If ... just if ...

[ami_junki]

I was thinking recently, what would I do if I won say 100 million pounds, crazy amount I know ... but just if, what would I would do and I the first thing that came to mind was buy out Amiga and try to turn it around.  But how would I do that, for me I would love to hire what`s left of the original team and get them to work with the new hardware developers, get them to work on a new machine and in the meantime release a new version of the A1200 with onboard PPC and graphics card called the A1400, sell this for around 99 pounds, then get the Mini Mig and brand them officially and sell them for around 40 quid as small devices like portable gaming or joysticks.  Probably not the best option I guess but I really do wish there was something that I could do ... what would you guys do if you were in charge of Amiga?

[Trev]

If I had the money to burn, I'd just open source what I could (not GPL, probably something less restrictive) and set it free. But it's really not about buying "Amiga"--most of the core IP is worthless, and what isn't worthless has been replicated fairly well by others.

It's really about taking the Amiga trademark and turning it into something users can be proud of. When you look at Amiga OS, MorphOS, AROS, and AmigaAnywhere, what you see is a standard API, implemented in the same way UNIX vendors implement POSIX standards or the Single UNIX Specification. Whether or not that API is really the best way to do things isn't what's important. What's important is allowing it to grow and prosper. It really can't do that in a small, disparate community relying on mostly closed standards.

[Sparky]

Unfortunately I doubt very many people would buy them .. amiga is hobbiest level remember .. you;d have to get as much hype as the iPod inspires to really re-launch it.

Mark

[AeroMan]

Why not ? Hobbies inspire people.... People that build DeLoreans for example.

But Anyway, if I get that amount of money I would buy a huge house on the beach and retire... :-D

[Plaz]

I was thinking recently, what would I do if I won say 100 million pounds, crazy amount I know ... but just if, what would I would do and I the first thing that came to mind was buy out Amiga and try to turn it around.

That would imply a great reward for Amiga Inc that has  badly managed Amiga IP all these years. Instead I would use that money to fund AROS, MOS, DiscreetFX, hardware developers like Acube and CloneA, and some how support Hyperion and it's developers. I would wait for Amiga Inc to come to me for a amicable deal or else leave them wither to dust.

Plaz
(not feeling charitable today)

[roanen]

Interesting take; support those that are actually doing something. I like that!

[ami_junki]

Hehe suffice to say, if I did buy out Amiga Inc I would fire all the people, for me I would want to re-create that community feeling again that the original Amiga developers had, so by creating a new powerful Amiga company which would be open and try to actually create new Amiga hardware and market.  I was thinking of what made the Amiga so great other than the hardware and it was the passion that the designers had to make something wonderful, if we could kick out McBill and his cronies and build a new Amiga company with the original name, bring in the original designers as consultants and have all the Amiga hardware designers work together ... unity and a level of conformity to an Amiga standard.  I think that if this would happen the Amiga computer could really kick off, people now are switching more over to Apple than before but what if there was a real alternative, a fully functioning Amiga computer that was on the same level at "least" as the PC and Mac ...

[countzero]

reality check. Most original amiga developers are at their late careers now, if still working in the industry at all. besides, you can never fight off competition from x86 & apple whatever you do. it would be a dead investment.

[ami_junki]

I think with proper management and advertising and a good product the Amiga could come back, you only limit yourself by setting limits.  I am not saying that Amiga could be number one, or number two but there is a market place still - but to be honest people are too jaded and there is no proper marketing.  Let me put it to you this way, if Amiga was back, say properly back with money, new hardware that was better than the PC or Mac, there was enough production, it was competitively priced, and there was proper advertising, there was new management no more of the McBill crew - would you buy a new Amiga?  The thing is that if there was an Amiga that ran the latest Amiga OS, had hardware that was powerful, could run original Amiga apps, was MS Office compatible and was cheap, put them next to a PC and people would start buying them. Not quickly at first of course.  Thing is it is become to easy to say, oh this won`t work because we can`t compete with this and that, well to be honest I think that is bollocks - things are tough yes, but so what.  If the original Amiga engineers had the same attitudes as people today there would have been no Amiga and to be honest they faced the same problems that people would face today.  There were only PC and Mac, they had to create a new market, same as today, but people are lazy and it is the great social condition of being negative and stalling true development.  I think the people out there doing the Mini Mig and Natami are brilliant, they not doing it because it will sell well or not but because they have a passion for doing something they think is right, same with all the software developers out there too.  

[Trev]

The things that made the original Amiga innovative are now ubiquitous. To move forward, the "Amiga" would have to make strides in parallelization and related areas. A complete paradigm shift is unlikely as users and the industry are too invested in the computing memes of our time--windowed GUIs, the mouse, peer-to-peer networking (not file sharing--peer-to-peer protocols like TCP/IP), etc. Much of what is innovative today revolves around new uses for existing technology, not innovations in the technology itself.

[da9000]

Unfortunately I think that Trev and the other "realists" are correct.

The Amiga at its time was a true quantum leap of sorts, both technologically and affordability wise. You could NOT get a computer that was as advanced as the Amiga and for that price back then. In other for the Amiga (or "another Amiga") to succeed or be reborn again, today, you'd need the same ingredients:

* Truly trend-breaking hardware advances (extreme parallelization with hardware enforced problem decomposition? thread-level speculative execution in hardware? self-modifying hardware? who knows?).

* Truly trend-breaking software advances (something beyond the GUI paradigm? is multi-touch it? not sure! or perhaps a fundamental difference in OS architecture and programming language paradigms - forget Object Oriented Programming, what's better or NeXT?).

