Interview with Trevor Dickinson

[AmigaHeretic]

That works out to like 3 guys @ 80k USD for 1 year. Could three guys port AOS 4 over to x86 in one year?

Yeah.

For $200,000.00 though Trevor could have bought 1000 of these motherboard/CPU combos for $89 each.  
http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=5567179&Sku=B69-4062

Given those 1000 boards for FREE to pretty much every member left in the Amiga community when they buy a copy of OS4.  He'd still have $110,000.00 left over just to give to Hyperion.

Hyperion gets $120,000 free + $160,000 in OS4 sales for a total of $280,000.00


But then we'd have 1000 active Amiga users running modern hardware.  Hyperion would then be selling their $160 OS with an $89 dongle instead of a $2000 one.  


No, I think the $200,000.00 is better spent to get Hyperion to waste another year of their time porting the OS to X1000 so 12 people already using OS4 can now run it on 4 year old hardware instead of 8 year old hardware.

[AmigaHeretic]

Its a hobby community jorkany.  More choices within a hobby are usually beneficial, it gives people another way to explore their hobby, assuming they can afford it.

Ever hear of the guy in the desert?  He is on the edge of death from lack of water.  He comes to find a deserted well.  There is a bottle of water at the well and a note.  It's says the well has plenty of water, but in order to get the pump to work you need to prime it by poring the bottle of water into it to get it started.

So the guy is holding a bottle of water in his hand.  Does he trust the note?  

Drink the water or prime the pump?


Problem with drinking the water is you might feel good for a an hour our two, but then you are going to die.  If he primes the pumper, maybe the note was wrong and the well is dried up in which case he dies anyway.  But at least he has a chance of getting all the water he could need.


That's how I see the X1000.  Hyperion has a small amount of resources. (The bottle of water).   Do they take the short road and spend those resources on the X1000 knowing it might bring them temporary sells of 50 boards?  Or do the prime the pump(port to X86) finally, where, once ported they are no longer anchored down to $800+ boards.  They have all the cheap hardware they choose to port to.

Which is better for the community?

[AmigaHeretic]

I'm already not anchored down to $800+ boards for this hobby, neither is the community.  Its called iMica.  If someone is tethered to it having to be branded "AmigaOS" to use it, well thats their problem.

I personally get a kick out of funky hardware.  My used G3 Peg II was not intrinsically worth the $500 I paid for it.  But I enjoy having it to play around with two hobby operating systems, MorphOS, and AOS.

Hyperion has been quite clear in its attitude that they don't give a crap about going to x86, no matter how many people ask for it.  Thats their choice, its their business.  If they are happier servicing folks willing to spend premiums on PPC hardware thats up to them.

What you should be asking yourself is not why Hyperion won't do what you want, but rather why does the community not en masse support the option already there for x86.

I hear you on AROS.   I use AROS as my main alternative OS.  I'm programming a couple of projects for AROS.   AROS Tetris is going to blow peoples minds!  ;-)

My post is referring to OS4 though.  I think AROS is in good shape.   Personally I think all that is said about not going to x86 for OS4 applies to MorphOS as well.  Though between their current choices of OS4 using custom hardware and MorphOS reusing old MAC hardware, I think the MorphOS is a better short term solutions out of those two.  However, I think they both need to move to x86.

[AmigaHeretic]

They both "need" to move to x86 to achieve what exactly?  Non-hobby OS status?  

To fight attrition at least.  Though it would be nice to grow the community somewhat.  If we had 10,000 active users across MorphOS, OS4, AROS, and OS3.x our hobby would be more interesting.  

It's hard to even combat attrition though with all the barriers to entry.  OS4 you have high prices.  MorphOS you have to buy used hardware off ebay.  AROS barriers has traditionally been finding the right hardware and lack of software.  They are now winning on the software front and thanks to ClusterUK any one can get in for cheap with no work at all.

Moving to x86 just takes away many barriers.  Price being one.  If someone wants to rebage an X86 board and call it the X2000 they don't need to invest $200,000 to do it.

Bitching and grumbling for a limited amount of time is acceptable, its called "potential customer feedback".  

The typical, "If you don't agree then shut up whiner".  I'm not whining.  I am discussing my hobby and it's future.  

Look at it this way, AROS is progressing a lot more lately.  The more people Hyperion scare away, force away, whatever the better it is for AROS.

I don't think that is true a majority of the time.  As people move away from OS4 (let it gather dust) I don't think they tend to move to something else other than Windows/Linux/Mac and our community grows smaller.  Same things for MorphOS and AROS.   If they stop using one of those because of whatever is lacking (hardware, software, etc)  they don't move to another camp they just move on.

[AmigaHeretic]

Don't forget VM Icaros.  With that there is no barrier to trying AROS at all.

Good example of another way to break barriers to entry.  Again, I don't believe a $2000 motherboard will help OS4 brind down barriers to entry.  In fact I believe wasting what is certain to be at least a year of porting to a $2000 board is destructive for Hyperion's future.

