An alternative approach to re-launching classic computers...

[commodorejohn]

While I would love to go and post this thread about a computer with nothing at all in common with the Amiga in "Amiga News & Community Announcements," as is traditional, I'm afraid I suffer from a compulsion to put threads in the appropriate forums, even at the expense of wantonly flaunting them for attention



Now, we all know the obvious and sensible approach to re-launching a classic computer line: first you license a brand name from whoever vultured it from the corpse of the original owner, then sit on it for a few years while you try to decide how best to exploit it, and your CTO has little squabbly feuds with people.

Then you start ballyhooing for a year or so about getting replica cases made and what a miracle of engineering and business that is, while your CEO has big squabbly feuds with people, and you have your hangers-on dance around ever actually admitting that the hardware underneath is going to be a generic PC clone. You also buy ad support from Disney and act like this is proof you've been chosen to be the next Pope.

Then you stick a mediocre PC clone board inside, forget to cool it properly, and yammer about how many hundreds of thousands you're going to sell, and how you've totally got contracts with Wal-Mart, for real, and no people can't see them, while you make a big deal out of getting new office space in a strip mall, and your CEO asks people about their sex lives.Then you sort-of-release it for three times the value of the components, and the mainstream media picks up on it for a day, goes "huh, whaddya know," and utterly forgets about it afterwards, and a handful of people pre-order (make sure to never actually release any numbers, so that nobody can know how poorly you're doing!)

Then you dance around acknowledging the cooling issues for a while, and decide that the thing to do is moderately improve the cooling, but put in a newer, mightier board that will run even hotter, while publically wanking to the idea of selling $25K workstations with $1000 branded cases, even though you think "support" is what you use to keep your junk in place during football practice.



That makes perfect sense, right? It's obviously just good business and helps community relations like you wouldn't believe. So imagine my surprise when I discovered this. These peoples is crazy!

What do they think they're doing? They've got some crazy project where they actually replicate the function of a (cult) classic computer in hardware, when everybody knows the way forward is to give in and become PCs! And even though everybody knows that you can't have custom hardware and not cost a bajillion dollars since that's what limited production runs cost, and custom cases are a miracle from the heavens brought down by the Archangel Barry, they've got both! And all they're asking is $400! Shouldn't that be like ten times that much? It's like they don't understand this business at all!

[commodorejohn]

You are wrong on so many levels, I won't bother to correct you.  I will say though, just accept it and move on.  You don't want their products, don't buy it.  I am at a loss on why this is eating you up like it is.   I suggest you just deal with it here and now, everything is OK, things happen for a reason and live life as happy as you can.  If you don't, when the massive reality check hits, I fear your life is really going to fall apart.

Heh, I know it's fun to play armchair psychologist, but actually it's not eating me up at all. I find the whole affair hilarious, in a pathetic kind of way.

[commodorejohn]

I'm in agreement with you and just want to know why this site has degenerated into nothing but CUSA bashing.  Amiga.org has become a total waste of time due to folks like Franko and his sock puppet/clone AKA commodorejohhn.

I can't be a Franko clone! I'm not even Scotch, I'm Norwegian-American!

And if you want to know why the backlash, you may stop and consider the simple explanation: it's because of the behavior of CUSA as a company, and Barry, BigBenAussie, and dammy as individuals. Or, you know, you could just ignore all that and pretend that there's no basis for it at all.

Or better yet, since they profess to be so smart, why don't they use their resources to produce a product that people would want to buy instead of spending so much time here whining about CUSA?

Would if I had resources :/

[commodorejohn]

It's nearing the holiday season.  Go out and prepare for happy times of being with family and friends.  That's the real importance of life, being with those you care about and eating some fattening foods plus drinking adult beverages along the way.

Oh, I am. But that doesn't preclude me from doing this!

[commodorejohn]

If you do not agree with anothers opinion, fine document it but do not call their opinion " a load of sh*t", where are your manners? :confused:

Oh, sorry, my apologies. I'll make a note to, in the future, refer to the notion that a company producing products is an impressive achievement and should win them credit and goodwill despite shoddy design and poor customer service as "a pile of feces."

[commodorejohn]

Care to enlighten me why you're torturing us then?

Some of us really don't care, but we have to endure your crusade now aswell, because the other kids were so nasty to you?

That sounds fair.

No, I just think it's funny to note that there are companies out there who are actually doing what CUSA wanted people to think they were doing, not trying to sell it as a luxury good, and not standing atop a little hillock and proclaiming themselves King of the World for it. Good on you, Microbee.

[commodorejohn]

I'm tired as well of hearing always the same bunch of people ready to moan like crybabies at the first sight of a yellow drop (which could be beer) in one of their "approved" threads, while at the same time they find perfectly reasonable to throw piss in buckets or barrels quantity onto anything "not kosher" according to their own judgement.

I've never complained about people disagreeing with me in threads where I express my opinion, I just disagree with their disagreement. That's kind of how opinions work.

