CommodoreUSA CEO Interview Answers

[vox]

@VOX

it is clearly cusa dont want to give any money to linux mint either. they choose it because it was free, for them to exploit and use as they wanted. so they could sell it with their 20 000$ systems. it is as simple as that, you can forget support cusa aint running a charity after all. barry only want to fill his pockets with cash and there ends his interests in anything amiga to, he have made that perfectly clear in this q&a.

Agreed, "play new, use free". But on worldwide conquest, you need to support what you claim is your own OS, and what when you are unable to do so?

Leaving users without software and hardware support is again not only immoral but breaking the customer protection laws anywhere in civilized world.

Never seen someone who doesn`t want to invest, but only to gain.
Top rankin`
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-yXBWxpaEHM

[vox]

Then you should be glad to be told you are wrong.  Tech support is given for hardware and COS.  I've been in the office when a C=USA customer calls up and is walked through a resolution of his tech problem.  Leo is online and answers many a COS or tech question from emails and on commodore-amiga.org posts.

Now will you admit your wrong?

First day CUSA admits some mistakes and call them not trivial.
Now using Barry tactics, I might be wrong for not knowing what you have seen, but it doesn`t matter anyway
because I have a licence to vox name.

Barry said in interview its all up to licencee. Even the software part "because Microsoft also does the same". Its good there is a Leo from Australia pretending to be support, since he is litterate and Barry to chat on the phone.
But again, there is more serious ways to setup the business.

And software support is updates and drivers. Without Linux mint team and with millions of possible driver combinations ...

[vox]

That is where you are wrong on two points.  One, this is not cheap plastic crap, they are pushing for reasonable quality hardware.  The other point your wrong on, there is much more then double digit number of C=USA haters online vs the world who remembers C='s name.  One of the biggest problems for the online C=USA hater's have is getting their head around, AO/AWN isn't the whole world nor a significant portion of the whole world.

Probably the number of Commodore and Amiga names positive heritages outnumber their own faults. 30 000 likes on Facebook is result more of that, then of CommodoreUSA`s innovation. Quality of hardware as x86 has improved, even the pricing is high. Is such model sustainable, CUSA`s longlivity will prove. Surely, COS is improvement over self-install Ubuntu, but is still beta and support and updates are yet to be established.

I would be worried if most of people that lived as Amiga Community over last decade disliked not merely the products as much as lack of innovation and bad PR. Maybe some conclusions could be drawn from that. Surely, the world market is xyz times wider then Amiga community, but if strategy was better Amiga community would be first to count on as customers and loyal promoters. In community terms its also handful (two digits) that have accepted CUSA agenda as way forward. If this was the idea, it failed so far.

Of promises really made A1200 (or A500) case, AROS support and some form o of innovative OS (and most expensive "Amiga workstations") remain vapor as much as Elite 4. Leo has done some good PR and hope will get more independence and funds to live such projects. Paradoxically, with best wishes for that to happen, that depends on the sales of current VIC, C64x and Amiga Mini offer.

To deserve support at least as PC of our next choice, CUSA should come forward with some next gen idea, like Community project was supposed to.

Legally, and even in market behaviour, CUSA is a small bussiness we expected way too much from, but is continuation, licencee and financer (via double licence - licence sum and per machine fee all CUSA users repay) of Amiga Inc, an offshoot of Amiga Inc side of the court agreement. Small Amiga scene seems to be small but resiliant, and sometimes CUSA shortcomings make an Amiga promotion.



Hope to hear we all learned some lessons and some improvements are possible. Then surely, even you can`t satisfy all the people all the time, your support from this kind of community would strengthen.

[vox]

@Vox. There have been various miss-steps of course, and all sorts of things were either promised prematurely or stated as plans in the euphoria of the moment of having secured usage of the trademarks. So what? Sometimes things don't go to plan. Stuff happens. But why that should in any way cause such consternation I have no idea. No one is forcing you to buy our products and nothing in your computing life has changed really. You just have another entity with the same goals as most of you, that can't do it all right now, but hopes to.

