NetNews Offline 2/NetNews Offline Volume 2.iso/news/comp/sys/amiga/multimedia/545

Text File | 1996-08-05 | 8.2 KB | 169 lines

Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.multimedia
Path: admaix.sunydutchess.edu!ub!dsinc!scala!news
From: [e-mail] (Dave Haynie)
Subject: Re: Scala for PC... oh well...
Sender: [e-mail] (Usenet administrator)
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
Date: Tue, 9 Apr 1996 21:27:46 GMT
Reply-To: [e-mail] (Dave Haynie)
References: <fulldog-0104960225140001@167.114.251.9> <[e-mail]> <Pine.SGI.3.91.960407052120.3245A-100000-100000@brook> <[e-mail]>
Nntp-Posting-Host: gator
Organization: Scala Computer Television, US Research Center

In <[e-mail]>, [e-mail] (Stephen Bowie) writes:
>: Scala, like so many other Amiga developers, has gotten too full of
>: themselves. They believe it was them, and not the Amiga, that was
>: responsible for their success.

Without an Amiga, Scala MM products would have been unusual
doorstops. Without applications like those from Scala, the Amiga would
have been an unusual and expensive doorstop.

They work together, see. The Amiga's architecture (that's SW and HW,
together, for those of you who haven't been paying attention)
certainly made things like Scala possible, when it was impossible on
other platforms. But the orginal Scala team put in years of hard work
to realize that potential. And Scala certainly sold some Amigas;
people don't buy computers just to run the Boing! demo. See, they work
together.

>: If you ask me, they are trying really hard to go out of business
>:by ignoring their roots and trying for the illusive and
>:non-existant PC pot of gold.

Ignoring your livelihood is the best way to go out of business. A big
part of Scala's business when Commodore was around was the integration
of Scala networks in hotels and businesses. Much like Newtek's Toaster
business, this requires new computers, you're not selling into
existing boxes. Once it became clear that C= was going under, Scala
didn't have much of a choice. Once Amigas were no longer available,
they would have virtually no income left.

So they rebuild Scala, with its own OS this time. They ported it to
the PC, and it's also going into some settop systems. This is what's
known in the industry as a survival move. If it works out, Scala will
be in a better position than ever. If not, they die. But they would
have died already sticking strictly to the Amiga.

>: The PC community will respond by doing what it always does. It
>: will almost completely ignore Scala because the PC community only
>: buys what everyone else already has.

Hardly. You aren't going places if you're trying to sell a mainstream
operating system on the PC, and you're in trouble if you're trying to
make money on a word processor or spreadsheet. The fact that most PCs
come with Microsoft versions of these tools makes it impractical for
anyone to compete, unless they really have something new.

In other places, there's plenty of action. The MIDI/Audio sequencer
market on the PC, for example, is exploding this year, as most of the
companies doing Mac-only work are releasing PC versions. And there
were already some excellent tools of this kind on the PC. There's a
similar flurry of activity in video-related tools from Amiga
companies. Sure, it's a harder market to penetrate, more money to be
lost as well as won.

On the other hand, long-time PC companies, especially those in the
midst of business automation market, have a certain myopia when it
comes to program design. They do tend to see the world as having one
OS, and they have a real hard time keeping up against Microsoft. So
you don't see much innovation. This is exactly why an Amiga company
has a chance on the PC. No one in the PC business would have done a
program like Scala. You can't do Amiga-like multimedia under Windows
3.1, and no one would have thought to write a portable, multimedia
friendly OS to host applications and enable this kind of thing. Of
course, it's not like there are many companies on the PC who would
even know about OS development. That's another thing unique about the
Scala team.

>: It's a shame that we, the Amiga community will have to suffer the
>: loss from yet another ego and greed based business decision.

You're totally off base here. Do you really need a list of all the
Amiga companies who DID go out of business thanks to Commodore's
demise, by sticking to nothing but Amiga development. Sure, some have
survived, but they're not in the same part of that market as Scala.

>First, if you think you are
>dissappointed/annoyed/frustrated/out-of-pocket by the damage done to
>our beloved platform over the last few years, just put yourselves in
>the shoes of guys like Dave Haynie and company who put heart, soul
>and career options into the Amiga for at least a decade!

Now that's more like it!

The demise of the Amiga wasn't Scala's doing, it wasn't your doing, it
wasn't my doing. It was a simple application of management's ego and
greed applied in quantities that would have been impossible in a
company with a less shady corporate structure. If nothing else, this
made me damn sensitive to this kind of thing. Unless you think its
greedy and egomanical to strive for simple survival, this has nothing
to do with Scala.

>I beleive it's still true that the majority of Scala N.American
>empoyees are ex-Amiga people...maybe 'ex' is the wrong adjective, as
>many are still working for the advancement of the platform in very
>real ways.

Indeed, a number of us have Amiga-related projects going. I have too
many.

>Scala -the company- itself (aside from providing astonishing software
>which allows even antique Amiga hardware to hold it's own with the most
>up to date PC) has recently released ScalaMM400 for NTSC at a very
>reasonable price, and has stated in this forum that the new BackBone
>code used for the Intel version is specifically designed with 'portability'
>in mind and that if the Power Amiga debut is reasonably succesful we can hope
>for a version which will make the PA shine above it's peers (my very rough
>paraphrase).

While I can't speak for Scala, if the Power Amiga does what's planned,
I think they'll be quite interested in using Power Amigas as Scala
players. If nothing else, it'll be simple economics -- a low-end Power
Amiga will be able to replace a rather fancy PC setup for the same
class of multimedia work. But Power Amigas don't exist today. And I
think the folks at Scala, most of us having been though the whole C=
mess, aren't about to bet the farm on any one company again. The
PClone, right now, is the only platform that's beyond the control of
any one company.

In fact, that little observation has had some powerful echos in the
computer industry, way beyond the whole Amiga/Scala thing. The whole
PowerPC Platform initiative is an effort to make another standard that
permits multivendor HW and system software to mix and match. Java, to
a large extent, is an effort to elminate software's reliance on any
given operating system.

These are important issues if you love innovation in personal
computers. A dominant OS can have too much say over what hardware can
do. And in the PClone business, the OS software is notoriously lagging
the capabilities of the hardware.

>They can hardly be blamed for wanting to enter a profitable market at
>the same time...possibly they'd like to feed their children, who
>knows.

Exactly -- those big slabs of raw meat aren't exactly cheap these
days.

>I don't (obviously) share your view that the PC market will ignore
>Scala.....like LW it's just too fine a program, and is a testament to
>those that worked on it.  It seriously outshines it's competitors.

Again, folks who have been around the PC too long seem to think in
terms of what it's generally accepted that a PC can do. Rather than
what it should be able to do. While it's not easy to get around the
software limitations, if you can, you have a real advantage. I don't
think Scala's advantage will be lost on the PC world.

>Long live Scala, long live the Amiga!

I'll drink to that, long and deep.

Dave Haynie          | ex-Commodore Engineering |   for DiskSalv 3 &
Sr. Systems Engineer |  Hardwired Media Company | "The Deathbed Vigil"
Scala Inc., US R&D   |    Ki No Kawa Aikido     |     [e-mail]

         "Feeling ... Pretty ... Psyched" -R.E.M.