Very Computer

by **Dimitri I. Rakiti** » Tue, 03 Feb 1998 04:00:00

Mac advocates:
Please explain the following to me: NeXT and NeXTStep were around
for quite a while without any considerable commecrial success.
What makes you think that Apple will make it successul? I still
think that Jobs simply saved his face by selling his going-nowhere
company(NeXT). Fact that he immediately sold all Apple stock he
acquired in transaction proves this.

Oh, I type this on my old mono NeXTStation 25Mhz :P

Dima

by **Glen Warn** » Tue, 03 Feb 1998 04:00:00

> Mac advocates:
> Please explain the following to me: NeXT and NeXTStep were around
> for quite a while without any considerable commecrial success.
> What makes you think that Apple will make it successul?

Possibly because they won't charge an arm and a leg for the OS. I notice
you are using a NeXT Station (per your below final thought); I'm guessing
you bought it used, right? When the NeXT came out originally, it was
prohibitively expensive ... but still, people (well ... people with deep
pockets and company reps) bit the bullet and bought the systems. Ross
Perot invested $10,000 into Steve's new company (and lost his investment
when Steve went all-software).

Speaking of the 'all software' bit, OpenStep was also prohibitively
expensive. I think someone posted on the 'net that the price was ~$2500 --
and you didn't get a heck of a lot with it.

As for Rhapsody, Apple has announced plans to support college students
with really reasonably priced copies of the Rhapsody (or "MacOS
Enterprise"; ugh!) developer's version (gotta get that software from
*somewhere* ... and seeding beginning college programmers is a good
method, I think).

Finally, here's a quote from an Apple employee (as quoted on MacOS Rumors):

"This OS is going to wet a lot of pants in Redmond."

Quote:> I still think that Jobs simply saved his face by selling his going-nowhere
> company(NeXT). Fact that he immediately sold all Apple stock he
> acquired in transaction proves this.

Maybe ... or perhaps the stock sell-off was some sort of amazing plan:
sell 1,000,000 shares of Apple stock ... and watch the stock price rise as
a result.

Instant publicity.

He's done it before.

Quote:> Oh, I type this on my old mono NeXTStation 25Mhz :P

... and I'm typing this on a system that won't run Rhapsody on release (a
PowerBook 1400cs 166). :o\

--gdw

Quote:
> Dima

--
Remove the 'aarrgghh!' from the e-mail, and you'll be all set.
(%*#$&! spammers ....)

by **Lawson Englis** » Tue, 03 Feb 1998 04:00:00

Quote:> Mac advocates:
> Please explain the following to me: NeXT and NeXTStep were around
> for quite a while without any considerable commecrial success.
> What makes you think that Apple will make it successul? I still
> think that Jobs simply saved his face by selling his going-nowhere
> company(NeXT). Fact that he immediately sold all Apple stock he
> acquired in transaction proves this.

> Oh, I type this on my old mono NeXTStation 25Mhz :P

The short answer is that Apple will market it better because it has more
resources available. My sig below refutes that.

The more realistic answer is that Apple has a captive market that
desperately wants an NT-level upgrade.

The *really* realistic answer is: who knows? Rhapsody may fall flat on its
face or be the best selling OS in history or it may be relegated to the
background for the rest of its existence.

Time will tell.

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Death, taxes, Apple Advertising.
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by **Lawson Englis** » Tue, 03 Feb 1998 04:00:00

Quote:
> Maybe ... or perhaps the stock sell-off was some sort of amazing plan:
> sell 1,000,000 shares of Apple stock ... and watch the stock price rise
as
> a result.

> Instant publicity.

> He's done it before.

More like: sell off the shares, watch the stock drop, watch the board panic
and get them to oust Amelio and then step in as a savior.

Do unto others as has already been done unto you...

---------------------------------------------------------------------
Death, taxes, Apple Advertising.
---------------------------------------------------------------------

by **Joe Ragos** » Tue, 03 Feb 1998 04:00:00

> The short answer is that Apple will market it better because it has more
> resources available. My sig below refutes that.

Your sig does nothing of the sort. Your sig merely shows that you're not
willing to admit that Apple has ever done anything right.

Apple advertising sucks--sure. But it's still better than anything NeXT
was able to put together.

--
Regards,

Joe Ragosta
See the Complete Macintosh Advocacy Page
http://www.dol.net/~Ragosta/complmac.htm

by **Holger Hoffstaet** » Tue, 03 Feb 1998 04:00:00

> More like: sell off the shares, watch the stock drop, watch the board panic
> and get them to oust Amelio and then step in as a savior.

