CommodoreUSA CEO Interview Answers

[Wildstar128]

Lotta guesswork in there and not much in the way of numbers. I ask again: do you have any basis for saying that CUSA makes more money than the entire Commodore/Amiga hobbyist market?

Again, "mainstream viability" is irrelevant. The Amiga is twenty years out of being the mainstream and a good fifteen years past any hope of ever recapturing a significant part of it. Even if you redefine "Amiga" to mean nothing more than any computer that has rented the brand name from Bill, there's no way they can ever make a dent in the mainstream. (Certainly not at those prices.)

Okay, if you were advocating for Windows or Mac OS and saying this, that'd be one thing, but if you're using this as a point in Linux's favor? I can only conclude that you've never actually used Linux. Trying to use Linux in any kind of semi-comprehensive desktop PC capacity is closer to programming than some actual programmers get these days.


Okay, but even by that definition, they've produced a run (10,000, according to Barry) of C64x cases. How many C64xes have they sold? If one were to judge by user posts on the CUSA forums, it's a dozen or two. Have they ordered another run of cases? Have they even made a dent in their existing case stock? How does this compare to the sold-out first run of AmigaOne X1000 machines and registrations for the second run?
 
 And, what, do the people at Amigakit just come in on a Saturday and fill orders for kicks? What basis do you have for suggesting that Amiga hobbyist businesses don't pay their workers?


 No. It is not based on Unix. It's not even Unix-like. It's certainly nothing like Linux.
 

 Okay. Now under what logic would you say that charging somewhere around twice the cost of the components for a PC built entirely from commodity hardware is "a fair price?"


 Who says it has to compete? It's an entirely separate market.
 
 The entire first run (100 machines? I think? Correct me if I'm wrong) has sold and they're registering interest for a second.
 

 Wait, so we're supposed to be grateful he comes on here to condescend and smarm and insult us? Dude told me outright that I've never accomplished anything in my life, and he doesn't even know me. I'm supposed to be impressed because he deigned to talk to me?
 
 
 Where are you getting these numbers from?

If your batch run is 10 then that isn't much to say.

10,000 units at $595 is 5.95 Million in sales. Then you have the Vic and other models. So, if you figure about $6-8 million in revenue. How much sales does jens make a year on all his products.

The last I recall, he didn't even sell 100 C-Ones. That was maybe $35k-$50k. Did he even get that. If I recall, he spent over $150k to get the batch produced. Maybe it was somewhere between $125k-$175k. It has been awhile since I saw his old post on the CommodoreOne list(s) with that info.

He is one of the largest commodore/amiga hardware developers existent. The big -10 would be lucky to be between $750k-$1M. That is if they have a good year and that is usually only the one time batch pre-order that happens maybe once in 5 years with each of the developers.

The sw developers generally make $0.

So, how do anyone make a living when you are lucky to sell 30-50 of anything.

There usually is only one time batches and that first may get sold old but the second batch takes years to deplete even though the second batch is half to equal the first batch.

There are maybe 100-250 active folks left world wide that actively purchases hardware on a regular basis. Of the ~6000, you are lucky to get 10% to buy anything a given year. So, each vendor is lucky to get 1-2% to purchase their product. So viably, I can only expect at most 50-60 purchases of something a given year and it would then take 3-5 times as much time to sell another 50-60. Product sale life is good for maybe a year and then it is slow as heck.

I seen this with many of the stuff produced in the Commodore and Amiga community.

These are ball park and vary. I seen this with Jens, Jim and others.

The few things that continuously sell are cables and cords.

[commodorejohn]

You can either get new people or serve only those that are already die hard people. The only way to get new people is in the mainstream. That is where they are. Old people that once was here and now is there - is there.

I disagree, but even if that's true, it's simply not going to work trying to break back into the mainstream. The only people who still hold enough affection for the Amiga, 20 years after Commodore's bankruptcy, that it would impact their purchasing decisions are the people who liked it for what it was, not for its name. Many of those people are right here in this community; those that aren't, if by some chance they ever hear about CUSA, are going to look into it and go "what the hey is this?" because it's not only not what they remembered, it has absolutely nothing in common with what they remembered - not even a case design! Even if there were any still interested, the sheer absurdity of the pricing would put them off.

They can't retain old die-hards by abandoning everything that the die-hards value, and they can't entice new people with a name that means nothing to the majority and prices that would be off-putting to the entirety. It simply doesn't work that way.

