Re: Your first A2.

[mjmahon@aol.com (Michael J. Mahon)]

william strutts wrote:

>The IBM's were an attempt by
>Big Blue to cash in on the new fad PC's and was a lame
>attempt at copying the Apple II.  The big difference was
>that big business saw the PC as the "standard" to follow and
>hence we proceeded to box making commodity computers.
>AKA Clones.  Not very interesting in my opinion.

Though this thread seems an obvious troll, I'll bite and respond
to this assertion!

Consider what Apple was offering at the time of the PC intro
in 1981--the Apple ///, for God's sake!  This was a machine
with plenty of "personality"--most of it capricious.  And with
terrible software availablilty, except in Apple // emulation mode!
(This is 1981, remember.)

The PC was, in principle, a rip-off of the Apple II slot concept,
but was otherwise a pretty reasonable ground-up design.  The
detached keyboard and pretty 80-column display font did wonders
for it in the business community, as did its little "IBM" logo.  ;-)

<rant>

Apple's abortive attempts to get native 80-column capability and
increased memory capacity effectively made them easy prey in
the office environment.  And the Mac continued to miss the mark
for the button-down office worker.  "Cutesy-wierd" was the main
perception of the Mac for years among business people (not the
graphics arts folks, who have _never_ considered themselves nor
been considered "business people".

Commercial success is at least as much understanding your
market as it is having a great product.  (Remember Beta!)  Although
Apple products were clever, innovative, and (after the ///) well-designed,
they _never_ understood how to market to the people with money to
spend.  Even Jobs appeals primarily to the Mac faithful, not the
uncommitted pragmatist with work to do.

"Being standard is better than being better."

"But that's just my opinion...I could be wrong."

</rant>

-michael

 Email:  mjmahon@aol.com
 Home page:  http://members.aol.com/MJMahon/