CommodoreUSA CEO Interview Answers

[Darrin]

Duce,

Show me what the price is for the FPGA and all its components and the PCB at volumes production at 100, 1000, 10,000 and 100,000 unit batch order volume.

I want to see a viable and sustainable business plan for running a full operating business supporting the Commodore and Amiga classics. I have not seen anything that allows for paid employees or even paying the owner a salary of any kind in a long time.

On a mainstream level, I am trying to figure out a way to get the volume produced at a price that won't cause it to be market designated into the console market or the desktop computer market just as the C64DTV was. If I was in charge of Commodore USA, I would need it to be in the market with the Atari Flashback 2 in order to sell without having to have the CPU clocks per cycles and memory in terms of MBytes per $1 as a modern PC and game consoles.

Of course, if you can seriously contend with a PPC Amiga x1000 type system that can be sold for under $199 and compete with every game console on the market or soon to be on the market within $2 years then maybe it might work if you got the games.

Maybe but there got to be modern software and games or you have a worse issue then the CD32.

Why are you asking Duce?  Ask aCube as they have already done it (I have one).  Ask Jens as he's already doing it (I have one).  Ask MikeJ as he is actually doing it (I have one of his prototypes).

But then I've already explained this.

Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

[Darrin]

I am not going to go weed through a million posts on 3-5 different forums with most of them across all of them.

You don't need to.  We've supplied some of them right here.

IIRC: I believe the issue belies misunderstanding. I don't remember that much of great reading comprehension among the Commodore and Amiga users still active that I have came to known and met in person and across the forums for over a decade time frame.

There was no misunderstanding.  It is a clear pattern of deliberate lies which has been ongoing for months.

What is also apparent is that you have no interest in admitting it.  You are here with an agenda.  Are yoiu being paid by the hour or by the post?

[Darrin]

Barry Altman's first post in the community:

read the exchanges that follow...you decide

Personally, I think this is counter productive to your desire to leave this in the past, but you asked...

#6

Thanks for digging that up.

I hope Wildstar reads it all from page 1 (but I'm sure he already knows about it).  Then it is worth tracking down the other threads as they show more designed that are not theirs, insult customers, send insulting and threatening PMs, post the contents of private PMs, etc.

It should keep him busy for months.

[Darrin]

Robert Bernardo, Jeri Ellsworth can certainly confirm to you that I am not Barry.

They actually met me in person. There are several others that can vouch that I am a different person.

I actually believe you on this bit.  Even after your couple of meltdowns, you're still a million times more polite than Barry would be by now.

[Darrin]

I will take my time looking at them. I can see how this devolved. I will have to read through it a few times as it takes a great deal to process this.

I do have some feelings that some of the responses were baseless and just part of childish, immaturity of some of the folks. Some claims were ridiculous.

I can say that Leo had stated a few things that might have been inappropriate in terms of claiming not that you won't wait x number of months. It was too open ended. Granted, they are only human running a business venture is unique and you make mistakes or decisions that might not have been the best or state things that might be a little loose with the mouth. Both Barry and Leo do have some looseness of the mouth. Maybe we all do.  Experience may limit those occurances.

I am not saying I am perfect either. I have been critiqued (ie. Ridiculed) about it. Someone here made a loose reference to percentage. This is why I don't use percentages about project status. It is also why I don't announce projects until they are done or ready for some review.

Anyway, the community often reacts far too volitile and with vitriol when it isn't really necessary. It is a problem with the "punk culture" which some of the community members come from. Sorry if the label offense anyone. It is meant to put into simple words that describes the culture and that was very popular among the demo scene.

This may certainly underly some of the cultural factors involved in the community that still is active.

Have at it.  Also feel free to search for other threads started by "Dammy" on Amiga.org or by "Damocles" (as he likes to be called) on Amigaworld.net.

I warn you now that there is a mountain of stuff to wade through.  We don't call him "Spammy" for nothing.  

[Darrin]

talk to Leo or Barry in a civil manner. Just ask what you want to know. Don't waste time on meaningless garbage and the other piss and vinegar. After all, it stinks up the place.

See, there you go assuming we haven't already tried that.

After a bunch of threatening PMs from Barry which finally stopped when I invited him to my home on the understanding that I would take him up on his offer by taking him out to a deserted property of mine in the country, he asked to bury the hatched and asked for my opinions.  We had a couple of polite PMs, he even PMed me and asked me to announce the birth of Leo's baby (which I did) and then he carried on as normal and promptly lost it again when I made a critical post.  He then posted extracts from our private PMs and used Dammy in the attack as well to make me out to be a hypocrite and a liar.  Dammy did his best to make me out for being two-faced because I had actually dared to try and find some common ground.  From that we can deduce that Barry is simply the type of guy who wll use the birth of a baby to attempt to manipulate people and that he feels that anybody who tried to offer an olive branch is contemptable.

He had his second chance from me.  I gave him my honest opion on how he could fix his lousey PR.  He threw it all back at me and continued his smoke and mirrors game populated with a neverending stream of lies.

End of story.

[Darrin]

In any case, Barry never so much as apologized for it.

Type A personality disorders prevents that.  In their minds they can do no wrong.  The firmly believe it is we who should apologize to them for daring to disagree.