Incidentally, that magazine(?) article is incorrect. Amiga ROMs for game emulation are under our license from Amiga Inc. Because of this, after many months of discussions, we are still on the fence as to whether it is worth our while licensing Amiga Forever.

Companies should conduct like adults, not like children. Consternation is caused by too many promises versus none community interesting solutions.

"So what" is true, but in sense there are no common goals as most of us,
and thus your products, announcements and changes shouldn`t be here at all.

Article is quite right, including the fact that currently your products ship with no Classic Amiga compatibility out of box, for reasons that are no interest of end user. In those terms Amiga Forever and AmigaOS 4 are more Amiga products.

It was supposed to be "Commodore Mint edition" Premium feature,
as well, and I do believe you have even announced a Partnership with Cloanto

Unique to MCE is a legal emulation of many Commodore and Amiga computers. We have included a number of licensed game ROMs through a partnership with Cloanto, including the C64 and Amiga Forever collection

[vox]

Funny, the Amiga online community couldn't get 500 people to agree on a specific item for C=USA to make for them but you complain about C=USA holding off on making a decision on AF?

IMO, C=USA should include AF in the installed COS systems.

OK, we aren`t worthwile of bother. Thanks.
There was product to be outlined by the last forum before the hack
and voting was ongoing. New page was poorely promoted and CUSA lost the moment,
if there was, to make something with the community.

Nothing was offered as idea of product to preorder
or support.

As far as I can understand Leo confirmed just the script that can rip off the AF.

[vox]

@Vox.

Incidentally, that magazine(?) article is incorrect.

MIcroMart UK

[vox]

Unlikely, as an investor should perform due diligence.

If an advertisment produced by CUSA for a product made misleading claims then you could have a point. However even showing the wrong factory in an advert would not be illegal, because it has no impact on the functionalilty of the product.
 
I don't know if I believe that it was the marketing companies fault, but it's definately possible. Bill Hicks had his own opinions on marketing http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gDW_Hj2K0wo

This is not current product but kind of "company history" missleading.
Nothing illegal, but kind of immoral.
http://www.commodoreusa.net/CUSA_ClassicModels.aspx

[vox]

I'm willing to accept it's incompetence.

 
Boring. It's business, morals have no place.

True, but even in bussiness there are even strict conduct of behaviour,
that punishes you heavily if you disrispect the customers.

C=USA just ain`t a good bussiness model.

[vox]

In business you have to worry about consumer law & contract law. If they break a contract or one of their obligations to consumers then they can be punished, disrespecting your customers has no direct consequence. You just might find it harder to find new customers.
 .

Well, we can say they are "driving on the edge" always testing limits of licences (Workbench 5 name, exact Amiga modeling, bundling with AROS, announcements that just prove to be fake) as well as customer patience.

It`s just isn`t a role model, think would you drive business same way if you were in charge. Even its retro time and globalization, as well as crisis. With Amiga its just different it`s not "just" retro, there is some community and it had some development, "a life after death", so C=USA isn`t a real comeback.

We are always surprised to see Whats Next

[vox]

Okay, now where are you getting the $6-8 million figure for CUSA from? What reason do we have to believe that they sold 10,000 C64xes in the past year? Nothing from them, certainly.

Non-sense to speak of more, especially threatening who for copyright violations?. Either C-USA are doing good and will conquer the world, so every house knows of Barry, or will fail because of properties and pricing of products. We should help by not discussing it anymore if we are not customers. If we are, there is a proper forum.

Good luck to "Commodore"-"Amiga".org community

Last paradox is that big interview and all the questions answered, there seems to be unresolved matters. But it is much clearer C=USA wants to distinct itself from existing (old) Amiga community and have new fresh customers. While it sounds like more rapid market, they don`t have "cool" enough products for the young, and influence via parents or schools can be beneficial, if not by what you are using at work. Dismissing people as customers as age group is also lousy, not to mention these are still people in health and productive age that can spend and produce much.

[vox]

** Image Removed **
Sad this isn`t Barry for community

Even he isn`t Commodore Barry too ...

[vox]

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.

No, it happens only if such mind is part of you. Think twice :-)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FTPa8Y-l9mM