4000 in Byte
Sometimes, when I reflect on the Amiga and the Mac and the PC, I think that
so many computer graphics people actually think that they created this
market… but to look at it another way, there has been, and always will
be, a tremendous number of people who are looking for more inexpensive ways
of solving big problems. It's a very general statement, I realize, but it
can go a long way to understanding how the Toaster market grew as fast as
it did, and may serve as a future warning as to how it might disappear.
The same goes for the Amiga market… if it stops solving people's
problems, it could disappear or mutate.
I'm just finishing up a comparative article for Desktop Video World
magazine, comparing a half-dozen presentation graphics packages on all
three platforms. It's still stunning just how much major butt-kicking the
Amiga can inflict on the other platforms. While the Amiga multimedia
presentation program was flipping screens at the fast-paced beat of a
techno-pop tune, the Mac and Windows packages were struggling to keep up
with the frame rate of a QuickTime movie. Blitters and multitasking are
still ahead of the Mac and PC.