I suspect he is better then the other a--holes who would shut down every Commodore website. Sued everyone of the sites with the logos, and had them all thrown in jail and fined for statutory violation of $25,000 per violation and legal precedence is that each day a violation occured would be a violation up to statutes of repose.

Well lets assume 2 years. That is 365x2 or 730 days of violations. Each day a violation. 730 violations at $25,000 and a year in jail for each violation. Imagine 730 years of imprisonment and $18+ Million dollars in fines each. That would be pretty gnarly. Then throw in the copyright violations.

That would be an grade AAA a--hole.

It is a good thing Barry is not one of those.

Okay, has anyone actually tried to do that? What grounds would they do it on? "He's probably better than a hypothetical complete monster with no regard for fair-use laws and who has the run of the courts such that they can impose utterly impossible penalties that wouldn't last ten seconds in an appeals court, and who probably eats babies" is not exactly a glowing recommendation.

[commodorejohn]

10,000 units at $595 is 5.95 Million in sales. Then you have the Vic and other models. So, if you figure about $6-8 million in revenue. How much sales does jens make a year on all his products.

Where are you getting those figures? According to Barry they produced 10,000 cases, but there's no information indicating they've sold even 1/100th of those. Hypothesizing about how much they might make, if they sold every single case they produced with at least a base configuration PC (i.e. not bare cases,) which we don't know, says nothing whatsoever about what they actually did sell.

He is one of the largest commodore/amiga hardware developers existent. The big -10 would be lucky to be between $750k-$1M. That is if they have a good year and that is usually only the one time batch pre-order that happens maybe once in 5 years with each of the developers.

The sw developers generally make $0.

Again, what basis do you have for any of these figures?

So, how do anyone make a living when you are lucky to sell 30-50 of anything.

Who said anything about making a living?

I seen this with many of the stuff produced in the Commodore and Amiga community.

These are ball park and vary. I seen this with Jens, Jim and others.

You say "ball park," I say "wild guessing with no sources to back it up."

[Wildstar128]

I wasn't suggesting that it was you personally. It was a generalized statement about that amount of times we have seen people trying to convince us that Commodore USA where the best people for the job. And yes like you I have seen others trying to bring the brands back into the mainstream. Lets not forget Commodore Gaming, a company I feel Commodore USA resemble in a fashion, that had taken a stab at bringing Commodore kicking and screaming into the x86/64 era. And that survived for a while then failed.
 
Look I am simply saying maybe it's time we just let this one go and allow the thread to fall off the front page.

Anyway, I think I said enough on this. I think the point I am trying to make is don't expect any serious business to try to venture much into supporting a nanoscopic number of customers. It generally take as much as an entire town of 10,000 for a small computer repair business to thrive and function because you don't get the entire amount every year.

There is less than that in the community.

Even the demoscene has been slowing down compared to 2005.

[Wildstar128]

Where are you getting those figures? According to Barry they produced 10,000 cases, but there's no information indicating they've sold even 1/100th of those. Hypothesizing about how much they might make, if they sold every single case they produced with at least a base configuration PC (i.e. not bare cases,) which we don't know, says nothing whatsoever about what they actually did sell.


Again, what basis do you have for any of these figures?


Who said anything about making a living?


You say "ball park," I say "wild guessing with no sources to back it up."

Lets look at the names on the membership list and assume easily the 50% of you are on every forum or most. Since 70-80% of you are on all the Amiga forums the of the  remaining around 15% are umique to this forum and the rest are on several.

Those here, represent maybe 1/5 of the folks and the rest are part of clubs and not online in appreciable level. I rarely saw any one forum being over 10,000. lemon would represent one of the largest bulk of the forums. Most of them are here and across all the forums. i would assume half those on Lemon are inactive folks and 1/4 of the active ones are repeat accounts. Ie. Same person had to create a new account and lost the old one.

6000-12000 would be a good guess.

I am being conservative and figuring 6000 active.

9077 lemon64 and 7131 or so on lemonamiga...

I would assume 80% of commodore users are also Amiga users.
I would assume only have the acconts are active and they would represent about 80%.

So around 6000 is rough hand guess of active amiga and commodore users.

I would go as much as 50% more for anyone not clearly measurable and is by large off line or little web presence. So, 9000 or so. I would doubt past 10,000 active.

[commodorejohn]

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.

[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.