[commodorejohn]

So I can expect that every time I feel the urge to speak my mind about that the X1000 being an overpriced doorstop, or similar dislike of Natami etc., regardless of the relevance to the thread, you'll be there disagreeing with me and yet supporting my freedom of speech.

No, I agree with you about the X1000. But if you mean "will I keep stating my opinion on whatever subject comes up," yes, that's kind of what forums are for.

[commodorejohn]

Maybe it's in order to remeber that during Generalissimo Franko epoch you haters promoted NOT ONE BUT TWO polls intended to outlaw CUSA posts.
But you were outnumbered in both.

Actually, more than a few of us "haters" voted against that.

[commodorejohn]

Would be nice, but unfortunately, the people interested in producing something like that don't have the resources, and the people who have the resources aren't interested :/

[commodorejohn]

Or, alternatively, one could skip out on licensing the OS and just purchase the C64Forever/Amiga Forever oneself...

(Or *gasp* *shock* *horrors* one could simply download the games in question off a ROM site.)

[commodorejohn]

I'm assuming it's probably B/C, lots of Z80 micros were built out of different combinations of off-the-shelf parts, and some of them still have kit variants around (for example, it's cheaper to build your own Jupiter Ace than pay the prices the few surviving command.) But it's not just a Microbee rebuild; I dunno how the extra hardware factors in.

[commodorejohn]

==Skateman, I appreciate the 'review' you've put up for the COS Vision and all, but I disagree with what you say here that the COS has 'nothing to do with C64'. CUSA is producing Commodore computers and a C64 for the 'modern age' (albeit with a nostalgic slant here, complete with fully custom Cherry Blue keyboard - just to please those fans).

No, they're producing a PC in a C64 case.

First is that CUSA was very lucky to have obtained the proper Commodore licence (for the brand).

Luck had nothing to do with it. Money did. The Commodore and Amiga brands have been passed around like a two-dollar whore since the bankruptcy back in 1994 - Barry's just the latest "client."

It is with pure luck that it is still in American hands and can still eventually be the former company it once was (with you and others help).

Is that what's important? That as long as it's Americans exploiting the brand, insulting the community, and slandering and demeaning anybody who raises objections, it's okay? (And should I even have to point out that the C64x is generic Chinese PC components in a case manufactured overseas, and IIRC assembled in China as well? It's about as American as escargot.)

And the second point is, please try to understand is that CUSA is trying to work from a point not where Commodore left off, but the most likely route Commodore would have taken (and been on now) had they still been around,

Okay, even taking that statement at face value? Why is that a good thing!? Commodore corporate never had any idea what it was doing, not since the initial success of the C64 and the launch of the Amiga. The community is armed to the gills with tales from engineers and programmers ready and willing to attest to how ineptly things were run. We'd be better off trying to figure out what post-Tramiel Commodore would never have done in a million years than try to follow some theoretical progression from the days of R&D malaise, countless failed side-projects, and executive malfeasance.

Much progress has happened in the technology world and the Commodore of today cannot ignore those changes (like it did in the past), whether in systems architecture, manufacturing, CPU/graphic card design or available/supported software. To do so (and going against the grain of what has happened/developed over the years), is simply to dig their own grave yet again.

Here's my question, though. If you're not making something different, then you're going head-to-head with the entire established industry. And if you're doing that, what could you possibly have that would leave you in a position to even stay afloat, let alone make any headway? Here's a hint, a brand and a fancy case are not going to cut it in the cut-throat, slash-price world of PC clone manufacturers. You'd have better luck trying to swim in a pool of pirahnas.

[commodorejohn]

If you're so up in arms about CUSA and how the brand has been "abused"  why don't you raise some capital and buy the brand yourself instead of constantly ranting in this thread?  Or better yet, go rant on the CUSA forums or have they banned you there?

Brands get bought, traded, used, abused, etc.....all the time.  Get over it.

And why don't you make it rain gumdrops? I'm working off $10K+ of student loans, trying to cover rent, fixing a car that keeps coming up with new things to need repair, and squeezing in a few pleasures of life when and where I can afford them, thank you very much - I have nothing left over for any business ventures. Believe me, if I could buy out the whole sorry fuçkup that is the CBM/Amiga trademark hoard, I would, but I can't.

And no, I haven't been banned on the CUSA forums because I never joined, because there's enough sycophants around here, thanks. I'm not just going to "get over it," either, not when it's still going on. If people were just licensing a brand name for crap, I wouldn't have anything to say about it, but when they're licensing a brand name for crap and then having their sock-puppets demand applause and swearing of fealty for it, you better believe I'm going to share my opinion about that.

[commodorejohn]

The positive thing about CUSA being American based is that it has created some jobs here in the USA and brought some money into this country.

Has it, now? I wonder, how many people have been hired stateside as a result? How many foreign sales of the C64x have brought how much money into the country? How does all that stack up against the jobs created overseas and the cost of manufacturing sending money out of the country? Guess we'll never know, because if you ask Barry he'll just ask about your sex life and imply that he gets off on watching.