Re: Piracy killed the apple. / Nathan Argument

[supertimer@aol.com (Supertimer)]

Robert Boucher <boucher1@pdq.net> wrote:

>Stephen B. Field wrote:
>> 
>> Supertimer wrote
>> 
>> "And anyone who cares about the future of such a marginal computer system as
>> the Apple II should feel the same way. Piracy may well have had a hand in
>> the death of the Apple II as a mass-market computer, but what's done is
>> done, and there's no sense in shutting the barn door after the horse has run
>> away"

Fraud alert!  Fraud alert!  I did not write the above quote!

>> 
>> I feel piracy had very little to do with the death of the apple.  Piracy
>> effects all systems produced, from the apple, ibm, commodore, playstation,
>> nintendo, etc.  If there is a way to re-produce it, it will be copied.  Its
>> the nature of the game.  Apple killed the Apple.
>> 
>>  Back in the late 70's early 80's, the apple was the king the hill.  Almost
>> all new releases for game software and some business applications came out
>> on the apple first.  Ports were then released for various other systems such
>> as the commodore and IBM etc.
>> 
>> Apple, during that time, maintained a very strict attitude of allowing
>> manufacturing of their computer systems to only themselves rather than the
>> open system policy of the IBM Compatibles(i.e. apples lawsuit of Franklin).
>> Apple aggressively protected their rights to exlusive manufactuirng of their
>> system.  (This was perfectly within their rights, I do not disagree with the
>> decision to follow this policy).  This enabled apple to make huge profit
>> margins on the sale of their various apple systems, and more than anything
>> else killed the market dominance of the system.

IBM tried to do this too, but Compaq put a successful defense because
of their strategy of "blind" reverse engineering...the programmers never
saw the actual IBM BIOS...they worked in reverse.

Franklin failed because they outright copied A2 ROMs.

Laser succeeded because they used the Compaq strategy.

However, Apple ROMs were harder to reverse engineer than IBM
BIOS because the ROMs did more.

>> They had an excellent policy of selling apple II's to schools all over the
>> U.S..  Even today there are still hundreds of school districts that still
>> have an apple or two in use.  This created great potential demand for the
>> sale of their systems.
>> 
>> What apple failed to do was compete with the price of the IBM clone.  While
>> apple was exclusively manufacturing apple computers, IBM clone manufacturers
>> were poping up left and right.   Selling comparable systems for much less
>> money than an apple system.  While apple sales were still tops in terms of
>> the sale of computers by brand name,(somewhere between 10%-15% of the
>> market).    For every 1 apple sold, some 6 pc's sold were IBM clones, the
>> remainder commodore/amiga etc.

You underestimate the Commodore 64.  For a time probably up to
around 1985 or '86, for every apple and pc sold, 6 Commodore 64s
were sold.  Remember the famous bar chart commercial "Commodore,
the company that sold more computers than apple and IBM combined"

>> If you are a software manufacturer producing software you are going to
>> release software for the system with the most potential sales not the best
>> system.  I remember the transferance that occured in the early 80's as more
>> and more titles were released for the IBM rather than the apple.

It was closer to 1987 or 88 if I recall.  That was when IBM's software
library overtook the Apple II.  Before then, the "10,000+ strong A2
programs" was always a strong selling point for the A2.

>> There is no question that apple's IIGS was a much superior machine to the
>> IBM XT.  However, it was much more expensive and software title availability
>> for the IBM greatly outnumbered the IIGS.

I know what you are talking about...I have such an XT...it is WAY
slower than even an unaccelerated GS and the sound and
graphics suck!  How the XT lead to the Pentium II but the GS
faded away can only be attributed to Apple.

>> Apple at the time, did very little to compete against the IBM.  There is no
>> doubt that the system was superior, but the greed of apple at selling their
>> machines with markups as high as 100% sealed their doom.

They tried, but they kept trying to do it with a computer OTHER
than the Apple II.  First, they unleased the Apple III, which failed.
Then they unleased Lisa, which failed.  Then they released
Muckintosh, which was failing until Jobs was fired and Muckintosh
with slots, color, and other A2 features were introduced.

Had they stuck to the A2 like IBM and clones stuck to the x86,
Apple would be way ahead of the game!

>> I was very hopeful that apple would start to rebound following there
>> decision to allow for the manufacture of MAC clone systems.  This alas fell
>> by the wayside on the return of Steve Jobs to apple.  I think that this was
>> a huge mistake on his behalf.

I kinda wondered about that myself.  If you add up the number
of clones PLUS the number of Muckintoshes sold during the
time clones were allowed, the total exceeded today's Muckintosh
sales....

>> It pretty simple, demand for any product will dictate the level of supply.
>> If apple would allow others to manufacture clones, market share would
>> increase as a percent of the total PC market.  More software developers
>> would in turn produce products for the apple community, albiet the MAC
>> community not the IIGS or IIe community.

I fear the moment a clone is successfully built WITHOUT licensing
the ROMs...reversed engineered ROMs, that is...then Apple would
begin to lose interest in Muckintosh.  It may not have been a
coincidence that remaining A2 support collapsed when Laser won
the court battle against Apple...

>I continue to see everyone blaming Apple for market loss in the business
>community. In 1983, I was the first person in a company of 11,000
>employees to get a personal computer. I requested an Apple IIe since I
>had one at home, and was familar with it. However, all of the company's
>"computer people" worked on IBM mainframes, and this was the company
>they were familar with. Management decided their expertize was greater
>than mine, and so the Company bought IBM Pc's. (There was a saying at
>the time, You can't go wrong buying IBM.)

There were at least as many A2s in schools as there were in
businesses, but I think the most important market for a personal
computer continues to be the home.  Apple kept neglecting this
market.  Commodore succeeded for a time in this market.  It
is the most important market to the PC clones, even, present
day...

>Apple was never considered, and so, at least at my company, price was
>not a consideration. When I retired in 1992, I was the only person in
>the company that had a company owned Apple IIe, but that is another
>story.

Some companies chose Apple.  99% of the schools had Apple.
Apple was poised to corner the home market, but they failed.

Apple also kept trying to penetrate the business market with
a computer OTHER than the Apple II line.  Look, I'm not in
any way suggesting they try to do it with a 16k Apple II model,
but new Apple II models with more capabilities should have
kept coming rather than stagnation.  This is why the XT never
remained an XT.  The Apple IIGS shows that progress can be
made...it was just way overdue and, to Apple, the last in the
line even though it had tons of potential progress left.  The IIGS
was the last chapter in a tragedy of infanticide....