CompuServe Messages

"COMMODORE RESTED ON ITS LAURELS WITH A BRILLIANT PRODUCT AND LOOK WHAT HAPPENED, LASTLY TO REINFORCE THE MESSAGE…" I basically agree with this statement, but there are some things to remember. 1) NTSC Toaster sales are very good. Without maintaining good American sales, the market for and surrounding the Toaster is likely to vanish. So they will plug away with the Flyer, ScreamerNet and other integrated projects for the American market, and enter the PAL market when they can afford to redesign the Toaster.. 1b) Commodore's actions may appear to be _similar_ to Newtek's, but in fact they are the _opposite_. NewTek is going after the largest, most talented market (America). Note that being the most popular platform in Europe did not produce much usable applications software; Very little, in fact, given the market size over there. It is no secret that America is still the most active and competitive developer market (esp. with regards to software), with many more programmers per capita than anywhere else. If the Amiga's Euro-market share had been aquired in the U.S. & Canada instead, we would be swimming in applications software and that is a fact; You simply would not be able to keep the developers off your doorstep. 2) A whole market of software and hardware products that have been made or come to rely on the Toaster now exists. Almost all of it relies on the NTSC format. This 3rd-party support for the Toaster is so robust, it truly sets it apart from even the Toaster-like products costing 10x more. If the Toaster had started as a PAL product instead, the situation would be very different right now. 3) NewTek's DTV products (not Digiview 🙂 are integrated. Commodore, however, can't even keep CDTV/CD32 compatible with the Amiga line (which fragmented their market, deprived Amiga users of full CDTV compatability, and drove potential developers away who would have written CDROM software for a market that also _included_ the 3-4million Amigas). 4) Europeans using the Amiga/Toaster in NTSC mode w/transcoder will benefit from the _large_ array of existing Toaster support products developed in America, and the existing Toaster developers will benefit from a larger userbase and not having to face porting their products to PAL. 5) Aside from software talent, Hollywood is also the biggest part of the NTSC market (yeah, I know.. I distrust Hollywood, too, but…..). So there is the artistic talent and motivation to consider also. While Europe has lots of TV talent, the TV-addicted American market is bursting at the seams. -Chris