Amiga the future is looking bleak :(
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                           By Sigma Alpha

As  you  saw  in  the  last issue Microprose are bailing out of the Amiga
software developing scene, and they are not the only ones.  Team 17 might
be  going  as  well.   What  once  was  a  thriving business according to
software houses is now not making enough money for them to stay.

I'm  sure  you  have  read  documents like this before woffeling on about
pirate  games  taking money away from these companies.  We ALL and I mean
ALL  at  one  time or another have come across some piece of software and
though  Hmmm yeah I like this why should I pay for something I have in my
hand.   The  truth is YES it is taking the money away and it's showing by
the  amount of companies that are no longer making software for the Amiga
so all the stories you have heard and disregarded ARE TRUE, and deep down
you  knew they are but thought I'm OK I have the latest game so what do I
care  if  they  loose £30.  Well think to yourself if thousands of people
thought the way you do then that is thousands of pounds of money down the
drain as far at the companies are concerned.

Well  for all you pirating people out there this is a message form all us
at Miggybyte:

         ***** STOP FUCKING PIRATING GAMES AND UTILITITIES *****

                        YOU ARE KILLING THE AMIGA



All  of  the  editors  of  /\/\IGGYBYTE  feel  the same about this having
lengthy discussions on the matter.  These software houses that are moving
to  code  for the PC, just what are they expecting to be different, there
are  pirates  in all formats there is no way of getting away from this or
is there?


Here  is  a  word to you Pirate BBS's out there, over the last few months
dozens  of  BBS's  have been raided.  Now think of all the users that you
have  do  you  know  if they are working for F.A.S.T?  are you completely
sure  a  user is not getting evidence of you dodgy dealings.  It's no use
you putting up one of your 'I have no responsibility for what goes on the
bbs  '  messages coz it don't matter shit.  So why not just shut down and
wipe  your  HD  of  any Pirated Warez.  If you liked some of what you had
then do what thousands of Loyal Amiga users do BUY THEM!

To  show  how easy it is to get on to your bbs's one of our staff was set
the  task of finding as many Pirate bbs's and to get validated on them so
he could have access to download warez.

He  logged  onto  a bbs that he found the number of in a pirated utility,
and  was  allowed  to join.  A few days later he see an advertisement for
two  new  bbs's  on  what is referred to as a 'wall this is a ansi screen
where  users  can  leave  comments  to  fellow  users.  These bbs adverts
included  NUP's Or New User Passwords.  These are required on these bbs's
to  join otherwise the bbs will log you off and not allow you any further
into the system.

Now  he  had Three Pirate BBS numbers in Liverpool he was assuming a name
that was well known in the scene world belonging to a hacker in a certain
cracking  firm.  Within a week he was offered a post as a Co-Sysop as the
Sysop  was  going  On holiday, so he had full access to this persons Hard
drivers  that  amounted  to  over 12 Gig.  This included not just what is
referred to as '0 day warez' but meg upon meg Of Hard Porn.

Of  course all warez that were downloaded were erased from his hard drive
after  looking through them.  When doing this he came across half a dozen
bbs  adds  in  all  kinds of archived formats.  So from one number he got
well  over a dozen bbs numbers.  So if he can do this within the space of
two weeks don't you think that others can too?  THINK ON.

I've  said  it  before  i'll say it again, most of the people I know that
have  had  pirate warez only do so because they do not have the amount of
money to pay £30 for a game that can be lame and that they could probably
find  a  better  version  in  the PD libraries.  I do not offer this as a
excuse  for  pirating but there has to be a message in this somewhere for
the software companies.  Chances are that if they did reduce there prices
they  would  sell  more  therefore making up the cost of making the price
lower.

After  reading  a transcript of an IRC chat with the creator of Directory
Opus  the  other  day  it  seem  more  companies are leaving the Amiga in
droves.   He  said that he was might not code another version of Opus for
the  Amiga and that he had half completed coding a version for the PC but
never finished.


This is VERY worrying news for the Amiga, but is this the only reason for
the  companies  leaving,  do  they  no something else.  Maybe the news of
Escom's  Amiga  company  Amiga Technologies, selling of licenses to other
companies  to  make  Amiga's is making them unsteady on the future of our
beloved machine.

End
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