The Magic Wand.

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                              The Magic Wand.
  Shane Kuntz                               Shane.Kuntz@heimdall.sdrc.com
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Many Many bitches, moans, complaints.

Many MANY flames. 

Many Amiga users thought that Escom/AT had a magic wand and after the long
buyout process and auction E/AT would fix everything overnight. 

It hasn't happened and anyone that thought E/AT would do feats comparable
to Jesus himself have been fooling themselves.   Let's look at some simple
facts and then put yourselves in AT/Escoms shoes. 

Commodore started it's decline long before they went bankrupt in 1994,
losing marketshare and developers as they sat on their rumps.

Liquidation started in 1994 and lasted an entire year.  Other companies
forged ahead, more developers lost, more users lost. 

April 1995.  Escom wins auction with a 10+ million dollar bid.

Escom starts sorting through the mess left by Commodore's demise.

Within the 10 months they have owned the technology:

- Hire the needed Amiga personnel.
- Form Amiga Technologies.
- Reconstruct a dealer network.
- Find distributors in various countries.
- Choose a manufacturing line for the machines.
- Retool that line for Amiga products.
- Negotiate the addition of software to be included in 
  the Magic Pack.
- Reintroduce the A1200 and the A4000T.
- License the Amiga Technology to Viscorp.
- Chose the PowerPC chip as the next CPU for Amigas.
- Start Developing the new machine and cooperate with Phase5
  to get the job done.
- Introduce the Amiga Surfer pack a all-in-one package to get
  your amiga online.
- Introducing a new machine with more processing power
  and expansion.
- Attended numerous shows/expos pledging their support for
  the Amiga and showing off their offerings.
- Held Developers meetings to try and draw back/keep developers
  on the Amiga.

This list isn't all encompassing of course as I don't know everything that
goes on at AT.  Just with the things I've listed here, AT has been HARD at
work in the last ten months for the Amiga.

Think about the above list for a while and what AT has done for the Amiga.
It is a lot in 10 months of buying the remains of a liquidated company.

The one thing that is a major gripe point is *price,price,price*  

How many companies could accomplish the above with out taking on an
enormous amount of debt/cost?  NONE.  If AT continues to price their models
high it will destroy the Amiga, if they bring their price down as they
become more and more stable everyone should be happy.  (some are never
happy though)

If it weren't for the price, what has AT done that is so *bad*???
Absolutely nothing.  They haven't played every card perfectly but they have
done some very good things for the Amiga in 10 months.

Think about this, if Dell had bought the Amiga Tech there would be no new
Amigas at *any* price. 

I ask all Amigans to look at the *whole* picture when looking at Amiga
Technologies.  Applaud them for bringing back the Amiga, developing new
Amigas, taking a chance.  Write them about the high prices and suggest to
them your ideas and opinions where you think they could improve. 

Quit looking at the half of the glass that's not full and look at the glass
that is full of many accomplishments.  A pessimistic Amiga community sucks.
We have enough people beating on the machines we use/love than to have
ourselves give into it also.  I'm guilty of it once in a while too. 

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