: Thu, 3 Sep 1992 07:02:14 GMT

   In the October 1992 issue of AmigaWorld, the editorial by Doug Barney which
is a response to the article in the July 12th issue of the San Jose Mercury
News which was basically an obituary for the Amiga.

   First of all, Mr. Barney states that "Commodore also felt the heat from 
Robinson's blasts, and that, I'd say, is a good thing.  The firm cranked out
a three-page reply outlining its arguments, and posted it to the nets."
Now there are about 260 million people in the United States, and articles 
from the San Jose Mercury News and the newspapers that carry its syndicated
columns have the potential of reaching up to 10% of these people.  It is
also true that a much smaller number of people by far read the nets or Amiga
user group newsletters -- probably 100,000 at the very most (I'm being 
extremely generous here).  So if Commodore was REALLY all that steamed about
this article, then why did they only distribute their response to the nets,
where only about 0.01% of the potential readers of the original article could
read their response???  The only reason I can think of is that Commodore public
relations and Amiga advertizing in the United States has become so heavily
structured around simply maintaining the existing user base that they cannot
reach out to non-Amiga owners even when they really want to.

   Mr. Barney also goes on state facts that are simply wrong.  He states that 
there are about 1000 Amiga dealers in the U.S., and there can't possibly be 
this many.  There might have been this many in the U.S. when the Amiga was at
its height in sales about four years ago, but things have declined considerably
since then.  I know for a fact that there used to be six Amiga dealers in the
state of Nebraska, and that there is only one now; and that there used to be 
five Amiga dealers in the state of Iowa, and that there is only one here now
as well.  I also know that the Midwest used to be stronger in Amiga sales as
a rule than most other parts of the country.  So even if the attrition rate
for Amiga dealers in other parts of the U.S. is only 50% (again, I'm being
generous; indications from the net lead me to believe that it exceeded 80%
in other parts of the country as well), then this cannot leave more than 500
dealers.  To get a figure of 1000 Amiga dealers, AmigaWorld must be counting
Amiga 'repair' places that do not stock Amiga hardware or software, but simply
charge you a bazillion dollars to mail in your Amiga to Commodore for a 
replacement -- something you can do yourself.

   Mr. Barney also states near his clincher that "[the Amiga] no longer 
competes with PCs and Macs, but instead takes on workstations from Silicon 
Graphics, NeXT, and Sun."  Now wait a minute!  The Amiga takes on workstations
from these companies like the ST does -- with hype and no substance.  All 
of the workstations mentioned have an actively supported version of 
Word Perfect 5.0 available for them, and the Amiga does not; and this is in
spite of the fact that woprkstations as a rule have a lesser need for 
productivity software than a home computer like the Amiga.  All of these 
systems also bear up very well against the Amiga in sales in the U.S., and 
this is in spite of the fact that workstations are far less affordable than
the Amiga.  Finally, all of these systems have *SUPPORT*, something the 
Amiga does not have.  (If it did, the original article in the San Jose 
newspaper would not have been written)

   My conclusion is that Mr. Barney has attempted one last flaming editorial
before bailing out of the Amiga community, and has done a blundering job of
it.  The response editorial by Mr. Barney was filled with more lies, 
innuendos, and double-speak than the original article, by far.

---
| Marc Barrett -MB-  |  email: barrett@iastate.edu
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Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.misc