CommodoreUSA CEO Interview Answers

[Wildstar128]

I am fully aware as to the business (LLC) status of Commodore USA.  Having run businesses of my own, I'm well aware of the perks (and drawbacks) of an LLC.  If I gave the impression I was thumbing my nose at LLC status, or otherwise implying C-USA is "not a business", that was not intended.  I don't believe I implied otherwise.  They have every right to conduct business as they wish, and unlike many here - I have zero interests or stake in some ideal that they are "defiling the Amiga name".

No one, including me - expects them to see the community as a charity case.

That being said, don't ask the community to see them as anything other that a commodity PC vendor selling Linux boxes.  Barry's own interview confirmed as much.

I wish C-USA no ill will.  I do not dislike Barry, Leo, Dammy, etc. - or anyone else in the extended community.  I assure you if I was waiting with baited breath hoping they fail, I'd let you know.

In fact I hope they make a rock solid PC that people buy and enjoy for many years to come.  That being said, it is becoming tiring on A.org and other well established Amiga forums portals how a commodity PC vendor is going to "save us all", when they themselves have so much as stated they are selling commodity boxes under a nostalgic name.

Just as I would be if Dell showed up here spamming adverts and press for their Intel machines.  Best of luck, but how it pertains to any of us is beyond me.  People would like to see some actual Amiga content on A.org rather than bickering about a PC vendor.

No one is "demanding" a single thing from C-USA.  In fact, their challenge to the community was largely ignored and laughed off due to the terms of it.  They brought that to us.  No one was willing to pony up a single dime to a commodity PC vendor that for 2 years has done nothing but be extremely abusive towards them, and you can't blame them in the least for that.

Ok, I can agree with a bit of that overall. I agree that bickering is no good for anyone. Thank you for your patience as we overall get some degree of understanding across. I just hope the overall community isn't demanding then to fulfill some age old broken promise of Escom or Gateway. I am confident that if there is budgetary room for more direct support of Commodore and Amiga classics, the would support it if enough people are willing to purchase.

There needs to be enough to support small volumes of products like 500-1000 units of a product. It needs to meet minimum orders conditions or you get too many to meet minimum order volumes but not enough purchases and you can see that is lots of money down the toilet. Jens been down that road and it kind of hurt him financially a little bit for a bit and added frustration with just 300 units of C-One produced. The demand isn't entirely unreasonable with maybe an issue of escrow account. Not sure about that.

If you want a $2000 computer then ok.... 500x$2000 would equal $1,000,000.

If you want a $500 hw spec then you got $250,000 to raise. Maybe I read it wrong but ok.

If they are going to use a custom designed platform then they need to get revenues for that. It is probably easier to develop a state of the art desktop environment following UI mechanics from the now expired patents in a modern 3d twist on next generation.

Hardware like new semiconductor ISA and development of such would be incredably challenging for anyone. They would have to get the old MOS plant and if there is remotely any of the foundry equipment there.. They would need to get that equipment updated at minimum to add additional stepper lenses to reduce the UV beam from 3 microns to um... 30 nm and pray to god it works and upgraded microscope to see that small accurately. We would need someone to make the photolithographs. None of this I would expect to work successfully for too many reasons. It would be easier to go fabless and that facility could be suitable for that and meet EPA. Maybe we be lucky to find anything there.

That is why I would be critical of expecting any new Amiga PPC hw that is competitive.

If they were to invest in such R&D, it would be something new not being overly concerned with technologies that the patents expired 3-6 years ago.

For someone to make new patentable hw, it is going to cost some $$$.

I don't think they are ready for that in-house.

[Wildstar128]

I apologize to everyone for any and all abusive and offensive statements such as unintended racial or religious statements (that may have been interpreted as rascist as that was not intended in the comparison) - that I have stated on this forum.

I am sure that when we get into a heated debate this tends to happen with all of us.

[Wildstar128]

Actually, my hair is strictly 1970, I only have stubble, I sweat very little, I wear pants that stay well above my waistline, and I don't drink Jolt. You know, not that that's in any way relevant to anything in this thread, but just for the record.


Uh, no. Just because I don't have the wherewithal to purchase the brand names from Uncle Bill (if he were even selling) does not mean I'm obligated to smile and nod mute approval at any yahoo who rents them.


Again, how do you even know that CUSA lives up to these criteria? We haven't seen squat for a business plan from Barry.


Uh, what? Barry is not Jewish, so it's...acceptable for him to question someone's sex life?


Oh, there sure are! For instance, some meanie might even go so far as to quote things he's actually said on public forums!

That would be terrible if someone were to do that!


I don't know in what society it's customary to question someone's virility and imply you peep on their sex life in response to a question about pricing, but I sure don't want to go there.


Oh, yeah. I can't tell you how many times I've brought the Jews into debates where I've had to defend a guy for acting like a total pervert to a guy who just wanted to know about pricing. Happens all the time.

I only was looking at comparing and contrasting Jack and Barry a little and why there is also different personality. Anyway, that comment of Barry seemed odd but then the question in fact might had caused some tongue and cheek sarcasm. Although it is not my style, I wouldn't do that. I looked back at the interview responses and am not quite seeing that. Am I missing something?

Ok, whatever. It was in that other thread I guess. Too many pages ago.

[Wildstar128]

Now now Vox,

We need to sell some AMIGAs.

Lol...

[Wildstar128]

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.

It is one thing to be critical and another to give a bunch of insults. In fact, one should never mix insult into a critique. A critique is to be constructive criticism not destructive.

I am not condoning or saying it is right for Barry to be unprofessional in the matters but some reason I get the feeling that you weren't conducting yourself professionally either and in my experience when someone is critical, it gets in a gang fashion throwing insults as a gang up party. You should realize that and request the rest of the fellow folks to just stay out of it and keep it professional. It isn't easy to keep calm with 10-20 post of b.s. Insults for every single decent sentence.

Think about the whole situation. You got mob like gang here flooding with insults. I am guessing it is difficult. Not right or proper but the surrounding context has to be kept in mind.

As for Dammy, well.... He's... Barry was pretty clear about Dammy.