More like: tell the clueless board what to do until he's blue in the face,
see them not getting it, sell off the shares to make them feel the heat and
force them to *ING DO SOMETHING they should have done LONG ago, like
stepping back and letting people with a clue run the show.
Apple's situation can be largely attributed to the incredible apathy
of the ex-board members for the last couple of years.

Quote:> Do unto others as has already been done unto you...

<shrug> what comes 'round..

Holger
--
Holger Hoffstaette - holger"at"object-factory.com
Object Factory GmbH - http://www.veryComputer.com/

by **Jason C. Hi** » Tue, 03 Feb 1998 04:00:00

> Mac advocates:
> Please explain the following to me: NeXT and NeXTStep were around
> for quite a while without any considerable commecrial success.
> What makes you think that Apple will make it successul? I still
> think that Jobs simply saved his face by selling his going-nowhere
> company(NeXT). Fact that he immediately sold all Apple stock he
> acquired in transaction proves this.

> Oh, I type this on my old mono NeXTStation 25Mhz :P

> Dima

I don't know about why it didn't sell well. There might be something in
the cost...from what I remember, to get a NeXT cube, it was extremely
expensive. Then, later on when Jobs stopped selling the cubes, OpenStep
cost near a grand if not more, and most companies 1) Want something
cheap. 2) Want something that works. Usually in that order. Also, I'm
sure software availability played a role in it. Another thing is the
original NeXT cubes didn't have diskette drives, while this helped sell
some NeXT cubes to the Black industry [Top Secret and above, no media is
allowed to leave the premise or area in which this is part of] it didn't
sit well with companies in which almost all software at the time came on
diskette. Anyway, the above are just my guesses, and I have heard these
in more than one conversation...so some of them may be true.

Now, as to your second, why does Apple think it can make it successful.
My first opinion would be this. Many people that use Macs want the power
and stability of a Unix based operating system, yet with the ease of use
and elegance of the Macintosh interface. I love UNIX, I love Macs, I want
Rhapsody. Now, while everyone out there doesn't have a Degree in Math and
CS and are currently working on their MS in CS, and may not know what I
mean by Power and Stability of UNIX, I'm sure a lot of people do, or they
can imagine what it is, and they too want it. And I'm sure Apple can sell
off it's "new" OS to quite a few people, how many exactly remains to be
seen. However, if any indication of the sales figures for OS 8 are any
clue, you could quite possibly see stores rapidly selling out of Rhapsody
as soon as they hit the shelves.

Anyway, that's my take.

-Jason C. Hill

by **Michelle L. Buc** » Tue, 03 Feb 1998 04:00:00

>Possibly because they won't charge an arm and a leg for the OS. I notice
>you are using a NeXT Station (per your below final thought); I'm guessing
>you bought it used, right? When the NeXT came out originally, it was
>prohibitively expensive ... but still, people (well ... people with deep
>pockets and company reps) bit the bullet and bought the systems. Ross
>Perot invested $10,000 into Steve's new company (and lost his investment
>when Steve went all-software).

Actually, In 1988/1989 I was in the market for a new computer. I
comparatively priced Apple and NeXT products and NeXT won hands down. A
high end but less capable MAC system of the time cost $15,000 with a small
monitor and no printer. For about $9,000 I bought a much better system with
a 400 DPI (high for the time) fast laser printer and a 17" mono monitor from
NeXT. I have since bought more.

When the color NeXT systems became available, even the MAC magazines ranked
the NeXT products as better price/performance.

People forget what monitors, RAM, hard disks, etc cost back then.

Openstep software has always been competitively priced against rival rapid
application development systems such as GALAXY.

by **Robert Fove** » Tue, 03 Feb 1998 04:00:00

[regarding the original NeXT machine]

Quote:> I don't know about why it didn't sell well. There might be something in
> the cost...from what I remember, to get a NeXT cube, it was extremely
> expensive... [snip]

I recall seeing SJ (in person) demoing the original NeXT machine.
I was wowed, along with everyone else in attendance. Then, I saw
the price. As both Nathan Hughes and Winston cigarettes like to
exclaim: "Do the math."

Quote:
> Now, as to your second, why does Apple think it can make it successful.
> My first opinion would be this. Many people that use Macs want the power
> and stability of a Unix based operating system, yet with the ease of use
> and elegance of the Macintosh interface. I love UNIX, I love Macs, I want
> Rhapsody. Now, while everyone out there doesn't have a Degree in Math and
> CS and are currently working on their MS in CS, and may not know what I
> mean by Power and Stability of UNIX, I'm sure a lot of people do, or they
> can imagine what it is, and they too want it. And I'm sure Apple can sell
> off it's "new" OS to quite a few people, how many exactly remains to be
> seen. However, if any indication of the sales figures for OS 8 are any
> clue, you could quite possibly see stores rapidly selling out of Rhapsody
> as soon as they hit the shelves.

