The legal future of "Amiga"

[persia]

Yes, it's a hobbyist OS which is why Hyperion need to win.  Hyperion folks are hobbyists, they know they aren't going to get rich but they have some fun and earn enough to survive.  The whole market is a few thousand.  Amiga Inc can't relate to this.

[persia]

Bash shell, fully Unix compatibility, a simple interface for complex inter-process communication, a well designed GUI, great image and video software.  The Mac is the 21st Century equivalent of the Amiga...

Rob wrote:
@Tension

Give it a few more years til the original Amiga hardware starts to die in big numbers, then we`ll all end up using Macs.

I'd rather use WinXP than buy a MAC.

[persia]

You've also got the insolvency clause.  If Amiga Inc (Amino) truly was insolvent before the transfer of assets to Amiga Inc (KMOS), then Hyperion win.  That's one of the complicating matters of the whole situation, the company that is suing Hyperion IS NOT the company that Hyperion had the contract with.

Die Hyperion really pay out US$2 Million to programmers?  There's no way they'll ever recoup that money.  That's just crazy.  Neither Hyperion nor Amiga Inc have any possibility of getting that much money from Amiga development.

[persia]

The problem is that this is 2008 not 1988.  OS X and Windows have a lock on the market.  Even Linux can't make it to the desktop in large numbers.

The main issues confronting any new OS are:

1) Software, can I open a .docx or .xlsx file, edit it and returned the marked up document?  Can I play the latest games?  Can I edit my photos and videos?  Can sync my phones address book with the one on my computer?  Can I play a modern game?  The answer to these for AmigaDos 4.1 is NO, for all practical purposes.  Heck I can't really even surf the web properly.

2) Bang for the Buck.  Is it affordable for me to make the switch?  Is the price performance ratio good?  Again, if the Sam card the answer is a definite NO.  The price/performance ratio is bad against Mac and horrible against PC.

3) Stability of he supply, if I'm buying something non-standard will the company be around next year?  History probably works against Amiga here.

4) Technology leap, this was Amigas original strength.  But nothing in AmigaDos says cutting edge, indeed AmigaDos 4.1 is still not up to 2008 trailing edge.

So in the end who will buy an Amiga?  Retro-Geek and hobbyists, a nice niche market but really only in the thousands of people  It isn't pessimism, that's realism.  

I may buy a SAM for play but they have to pry my MacPro from my cold dead hands.  I love 1988, but I live in 2008.  With Amiga I can relive 1988, but when there's work to do the Amiga simply can't cut it.

[persia]

The key to Linux is you can multiboot the machine, into MS Windows and if you are not too concerned with EULA issues, into OS X.  A PPC machine can boot into what, a ppc version of Linux?  With little or no software...

SO what you have is a retro looking OS on seriously underpowered machines (mobile phone level) at big box prices with no software produced by a couple of companies that are deep in debt.  Yep, Tesco's will jump on that for sure.

Most of the old Amiga owners have moved on.  I met an old friend the other day.  He and I started the local Amiga club together.  We talked about Amiga and the fact that I still own a couple and play with UAE.  He just sort of laughed and said that if he were to go back to Amiga there would need to be a reason, a killer app that he had to have, otherwise he would stay with his PC.

In the end we can live in hope that Hyperion win, get rid of the back debt through bankruptcy and produce some nice machines we can tinker with.

I don't see why someone doesn't produce a classic Amiga in a joystick, I'd buy it...

[persia]

@Dammy

This is a civil case not a criminal case.  There are so many shades of grey in civil cases that it's difficult to say what the judge will do.  Hyperion can argue that Amiga Inc's shady tactic of dumping the corporation and transferring the assets to another shell could be insolvency according to the contract.  

Would a reasonable person hearing Amiga Inc's story believe them to be insolvent?  Yes.  So Hyperion's case hase merit.  But Amiga Inc still exists in a way, hence their case has merit.  The judge will have to weight the two sides and come up with a solution.  

But speaking of insolvency, I notice Amiga Inc have been silent for almost 11 months and Amiga Development India have been quiet for well over a year and a half.