🚀 go-pugleaf

I totally agree with Jim Wilde's remarks about the cynicism of recent 
posts here. Business is business and I don't blame SCALA a bit for 
cross-platform development. In fact, realistically appraising the 
situation, we should consider that SCALA might never support the Amiga 
platform in the future if it doesn't bring in some major revenues from 
the PC platform in the near future.

I sympathize with Joe Rothman and commend him for sticking by the 
platform as a dealer. His survival may be at stake, but so is SCALA's. I 
really am disappointed at the continuing whining here and the perceived 
need to find blame with someone, anyone, about the Amiga situation. Look 
at it this way: Computers evolve. Software evolves. Then the hardware 
evolves some more and the software usually includes greater capabilities, 
which makes it larger and slower -- unless you're running it on the 
machine it was designed for (and even then it might be slower than we'd 
like). 

Eventually, upgraded software grows too large for older, 
unaccelerated machines. Where can the Amiga go? The 060 processor? Sure, 
but that appears to be just a short-term solution. To remain competitive, 
it has to move to a different processor -- whether powerpc, alpha or even 
the P6. And since we don't have those machines yet -- and it's still 
reasonably questionable whether we will get them -- it makes sense for 
the developers to try to break into other markets (like Wintel). So let 
them wait until the Amiga market sorts itself out and they can design new 
software for the new boxes.

Having come to the Amiga from the Macintosh camp and working among 
PC-steeped colleagues, I remain in awe of the Amiga's many superiorities. 
I've considered migrating to another platform, but when I've compared the 
cost (even of RAM alone) of doing what I want to do, upgrading an older 
Amiga is still a far more attractive option. (Although I wish we could 
standardize with some of the other platforms to provide better internet 
access).

How about we take a more positive attitude. We ought to be grateful for 
all the support our friends continue to give us -- John Chang included. 
He's been great to this newsgroup over the years, providing a tremendous 
amount of technical support here, to say nothing of the IRC sessions he's 
held (and yes, I have read the transcripts in Amiga Report).

It may sound trite, but in this case it's true: it is better to light a 
single candle than curse the darkness like a broken record.

==============================================================================

Greg Brown
SCALA MM400 User and Fan

==============================================================================