🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <449@oracle.UUCP> csimmons@oracle.UUCP (Charles Simmons) writes:

> So far I've heard three objections to the design of te NeXT machine,
> and I'm wondering just how valid the objections are.  The first objection
> is that the machine doesn't have a floppy drive for software distribution.
> ...

> It seems to me that the people who raise these objections aren't considering
> the type of environment that the NeXT machine was designed to run in.
> Certainly, these would be valid criticims if the NeXT machine was
> designed to be a standalone PC.  However, the NeXT machine comes
> equipped with Ethernet capability, and most people will want to attach
> their machine to a network. ...

Well, I had had the feeling that the NeXT machine was supposed to be
designed so that the STUDENTS could own them.  (I got this impression
from Jobs himself when he made a stop here in Princeton some time ago
(~1 year?).  They arranged a lunch for him with about 20 students so
he could meet with us and get our input.  I was one of two grad students
there.)

If the students are going to own these, they'll have them in their dorm
rooms, and they almost definitely WILL be run as standalone PC's.  I know
of one campus (Iowa State University) that has wired their dorm rooms with
a second phone line for future data communications use, and there are probably
more, but I doubt that ANYONE in the near future will be wiring their dorms
with full ethernet capability, file servers and extra tape/disk drives for
loading data.  In a DEPARTMENTAL context, I can see the use of these machines
in a fully networked environment, but then it'll be the professors who have
the individual machines, possibly a FEW grad students (but not likely), and
a couple machines for general undergrad use.  But that's not terribly
different from the way things are now with undergrad access to campus
machines, and quite different from what I thought Jobs had been wanting
to push: EACH student having their OWN machine.

That also brings up another point, the $6500 price tag, *academic*.  I don't
know many undergrad students (or grad, for that matter, but I'm not sure
Jobs was thinking about us at all) that could afford pay that much for a
machine.  When Jobs was here, he was probing us on the issue of cost as
well as other things.  The gist of the question was: "If we made this
really neat machine that does all these thing, but it's kind of expensive,
(I think he was vaguely suggesting the $3000 range, but don't remember)
would you get one?" Of course one of our Princeton undergrads piped up with,
"Oh sure; I'd just ask my parents to buy one for me", but most of the rest
of us were more of the "Gee, well, I dunno..." persuasion.  And now he's 
come out with a price of $6500?  How many students are going to be able to
afford that?  That's a fair chunk of a year's cost at a private school
and should be more than enough to pay for a full year (tuition, room&board,
books, etc) at any state school.

Maybe the economics of the thing has forced him to give up on the idea
of letting the students themselves own them, but if it really was his
intention to release a machine that's AFFORDABLE and USEFUL to the
average, individual student, I think he's failed.

------------------------------------------------------------------------
William R. Somsky                          Physics Dept ; Princeton Univ
wrs@pupthy.Princeton.EDU                 PO Box 708 ; Princeton NJ 08544