* Truly competitive price model (when you can get $500 PCs in the 3Ghz range, your "new Amiga" better be at that range or near that - and don't forget the broken world economies due to all the greedy, corrupt, cheating bankers and financial institutions).

* Some good style and design. Computers are so ubiquitous today that almost all can surf on the internets and all are 3Ghz or something like that. People are thus now choosing what is also cool looking, or that feels good or that pampers them with backlit keyboards, lighter weight, longer battery life, built-in cameras, etc. (Perhaps that's why you're seeing Macs appearing everywhere lately. Apple gets it.)


As to the original question:
I'd probably invest in space travel. I'd love to walk on another planet before I perish from this one! (of course I'd be carrying an Amiga with me so I can send messages back to you guys via IRC or something :-D)

OK, OK, the original question was rephared, more specifically what one would do if one would be running the show with a new Amiga company. Basically I'd hire the most passionate, obsessive, creative engineers and have the whole show run by a super-passionate tight-handed French business guy (to make sure spending doesn't get out of hand as in the original Commodore, and to make sure there's some culture in the product and the company) who would have to be, without a doubt, a true visionary and a true leader, else it'd all be pointless. OK, I don't know what I would really do :-)

[darksun9210]

yup, i hear what you're saying, and 100 million would by a house for me, my parents, my girlfriends parents, and my good friends.
then i'd have enough left over to maybe play about with investments and stuff. i don't think 100mil would get you anywhere near a new machine to market,so i'd look at other ventures. however, if i did have the capital behind me...

not sure how far it would go with development of a new machine. but i'd buy out A.inc or whoever they are these days, sack the crap out of the management, cancel their pension funds/401ks or whatever and have them investigated for fraud, buy out hyperion and give those guys a massive "thank you" bonus and "stay pay" to stay on and dev some more. merging both companies should iron out any legal disputes, or have hyperion in a offical consultancy capacity to Amiga. help out red/vesalia/softwarehut/amigakit to become regional distributers if they want,

hire the talent we have on the amiga forums

if you were really flush with cash, buyout Nvidia - put it under some decent management, buyout AMD/ATI, ie, so you have a controlling share of GPU development as ATI did the xbox360, Wii, Gamecube, Nvidia did the Xbox, and PS3. maybe munch into Motorola as i don't think they're doing to complain much these days.

then you'll have a fairly solid foundation to generate funky hardware. but obviously keep churning out some parts that fit the current market in order to fund your R&D.

the sooner the world ditches x86 and moves on, the better. its about time for a revolution rather than an evolution. and when you bring something to market, it has to be a top to bottom range.
PDA/(i)Phone alike mobile device so you can get your contacts/emails, run some basic apps, stream IPTV/music from your media centre machine, maybe even RDP into your home/office machine.
CDTV/CD32 alike set-top box home theater / media centre machine with multiple cable/sat/digital terrestrial tuners, and IPTV streaming to other "media extenders".
A500/A1200 alike for gamers and learner coders.
A3000 alike funky serious machine that doesn't look out of place in the home / homeoffice
A2000/A4000 alike heavey weight machines for businesses and enthusiasts. not being funny, but spreadsheets sell machines. we've just put in an order for another floor of machines. probably about 300, with minimum 4 screens each. on an average joe level, people want the same as they have at work, at home.

my idea would be to ween the world off backwards x86. but i heard somewhere intel puts in something like $2billion a year on development. so $100million may just about cover your marketing budget...  :roll:

so we need a few of us to win the euro millions, the UK lottery after a few roll overs, and there has to be a lottery in the US?
then we all join up as a business entity and do this thing!  :lol:

--edit--
i was thinking about this... in the grand scheme of things, $100mil isn't that much these days.
house for me, my parents, my girlfriends parents, holiday home for the same three, say a million$ a time. thats 6mil.
flat/town house in the city for somewhere to crash after a heavy night out, another mil - or 2 for river front property. nice cars, holiday... thats $10mil gone in the first week.
then i'd buy houses for my close friends so they never have to have the milstone of a mortgage around their necks. at current prices, that'll prolly be another 10mil$.
then i have to maintain the lifestyle to which i am to become accustomed for the rest of my life. god knows how much that'll cost. start my own business, do things i really enjoy, be a "silent investor" in hyperion :-D and that's before i've even thought about buying up all the scraps of amiga and putting it all together...

[ami_junki]

lol come to think of it, yeah it is not that much money nowadays really, sounds like a nice plan though. I wish I had been old enough to have worked in the old Commodore days, I used to live quite close to the West Chester headquarters, I remember going past there and thinking ... whoo my new A500 will be coming out there soon!  It`s funny though that even after all this time, coming back to Workbench and doing work is still so much more rewarding experience, to tell the truth I still write all my documents in Final Writer, still find it the best and doing graphics in Brilliance still has that special quality.  But I digress ... sounds like a top plan, everyone win the lottery and get the Amiga going again   :-)   :idea:

[darksun9210]

^5 :-)

[darule]

If I had the money, like for example Richard Branson, I would buy all companies, assets and rights related to the Amiga. I would kick out everyone and start all over with innovative people like Haynie. I would make Haynie CEO by the way.

Next Amiga on the market: The A5000.

PPC powered @3GHz
4Gb RAM
onboard 2.5" HDD 500Gb
AAA-like chipset featuring Dale(video),Glenn(audio),Dave(DMA chip).
VideoMem would be 1Gb
PCMCIA-port
SDRAM/MMC/CF ports

Need more? The A5000T.
Extra:
5x PCI-bus for more hardware
3x ZORRO IV, backward compatible with all others ZORRO ports.

Oh well, one can have dreams...