That was a great interview! Thanks Dave, Kees/amiga.org and those who submitted questions!
Yes, it does seem like Dave is - self-admittedly - a bit out of the loop regarding current Amiga events. Since when is that a crime?
As for the "wannabe" comment, I think the ensuing discussion to a great deal arises from people's personal preferences, and that stinking old factionism. Personally, I don't see "wannabe" to necessarily have negative connotations. MorphOS
is a wannabe AmigaOS. But hey, I thought that was a good thing, I guess that's primarily why most of us are interested in it (in whatever way, positive or negative) - otherwise we wouldn't be discussing it so regularly and fervently.
He also said that the excitement (in our little "market") over the Terons is AmigaOS4, "pretty much start and finish." Dave also sees the obvious that there won't be any new Amigas (unless someone's got "$250 million" laying around...
). A pragmatic view of hardware being a commodity, already out there and continuously being sold and developed by those who already have that capability, it's ready to be used. So if you're trying to sell an OS and don't have $250M or any weight to throw around in hardware development, then make it run on the hardware that people want.
In that perspective he didn't really diss the Pegasos hardware per se, it's just that AmigaOS won't be allowed to be sold for it. AmigaOS has been turned into a sales-pitch for Terons; a compulsory for-old-times'-sake charity fundraising action for Eyetech. He wants AmigaOS, so he has to buy an "AmigaOne".
I don't quite get the "Pegasos splits the market" bit. More hardware options is a prerequisite for market
growth. "I’m pretty much not going to spend $1000 or so just to taste out this new OS", as Dave said, and to see market growth that statement can be applied to any OS, including AmigaOS. The split, for AmigaOS's part as that seems to be a common interest of mine and Dave's, comes from the artificial divide created by AInc's licensing idiocy imposed on 3rd party hardware. In contrast, both parts of the MorphOS/Pegasos package are controlled, developed and sold by one company. I could see MorphOS sold for other hardware, like Macs or Terons, if Genesi can keep the Peg competitive in the geek PPC niche - they'd still be selling Pegs at the same time as they'd get MorphOS users (and thus possible future Peg customers) elsewhere.
I'd like to run the "official" AmigaOS. I know and like the current AmigaOS, and an updated version will no doubt rock on more modern hardware. I'm however not as "faithful" as Dave seems to be, I'm not prepared to pretend there's a reason to buy my hardware more expensively on a restricted "Amiga market" just to continue to run AmigaOS.
Given that AmigaOS4 and MorphOS/ABox seem to offer current AmigaOS users roughly the same things (I'm sure someone will now post a detailed list of reasons why one r0x0rz and the other sux0rz...), the main marketing point of AmigaOS4 indeed seems to be the Name. It's "official". Takemehomegrandma wrote a good summary IMO in the forums on just how the Name has been devaluated, especially over the last 3-4 years. To level the playing field, AInc needs to realize that their
product, what they should be
selling (maybe that's a strange concept...), is AmigaOS, not other people's hardware or trademark licenses for such. AmigaOS4 is but one alternative among others for current and future users interested in AmigaOS. Make people choose your alternative by making it more attractive, not with comradery and lenience to irrelevant former partners, futile hopes for short term license income, restrictions and lockouts. A couple of thousand stalwart fanatics is nothing to fight over.
Stop me, I'm rambling!
Anyway, nice interview, if nothing else from a historical anecdote perspective.
