Loosing faith in the Amiga "community", like so many before me

[jtsiren]

I'm sorry Mike, but I too have to join those who consider your articles a little biased. You seem to treat material coming from Amiga Inc. very positively whereas your comments about the competing product seem lukewarm at best. You obviously made an effort to be objective and avoid passing too much judgement in your MorphOS article, but, well, there is still a distinctly different feel to the article than to those about Amiga Inc.'s activities.

And I'm having a hard time believing this is just because one product is better than the other.

Make of it what you will, I just wanted to let you know that I have to agree with people who have observed a bias. The fact that you do try doesn't really remove the bias even with the best of intentions, and I wonder if that has some effect on the way you perceive e.g. communications from the Thendic France camp as well.

I also have to agree with the people saying provide proof or take back your comments about threats. You already broke confidentiality (if there ever was such assumed) by saying threats were made. Not substantiating them is like writing a blank check. People are now free to think the worst or the best, even if reality is nowhere near their imagination. And what is this FUD you refer to? Please substantiate.

Lastly, I wonder if you consider Amiga Inc.'s or Hyperion's allegations about MorphOS as FUD? And if so, or if not, how would you compare those to any alleged FUD by Thendic France or their partners?

Anyway, I do wish you the best of luck with your articles and your hobby.

[jtsiren]

>My MorphOS article was even *too positive* to
>be entirely unbiased. Anyone comparing their
>current product with MacOS X or Windows would
>slaughter it, because the product at this stage is
>too unstable, lacks compelling features and
>software support in general.

Yes, I'm sure it would have. I too have seen MorphOS live. It had some neat apps, and it was fast, but even I could make it crash. I'm not sure how meaningful such a comparison would have been, but I'm sure a new-born beta operating system will have a hard time compared to proven technology with market success. However...

>Yes, I think AmigaOS4 is a good project, from my
>*AmigaOS fan* point of view, but I see a far greater
>future for intent personally.

Therein, I believe, lies at least my personal grievance as I pointed out above. AmigaOS 4 and AmigaDE, what we've seen of both, would be slaughtered just as well by a comparison to Windows or MacOS X. Yet you didn't acknowledge that, and still you went on supporting it in the article quite a bit more than you did the competition.

Even though MorphOS has a lot more to show of its progress at this time than AmigaOS 4 or AmigaDE combined. You seem quite eager to discuss the downsides of MorphOS here, yet I am yet to see any such comments concerning AmigaOS or AmigaDE. Is this because you honestly believe no such grievances exist, or because you "want to believe"?

Sure, intent is a nice piece of technology but in many ways that is as much a separate development as Java is - unless, of course, AmigaDE comes through in some huge way, but we have just about as little information or proof about that as we have of Thendic's eclipsis or related plans.

I firmly believe that if one wants to write an article from a "slaughtering point of view", one could easily and with merit do so for both of these products. It might not be entirely fair, but it would probably be pretty-much factual and representative of the huge uphill climbs these products face.

My point? Claiming you could do this for MorphOS and at the same time going on merrily talking about AmigaOS and AmigaDE like there hadn't been much trouble or lack of evident progress lately, is just a bit unfortunate in my opinion. I would very much hope you can see this issue in a constructive light.

So please, what ever you do, do not take this as a personal attack. I believe in discussing issues, and I hope to tackle these with you to reach a better common understanding. Maybe we can all learn something.

I ask you again, though. Do you consider Amiga Inc.'s accusations on MorphOS as FUD? Do they not distribute fear, uncertainty and doubt about a competing product? Have they been substantiated? And if you think so, or if not, why not? You seem to use the acronym FUD quite often.

>Believe me you will
>*not* find anyone completely unbiased anywhere!!!

I'm not saying they would. I'm sure we could find someone unbiased about this issue in particular, but then that person probably would also have to be completely ignorant and unknowledgeable about it. We all have our histories and biases. But I do believe you have a bias and originally didn't take too well people pointing it out.

I think most people complaining really didn't have a problem with your MorphOS article as such, though. It is, as I said, pretty restrained in this regard and we welcome it. Thank you. However, one doesn't need to go any further than read your comments about AmigaOS and AmigaDE in an earlier article and compare them to the MorphOS article and see a huge difference that is not based on technology comparison, but a simple difference in approach.

Well, even you acknowledge that you are an "AmigaOS fan" and not a "MorphOS fan" and unfortunately this is a little too evident in your articles. The first concludes with calls for help and tributing Amiga Club members, while the latter is far more technical in nature. I would personally prefer if your future articles would all be more like the MorphOS article. It was written more like a news piece than a column.

Having said that, that is probably pretty hard considering that most developments from Amiga can not be tested yet like MorphOS can.

P.S. I personally know the difficulty of writing objectively about a product which one really fancies. I've been down that difficult road myself in the late 90s covering Amiga to a local magazine. I'm sure I made my share of mistakes as well. It is difficult and I sympathize. But I do still strongly believe people have legitimate grievances in this discussion and that you could do well by listening.

Thank you for your attention.

[jtsiren]

>> I'm sure we could find someone unbiased about
>> this issue in particular
>I believe you are wrong. Currently only one who
>would want to do an in depth review or preview are
>people who have experience with the platform.

Well, yeah. What I meant was... and here is the full quote...

"I'm sure we could find someone unbiased about this issue in particular, but then that person probably would also have to be completely ignorant and unknowledgeable about it."

...I meant someone like my mother or someone like that who has no knowledge of computers. I doubt she'd have any bias on this issue, but then, she'd also have no expertise to choose either way.

With expertise comes experience (or, actually, the other way around) and thus bias. On that we do agree. But now we're just nit-picking. Sorry.

In any case, of course, with professional journalists there are guidelines to follow that help control this bias. Such as always asking for both sides of the story and leaving opinions to opinion pieces only (columns). But with the advent of Internet and high exposure and reach of amateur articles, much of this responsibility also falls on amateur writers.

Your articles seem to suggest that not only do you favour one of the alternatives, you actively support and want to support its growth. Or how else would you explain the calls for help in the end of your AmigaOS article versus the far more restrained ending of your MorphOS article?

This is, of course, your choice and you are welcome to have it. I wish you the best. But if you want to be taken as a somewhat objective (a relative term) writer, you may have to choose either the latter way of writing - you probably can't have both without a strong bias shining through.

You said above that you think people like your articles because you add your opinions. I don't know what other people want, but I do know what I'd like to see. I'd really appreciate more articles without opinions and product-support agendas  (and if they are opinion pieces, they should be clearly labeled as such). But that is of course just me.