RE; State of the Amiga 2007 + !

[Lurch]

Why not buy Amiga Inc.. divide it into shares... I can just see myself owning part of Amiga

Finally the Amiga community would have their say

[Tomas]

The Amiga has been nothing more than a hobby, almost since it's beginning. Even moreso since the fall of Commodore in 1994/95. The problems in this community are caused in their entirety by people who want to steadfastly pretend that the Amiga is than the hobby it really is.

Uh? Are you claiming that one of the best selling home computers in Europe was not much more than a hobby at that time?
It might have been the case in the home market in usa, but in Europe the Amiga was a big thing until the mid nighties.
The Amiga even sold really well in Europe even for a while after commodore went bust and the european commodore actually went with profits while the US one suffered like hell.

But even in USA it could not be called just a hobby, considering that the Amiga+videotoaster was very popular in the tv/movie industry.
Today is of course a whole different question.... What can one expect when it has been well over 10 years without any new hardware?

But yeah, it is a hobby now just like how the c64 or atari is a hobby.

[amiga92570]

Lurch wrote:
Why not buy Amiga Inc.. divide it into shares... I can just see myself owning part of Amiga

Finally the Amiga community would have their say

I don't know about the stock part, I got burned on commodore stock when they went bankrupt the first time!  :madashell:

but I more than made up for it on Western Digital.  :-D

[guru-666]

@wayne,
what the heck,  inc can't tell you what to support on YOUR site.  So what if they have a lawyer... it's none of there bees wax.  They have there own site amiga.com.  What am I missing here?  If you want to be a site for classic amiga stuff why can't you do that?    Your not affiliated with AI. There is also real question as to what AI actualy owns anyway. Either way you can't be forced to cover new products if you don't want to.
 
tow what line?  

[Doobrey]

Wayne wrote:

Our problem, as Amiga.org, is that there may be a point here shortly where we find ourselves the hot box being forced to support whatever Amiga Inc puts out, whether we like it or not.  

Sigh.. when will McEwen ever learn :roll:
Even if he thinks he can strongarm support from the owners/moderators of this website, it doesn't mean that all the users here are gonna line up like sheep and follow.

Maybe Wayne should use some of the leftover kitty to buy this book for Bill

[guru-666]

or may be sould start a forum called "cool computers form the 80's and 90's...not including the ST"  LOL

[pixie]

Lurch wrote:
Why not buy Amiga Inc.. divide it into shares... I can just see myself owning part of Amiga

Finally the Amiga community would have their say

Why not buy Amiga.org instead? And all those people behind it give a clear sign that if things are going out of hand, they will be taken cared without fear...

Wayne could keep with his site as always trough golden shares like Google Co-Founders Larry Page, Sergey Brin does.

If Amiga.org belongs to it's users perhaps things would be seen differently.

[guru-666]

@pixie
have you ever stoped to consider that some thigns are not for sale?  Amiga inc is not for sale nore is amiga.org....

you can;t just buy anything, even less so then you don't have any money and just assume everybody else would fund your crazy idea.  

@all
anyway, if inc want to sue amiga.org, I would be willing to plop down a few hundered bucks personaly to defend a.org and expose inc for what they are in court... honestly.

I still have no idea how inc could do anything againts amiga.org and if I where running the site would welcome the opertunity to see inc in court.

[pixie]

@guru-666:

have you ever stoped to consider that some thigns are not for sale? Amiga inc is not for sale nore is amiga.org....

I'm yet to know how exactly you understood that I was talking on buying Amiga Inc. :roll: What I was talking about was setting a way whereas Amiga Inc to sue Amiga.org would have to sue all those thousands users who use, that was what I talked about, it could be symbolic, and the site still be run by Wayne Hunt as always.

you can;t just buy anything, even less so then you don't have any money and just assume everybody else would fund your crazy idea.

Please read what I said and think if it makes sense what you say. By (collectively) buying Amiga.org, how do you do it? Trough shares, which prices the shares are? It all depends on those who are selling and those who buy. It's not a matter of money, it's a matter of community altogether securing what 'is' theirs.. that's how things actually work, you wouldn't need petitions with dubious results, Amiga Inc to sue would rather have thousands of people to go after rather then one... I think its case would weaken a lot.

@PIXIE,

I've never exactly made it a secret that if someone came along and offered me my asking price, Amiga.org could be sold.  I'm not in the market to sell it specifically, but if someone met my price, I would not turn them down.  

I've often thought about how it would work for a shareholder arrangement, but you would definitely have control issues unless one person were given absolute final say so on the operation of the site.

Anyway, I figure there are fewer than 200 real people left in the Amiga online community and if every single one of them wanted to join together and make an offer for the site, that would only be about $100 each out of pocket.  That being said, getting 2 Amiga users to agree is hard enough, but getting 200 to agree?  Never happen..

Wayne

[pixie]

I'm not talking of selling the amiga.org domain, not per se anyway, the status quo would remain unchanged, the 'one person absolute with a final say' would still be up in your hands, until you at least find someone to sell your golden shares.

As such, the commercial value of amiga.org users would be at most symbolic, and the real one would still remain in your hands (It might be seen as a shell but on reverse :-)).

This shareholder arrangement would have only use to dilute Amiga Inc position against it, our shares would be of no great value namely when  in the end only you would have the final call.

[guru-666]

there would be no point to buying amiga.org.  We could simply open another site, also there are others.  It such a small group anyway and the domain is not worth anywhere near what wyane wants for it.

[stopthegop]

Anyway, I figure there are fewer than 200 real people left in the Amiga online community

Gotta be a lot more than that.  Are you counting just the people who use Amigas exclusively, and nothing else?  If so, then I would argue that number would be closer to zero. To most of us, Amigas are a hobby.  Some just take our hobbies more seriously than others, thats all.  There are definately more than 200 people in the world who own and use Amiga computers.  How often lately have you seen threads from "returnees", former Amiga users seeking repurification after a stint in the windoze world?  The minimig thread has, what, like 75,000 reads and 1400 relies?  Amiga hardware is bid up to astronomical prices on ebay all the time, often with dozens of bidders competing.  I'm not suggesting our numbers are huge, or even significant for that matter..  But 200 only?  No way.  I'd say about four or five times that many.  

   

[pixie]

guru-666 wrote:
there would be no point to buying amiga.org.  We could simply open another site, also there are others.  It such a small group anyway and the domain is not worth anywhere near what wyane wants for it.

Are you hearing voices in your head? :-P

I'm not talking in buying amiga.org in the way you present it.. And why would the community, being org (non profit organization) should have to leave in the first place?

[guru-666]

@pixie
I have no idea what youare talking about... amiga.org is a nice site but not "worth" much.  It's nice that wayne puts up this site (that we pay for) but he did not create any amiga stuff, he is a web guy with very little conection to the classic amiga so I see no reason to elevate him to have controll of the community, what? why?  

I think with 200 he means active members that contribute over the years, yes often ppl come back join the site post 5 times and disapear again... nothing wrong with that just not realy part of the community.  The amiga community needs programers and hardware designer, ppl that can bring new thigs to the table... fact is there are not many people like that out there anymore. With people like bill mcEwen in charge is a miracle that anybody is still interested in the amiga.

Anyway best of luck to you. Love Potugal, great and beautifull place!

 

[pixie]

I meant: The value of Amiga.org would remain in Wayne hands, the hassle of going after amiga.org would be distributed over its users...