If my previous posts about CUSA were rather mean spirited and harsh (yes they were) then I officially apologise.
I suppose I'm rather passionate about the legacy of commodore and amiga after all these are/were my favorite computers of all time and I'm a huge fan of them.
We've all also been through how many hucksters, con artists, scammers and people looking to make a quick buck off the corpse of amiga. (Some asshole still owes me a t-shirt!) I always called them amiga's grave robbers. When this all came about, it seemed like just another scammer.
Part of that perception was their own fault. They made some really bad decisions early on, but I forgive them, its not worth the energy to hold a grudge. I hope they will much more carefully consider the words they choose and the actions they take going forward.
Why the change of attitude?
I was reminded by someone kind of on their side how passionate he too is about amiga. With that huge passion for amiga in common, why wouldn't I also support their efforts? Even if they fail horribly, at least they are trying to do something. No matter what you think of their plans, at least they are going in a different route than every other camp. It may succeed, it may fail, but at least its their own choice. (Like it or not as their CTO says)
There is also the issue of the continual lag that all amiga flavors have. (5+ years behind other modern OS)
Os3.1 api compattible? Thats great but there are 2,4,6,8,12,16 even 32 core processors on the market or about to be. What should I do just ignore all but one core because people want to remain using an api that is how old now?
Something like gobolinux stripped down, optimized and a new amiga like gui placed on top? Thats has a much better chance of suiting all my computing needs. I basically am running something similar to what CUSA plans for my daily computing needs. Its very stripped down and slick and fast, has drivers for EVERYTHING, looks like amiga, and feels more responsive than most any linux out there. I'm just one nerd, so if I can do that and make something really decent, why couldn't someone with the time, money and resources making something like that but ALOT better?
So I say I support their efforts, so long as they play nice with everyone in amiga land who is trying to keep the amiga alive. I will reserve all my comments until they ship something worth talking about. If its bad, I'll tell you what I think for sure, but no more slamming them for stupid mistakes they have made. I'm pretty sure they mean well...
I would encourage them to offer their "workbench" as a seperate product and not force people to buy their hardware just to get it. If they do that, which I think they may be forced to by gpl, then I'm all for it.
Even if amigans don't like most of what they do with that, perhaps someone else can use parts of it to make something better?
Steven