So spend the energy on jazzing people up for AROS instead of harping on a company that has told you multiple times to go frack off and die.

A-Eon?  I hope they die so AOS4 can move on.  Hyperion?  I have never told Hyperion to die.  Go to AW.net search the forums for my nick and the word "Lawsuit" .  How many hundreds of posts do I have supporting Hyperion?  

I don't like that Hyperion gets sucked in to this $2000 board garbage (it makes them look incompetent), and I do wish for a future AOS4 x86.  So what?

AOS 4.x is not your hobby.  Its their hobby.  Your hobby is AROS and AOS 3.x.  Sure if you *really* want to use AOS 4.x, well you've said your peace hundreds of times now.  They don't give a crap.  And they even have said effectively they will continue to not give a crap.    At that point when you continue to go on so much you look not very interested in AOS 4.x at all, and more interested in making a sport out of bitching.  When a woman rejects you in a bar, do you talk about her 4 years later, or do you find someone else to pursue, someone that wants to be with you?

It certainly is my hobby.  The Amiga community is my hobby.  I am an active user of Amiga68k(3.9 mostly) and AROS.  I am soon likely to be using MorphOS (now the barrier to entry has gone even lower), but I still enjoy seeing the latest OS4 and checking out progress on ports etc.  Yes this is my hobby.


I know a lot of peoples who hobbies are in airplanes.  They read about old ones and get the latest news about new ones.  Have magazine subscriptions, browese websites.  Guess what?   They don't own every single brand of airplane.  Most of them don't own a single airplane.  Still their hobby.

I don't think I have to own every brand of AmigaOS to see all of the "Amiga" as my hobby.

Its not like Hyperion is sharing code with other camps.  Even if you are right its no loss on AROS or MorphOS.  And I'm sure at least *some* folks are willing to try one of the other choices out.  How many?  Thats impossible to know.

It's not about Hyperion sharing code.  It's about users sharing code.  Sharing ports.  Building the software database.  It's about all camps growing to a point where if there was enough users to sell a piece of software, it could be sold as an "Amiga" title across AROS, MorphOS, OS4.   I think we already have that a large extent.


If MorphOS ran on x86 and still kept the same 30 minute demo idea then many more people would try MorphOS.  Running on modern hardware would only make it more appealing and that would translate into more sales.

Maybe the Hyperion folks will catch up someday.  I think that would be great.

[AmigaHeretic]

Too bad the quote does not say what you say it does.  I'm not here to impress anyone.  And trying for jabs about English as a second language for me and my opinion being worthless, well you have fun with that I guess.  Its more mild than the pig talk at the Moo.  What is your handle there BTW?

I feel like the posts between us are me usually saying how I feel about A-Eon and why personally feel it is madness.  Such as this topic "Interview  with T.D."   I have stated my opnions on spending $200,000 on building X1000.  Why I think it is a bad idea for the community as a whole and only hurts us, how I think the road map is short sighted, etc.

I feel like you never really state your feelings and opinions.  I sort of feel you mostly just post that I shouldn't think those things or that I am whining for discussing these things.


Would you mind telling us your opinions?   Could you explain the benefits to the Amiga community that you see in the creation of the X1000?   Give your take on how this plays out as far as the future of OS4?   Can you tell us how successful you think the X1000 will be in terms of sales, ROI for Trev, and how this benefits Hyperion financially?   What do you think the long term road map should be?

Thanks in advance.

[AmigaHeretic]

I'll just state again with regard to the interview,the X1000, the amount invested my thoughts.

There is nothing wrong with having short term goals.  Hope to invest something to make enough to invest in your long term goals is a valid business solution.

I fail to see how the X1000 is good short term or long term investment.


In the short term:
You are talking about Hyperion investing a years time minimum (they've already been porting for 6 months?) for very few sales.  20-50 boards?

As a short term solution I don't see how Hyperion make their money back, let alone the wasted potential of not investing their time in something more viable and that offer more short term returns.  
And as a short term solution what happens to the 20-50 X1000 users?  Will it be worth supporting them in future updates of AmigaOS4?  Or will they be thrown to the side like Classic OS4 users with the excuse that there are just too few users to support?


As a long term solution:
X1000 doesn't makes sense either.  For many of the same reasons.  Can you suggest that a $2000 board will give you long term sales?  If in 2012 the price drops dramatically you are left with a very outdated piece of hardware.   If it costs $2000 per board to make a customer PPC board today, is there reason to suggest that in a year or two that it will become much cheaper to make a more modern custom PPC X2000?

No I just can't see this as a long term solution either.

[AmigaHeretic]

I, myself, am baffled as to what AmigaOS users think they would bring to the X86 market.

1) an OS w/o memory protection
2) that doesn't support more than one processor core
3) with no outstanding legacy software that can't be matched or superseded by applications in other X86 OS'
4) a 32 bit OS in a market that is rapidly moving to 64 bit (and eventually to  128 bit)
5) an OS which in its multiple variations does not support modern GPU hardware like shaders

Given time, I could come up with many more flaws to this argument.

