🚀 go-pugleaf

> gmg@unify.com (Gary M. Gealy) writes:
> 
>>  Can anyone out there point me in the right direction for some information on
> Atari corporate history?
> 
> Bright in the mid 80s, went down the shitter after that...
> 
> Thanks to the Tramiels.

That's not entirely correct, and somewhat over-generalized.

Any peaks Atari had over its entire history have been mild.  Ever since
Bushnell left the company it's been on a spiral down the tubes.  Do you have
any idea how many CEO's Atari had between Bushnell (late 70's?) and the
Trameil's (early to mid 80's?)  I read a case study in my Principles of
Management class a few years ago, and I seem to remember about 4 (give or take
one).  One of the later CEO's was imported by Warner from the _textile_
industry!  Unless you can think of a way to make a solid company out of
practices like this, you should probably thank the Tramiel's for buying Atari
and not letting it go straight down the toilet like Warner was!

If you want to criticize Jack Tramiel for not running the company in a
'perfect' manner, you probably can, but remember, and think how much more Atari 
is exposed to their customer's (yopu and me) critical eye more than say IBM or
ANY of the clone comanies, or the Apple Corp.  Maybe Atari should takeon
practices more like Apple and company, and keep us more at arms length so they
could work out their problems without all of us knowing every little detail.
I personally can't find a legitimate way to criticize them much, as, Jack
Tramiel's and my positiopn were reversed I would probably do thing with just as
much apparent logic.

Also, as far as the microcomputer market is concerned, I don't think there is
_that) teremendous of a difference between Atari's future and IBM's.  (The key
there is what market I am talking about -- IBM does business in MANY other
markets than that of the microcomputer!)  I really don't think the current
80x86 line can be considered to be a large part of their future due mostly to
the clone market, so they will not have so great of footing as one might think.
This will make Atari, Apple, and IBM much more competitive with each other.  I
think it will be very similar to how it was in the mid-80's, with the
exception that Apple will obviously have a much larger share of the market
than it did then.

				-Matt the economic forecaster!