I agree with Mr. Hill, and share his sentiments, with the exception
of his statement "I love UNIX". I use UNIX daily, and I appreciate
its power and relative flexibility and robustness, and I respect it
as an OS... but I do not love it any more than I can love a lawnmower
or a chainsaw. Like a chainsaw, UNIX makes my life easier... but
like a chainsaw, UNIX is a powerful tool with more than a modicum of
danger associated with it. I look forward to UNIX with a human face,
an intuitive look-and-feel, and I hope that's Rhapsody. UNIX has every
possible buzzword, except the most important one... GUI elegance.

--
Prof. Robert Fovell
UCLA Atmospheric Sciences

Visit www.ucla.edu to find a serious email address

"That's not what a Mac does. I want Mac on the PC,
I want Mac on the PC." -- Bill Gates

by **Michel Cost** » Fri, 06 Feb 1998 04:00:00

This was written in
comp.sys.mac.advocacy,comp.sys.next.advocacy,comp.os.linux.advocacy

> >Possibly because they won't charge an arm and a leg for the OS. I notice
> >you are using a NeXT Station (per your below final thought); I'm guessing
> >you bought it used, right? When the NeXT came out originally, it was
> >prohibitively expensive ... but still, people (well ... people with deep
> >pockets and company reps) bit the bullet and bought the systems. Ross
> >Perot invested $10,000 into Steve's new company (and lost his investment
> >when Steve went all-software).

> Actually, In 1988/1989 I was in the market for a new computer. I
> comparatively priced Apple and NeXT products and NeXT won hands down. A
> high end but less capable MAC system of the time cost $15,000 with a small
> monitor and no printer. For about $9,000 I bought a much better system
with
> a 400 DPI (high for the time) fast laser printer and a 17" mono monitor
from
> NeXT. I have since bought more.

That's the simple TRUTH!

Quote:
> When the color NeXT systems became available, even the MAC magazines
ranked
> the NeXT products as better price/performance.

> People forget what monitors, RAM, hard disks, etc cost back then.

Yes!

--
mc

MiCMAC <http://www.micmac.com>

by **Maury Markowi** » Fri, 06 Feb 1998 04:00:00

Quote:> Mac advocates:
> Please explain the following to me: NeXT and NeXTStep were around
> for quite a while without any considerable commecrial success.

Actually it depends on what form it's in. The system definitely suffered
from attempting to be all things to all people on a machine that no people
could afford. That initial release scarred it for life.

OpenStep on the other hand, as a development system, seems to have done
fairly well considering it's cost and overheads when run on non-Mach systems.

Quote:> What makes you think that Apple will make it successul?

No, that's HOPES Apple will make it successful. Sometimes it border on
prays.

Apple certainly has no great track record either, but they do have a legion
of die hard fans, some solid hardware to run it on, and lots of good ideas to
integrate into it. They also have more money and exposure.

Quote:> think that Jobs simply saved his face by selling his going-nowhere
> company(NeXT). Fact that he immediately sold all Apple stock he
> acquired in transaction proves this.

It does nothing of the sort, of course.

Maury

by **Toon Moen** » Fri, 06 Feb 1998 04:00:00

> > When the color NeXT systems became available, even the MAC magazines
> ranked
> > the NeXT products as better price/performance.

> > People forget what monitors, RAM, hard disks, etc cost back then.

> Yes!

I still use this over six years old NeXTStation Color at home - and I have to
keep explaining to people at work that it is *not* inherent in Windowing
technology that you ruin all colors in other applications on screen when
starting a Web browser.

16-bit color - what a relieve.

--

Saturnushof 14, 3738 XG Maartensdijk, The Netherlands
Phone: +31 346 214290; Fax: +31 346 214286

by **Maury Markowi** » Fri, 06 Feb 1998 04:00:00

Quote:> More like: sell off the shares, watch the stock drop, watch the board panic
> and get them to oust Amelio and then step in as a savior.

Interesting theory I suppose, except for the fact that the stock price did
rise. But who are you to let facts get in the way of yet another Apple
* theory?

Quote:> Do unto others as has already been done unto you...

Ahhhh, THAT explains why you've sounded like Dave Field for the last year!

Maury

by **Lawson Englis** » Fri, 06 Feb 1998 04:00:00

> > More like: sell off the shares, watch the stock drop, watch the board
> panic
> > and get them to oust Amelio and then step in as a savior.

> Interesting theory I suppose, except for the fact that the stock price
did
> rise. But who are you to let facts get in the way of yet another Apple
> * theory?

My recollection is that the day he sold his stock, AAPL droped about 20%...

Quote:> > Do unto others as has already been done unto you...

> Ahhhh, THAT explains why you've sounded like Dave Field for the last
> year!

??

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