Bring to the x86 market?  What are you talking about?  x86 is a piece of commodity hardware that we "use".  Toilet paper is a commodity item.  X1000 is like a pine cone.  x86 is like Charmin.   I don't bring anything "to" toilet paper, but there are many reason for me to "use" it over alternatives.

(Yeah yeah I know I technically bring something to toilet paper ;-) )

Oil is a commodity.  So you are saying OS4 is like a Yugo.  You list a huge list a deficiencies.  I can lubricate it's engine with 4 bottles of Dom Perignon at $150 a bottle or I can use 4 $1.50 cans of oil which will work 100X better.  I don't bring anything to "oil" by using it in my Yugo.  Though my Yugo runs better with the oil and I save hundreds of dollars.

Right now, Amiga users are basically hobbyists that use an alternate OS out of personal interest. AmigaOS is not a viable competitor for Windows, OSX, and maybe not even Linux.

Again I don't follow.  Amiga is an OS.  Windows is an OS.  Mac OSX is an OS.  Linux is an OS.    You are saying if we pay $800 - $2000 for a piece of hardware OS4 is no longer is an OS?   If we only run on old Macs MorphOS is no longer an OS?

Personally, I hope we stay with PPC architecture. It differentiates us from the rest of the market and RISC code is easier to work with than CISC code.

How does it differentiate us?  That we pay more for slower CPUs?   I mean PPC hasn't been RISC for a long time, it has more instructions at this point than x86 CISC.

The Term RISC and CISC has not been used by chip designers for a long time. The chips are now classified by their architecture, rather than the "design Philosiphy". Most CPU's are now "Load-Store". The x86 has a less complex instruction set than some RISCs, and the PPC has the most complex RISC instruction set ever seen.  Both CPU's share RISC/CISC features, as it's more efficient to use both concepts.

[AmigaHeretic]

He's saying it's not a competitor, that's true.  Is that so bad that it isn't in competition?  A competition it has no chance of winning?  Niche players don't compete, they simply exist for the sake of the niche they fill.  Far better to accept this than to true to go after the millions of people who are not and never have been waiting...

Maybe I misunderstood.  It sounded like he was saying if OS4 all of a sudden ran on x86 it is then a competitor with all those other OSes.  

My point was PPC or x86 makes no difference in competition with other OSes or not.  In my eyes none of the Amiga camps compete with Linux, Mac, Win.  I think most of us run one or more those as well.  AmigaOS is just for fun on the side.  

If we are not competing on PPC we are not going to be competing on x86.

In the best of times we had a couple million users.  That wouldn't be blip on the OS radar these days.  

Though having even 10,000+ users would give us more to talk about.

[AmigaHeretic]

Lots of wealthy people spend more than $200,000 on their  hobbies or in pursuit of personal pleasures.If a dozen more wealthy people underwrote Amiga product or software development out of nostalgia I would cheer them.If it gives Trevor pleasure to share his Amiga hobby with others then more power to him;no one is being FORCED to buy an X-1000.If you  don't want X-1000 simply buy the  best SAM available for the best Amiga)S experience available now.

I think the issue is not what Trevor spends his money on, but the limited resources of the OS4 team.  People that currently use it or want to use may not think it is the wisest thing to bend to the whim of a guy throwing money around when all Hyperion gets in the end for a years+ work is 50 sold copies of OS4.

This has been one of the main arguments against x86 by Hyperion and others.  Not enough resources.  If they port to x86 many repeatedly argued that the other versions will get neglected and features will not be added during the time they are working on the port.  Namely because there are so little resources.

Yet, here we have them using those limited resources to port to something that has 0 future and 50+ sales?  Don't you see the irony in those two things?

[AmigaHeretic]

Which mods?  Which posts?  Do you think we have conspiracy meetings in the mod forums?  I would suspect if something was removed it was removed for the content being inappropriate for the site.  If someone wanted to hide something they'd delete entire posts and/or threads no?

I do.  I have had my threads "disappeared" quicker than an American hiker accidentally crossing the North Korean border.

It's really nice when you get an abuse report message that has the link to your "supposed" violating post only to click on it and see your thread is gone.

When PMing a mod that is exactly what you get,  "We moved it to the mod area and are discussing it."  Only for it never to be seen again.

[AmigaHeretic]

This was one of the best threads on Moo a month or 2 ago.

AW mod Alkis Tsapanidis had blatantly and unfoundedly called a user a liar in an AW thread.  When the accused proved him wrong he admitted it in a post in the same thread.   A Moo poster quipped that some one should grab a screen shot before the thread was deleted.

Alkis post in response on Moo, "No, those posts won't be deleted. I admitted I was wrong, there's nothing to hide."
http://moobunny.dreamhosters.com/cgi/mbmessage.pl/amiga/171127.shtml


Shortly and hilariously after he made that post the thread was of course deleted and magically is still missing:
http://amigaworld.net/modules/newbb/viewtopic.php?topic_id=31424&forum=7