Amix was Re: Aztec C (was: more eBay stuff)

[John Foust]

At 12:56 PM 6/1/2007, Bryan Pope wrote:
>Note key word "marketing" and remember we are talking about Commodore, 
>which can mean anti-marketing..  :-/

Yes, CBM's marketing was the first time I heard the old joke
about "If they bought out Kentucky Fried Chicken, they'd rename 
the company Warm Dead Bird."

Gadzooks there was lots of "What if" wishing being done by 
Amiga developers back in the day.  As with many tech industries,
I think it stems most strongly from the base of lower-level techies who
in their gut fervently believe that if a product is somehow
technically superior, it should win in the marketplace.

The Amiga did pioneer so very many things, but in the end, 
sheer numbers win, and as the Mac and PC market blew past it, 
carrying the mutated developments with it.  Lots of its "who needs it?"
soon became "must haves": color graphics, sound, multitasking, video, 
networking, hypertext.

But I know I've said this before - in a post below, almost old enough
to make the ten-year-rule.

- John

>Date: Thu, 25 Jun 1998 16:38:24 +0000
>To: classiccmp at u.washington.edu
>From: John Foust <jfoust at threedee.com>
>Subject: Re: Old computer books
>
>At 07:25 AM 6/25/98 PDT, Max Eskin wrote:
>>Why not? The Soul of a New Machine, Insanely Great, and Hackers seemed 
>>to do just fine, to name a few. I don't mean an encyclopedia, but a 
>>bunch of stories about the design of stuff (i.e. a chapter on how 
>>Multics was made, a chapter on how the Apple arose, a chapter on where 
>>the ENIAC came from,etc.). 
>
>Once upon a time when I was in the thick of it, I thought about writing 
>a book about the history of the Amiga, where even from the early days 
>it clear the machine had strengths beyond the more popular computers 
>of the time, and that it was swimming against the current.  
>
>The problem in my mind was that there was no guiding thread, no "hook", 
>no core story, no moral or lesson - just fumbling computer companies, 
>insane investors, inept marketroids, crazy genius types, etc.  Is this
>interesting enough, or just interesting to Amiga-heads?  I knew other 
>people who thought about writing a book like this who had similar 
>concern about lack of focus, about how to make the story interesting
>enough for someone who wasn't personally involved in some aspect of it.
>
>One clarifying thought was inspired by the drunken ramblings of an 
>Amiga dealer during the last days at a NewTek party, who said "It's 
>like we were from five years in the future, and we had television, 
>and we were trying to explain it to people who'd only seen a radio.
>Radio with pictures?  Who wants that?"
>
>There's another lesson to be told about the tendency of techies to 
>believe that technical excellence should always Win, but it rarely 
>does.  Then again, maybe these sorts of Valley stories rarely have 
>a point.  :-)
>
>- John