[Borut]

Uaaaaah (still getting tired of CUSA stuff) - nothing new, nothing great, none at least a little interesting things. The last one please turn off the lights LOL

In the Demoscene I assume they would call such people something like "lamers" ;-)

[WotTheFook]

@ Wildstar128

If your argument  about mainstream computers is true, then how do you explain the popularity of the Raspberry Pi?  It's NOT about beaing mainstream at all; it's about going back to the roots of where we all came from in early computing and re-inventing it for now; the Raspberry Pi has managed that and it can still perform as a NAS, play HDMI video etc. and it's dirt cheap. I'd imagine it's capable of emulation too. They even plan to teach programming it in schools, so it's kind of re-inventing the BBC Micro era.

If they were to put it into a keyboard case they'd have the modern equivalent of computers from the BBC, Spectrum and C64 through to the Amiga.

The guys that came up with the Raspberry Pi know what market they are targetting and it's working for them. Barry is just thrashing around trying to find the computing equivalent of a lottery ticket and that's why everything he touches turns to crap - it's the total opposite of the Midas Touch. He could learn a lot from these people, but Barry knows that he is right, that everyone else is wrong and that's all that matters.

[commodorejohn]

If your argument  about mainstream computers is true, then how do you explain the popularity of the Raspberry Pi?  It's NOT about beaing mainstream at all; it's about going back to the roots of where we all came from in early computing and re-inventing it for now; the Raspberry Pi has managed that and it can still perform as a NAS, play HDMI video etc. and it's dirt cheap.

Point. And they sold out a 10,000 unit production run (C64x-size)...in seconds, on the first day.

[Pyromania]

I don't believe they sold 10,000. Just my opinion, remember when Dammy said they sold over 100,000? My best guess is they sold 20-100 tops and that is beng generous. That's why no inject molding Amiga replica cases.

[dammy]

I don't believe they sold 10,000. Just my opinion, remember when Dammy said they sold over 100,000? My best guess is they sold 20-100 tops and that is beng generous. That's why no inject molding Amiga replica cases.

I know I'm getting old, but I don't remember saying that.  URL?

[number6]

I know I'm getting old, but I don't remember saying that.  URL?

Perhaps it was this?

Total sales (C64x series[including barebone model]and VIC series) is well over 100,000 units. Right now you can drop by different computer shops around the world and purchase a custom built C64x or Vics. C=USA has a new site under construction at http://www.commodore.net and in the coming weeks will be finished and ready for business.

source

#6

[dammy]

Perhaps it was this?



source

#6

Alright, I'm getting old.

Thanks

Edit: http://www.commodore-amiga.org/en/forum/2-welcome-mat/14621-pic-of-amiga-mini-in-production

[number6]

Alright, I'm getting old.

Thanks

Welcome. btw, same thread you said:

I am so glad Ben blew off Barry, I really am.

Yet in the Q/A, we have official confirmation that no talks took place.
I'm guessing your source at the time was probably not Barry. Heh.

#6

[commodorejohn]

I don't believe they sold 10,000. Just my opinion, remember when Dammy said they sold over 100,000? My best guess is they sold 20-100 tops and that is beng generous. That's why no inject molding Amiga replica cases.

I agree - but that's my point. Barring a statement to that effect, I don't believe CUSA has even put a dent in the 10,000 cases they claimed to have produced...but the Pi, piffly and tiny and bare-bones as it is, sold that many in the space of mere minutes. Those folks knew what they were trying to achieve, knew who a good secondary market would be, marketed to them effectively and paid real attention to their concerns (AFAIK the only thing left to be documented for the tinkerers is the GPU API, thank you so damn much Broadcom.) As a result, they've enjoyed huge interest, such that people have stuck with them even through some frustrating manufacturing hiccups.

Barry, on the other hand, didn't understand the Amiga community coming in, didn't try to, made fun of anybody who told him that community interest generally lies elsewhere, distributed much misinformation, showed extreme unwarranted self-importance every time he posted, acted more combative the more people tried to tell him how he was mis-stepping, and ultimately just charged too much for too little in hopes that the name would make up for it, when he'd already half-alienated the people who would've been interested in the first place. He tried to cover that by saying "well, you're Not Our Target Market," but he keeps coming back - because (I theorize) we're all he's got. The world outside the Amiga community cares even less about the brand names and is far less inclined to pay large sums for unimpressive hardware.

Barry's entire time here has basically been one long session of shooting himself in the foot. He pretty much killed his business before it even got started.