Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!cs.utexas.edu!usc!ucsd!nosc!crash!hrlaser
From: hrlaser@crash.cts.com (Harv Laser)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga
Subject: Re: Has AmigoTimes gone under?
Keywords: bankrupcy
Message-ID: <1841@crash.cts.com>
Date: 15 Mar 90 18:56:08 GMT
References: <13155@burdvax.PRC.Unisys.COM>
Reply-To: hrlaser@crash.cts.com (Harv Laser)
Organization: Crash TimeSharing, El Cajon, CA
Lines: 88

In article <13155@burdvax.PRC.Unisys.COM> raf@PRC.Unisys.COM (Ralph A. Foy) writes:
>Has anyone heard anything about AmigoTimes, a rather nice magazine
>which is/was published in Canada? I had subscribed a while ago (check
>was cashed) and when I called today to see where my mags have been
>going, their numbers have been disconnected...
>
>sigh...
>
>Ralph Foy
>raf@prc.unisys.com


Yes, Ralph... heave a big SIGH because most likely you will never see your
money again and you will never get subscription fulfillment.

I wrote for every issue of AmigoTimes that was published... nine issues
total, over the course of two years. (It was supposed to be a monthy
magazine..another sigh).  I was not employed by them.. I never stepped
foot in their offices... I live in Calif. and they were in a suburb of
Montreal, Quebec, Canada.  I met their owner/publisher Eyo Sama on
a couple occasions, the most recent of which was at the SF DevCon
last July.  He seemed like a nice, personable, knowledgable fellow
and he was paying me for my writing fairly well, as Amiga magazines
go.. (a couple others paid me a little better, a couple o thers paid
me a little less).  His payments to me as an author were not what I
would call "timely" but up through issue #1.8 there was really no
problem, other than having to make l/d calls to Canada to find out
where the check was :-/

Issue #1.9 was the last issue he spewed forth, sometime in November '89
I believe.  Shortly after it was published I began making my usual
phone calls to find out when I'd be paid.  (I live off this stuff,
you see).  The payment I was owed for that issue's writing was around
US$400.00, not a fortune, but not an insignificant sum either. 
On three separate occasions I was given the promise of "check is in
the mail" and yet, after weeks of waiting, no check arrived.

Finally, towards the end of January 1990 I had had it, and I phoned
ATimes' offices, and spoke with Lisa Sama, Eyo's wife and "keeper of
the books." I politely but strongly told her that if I was not paid
within one week I would report to the world, via People/Link and via
Usenet that they were not paying their authors and surely they did
not want that kind of information spread about so it would be in their
best interests to pay me.

A check arrived a few days later by overnight courier.  It was drawn
on their usual Canadian bank but was payable in US dollars and I 
deposited it in my bank account immediately.

Last week, some six weeks after cashing that check, it was returned to
me by my bank with rubberstamps in French all over it which translate
tothe dreaded "insufficient funds."  My bank had withdrawn the $400
from my account and charged me $5 for the pleasure.  So, I'm out
$400 plus $5 plus numerous phone calls plus my time to collect the
money plus plus etc. etc.

Magazines which are in good finiancial health do not bounce author
payment checks.  AmigoTimes is, as far as I am concerned, KAPUT. GONERS.
HISTORY.

Yes their phones are disconnected.  I have made MANY attempts to reach
Eyo Sama, by researching home phone numbers of some of  his co-works
err workers and employees, all to no avail. I have attempted to pass
messages to him through these people and he has not called me back. 
Basically, I'm screwed.  Screwed too are all the other authors of
issue #1.9 not to mention issue #1.10 which was sent to the printers
ready to roll but was never published and for all I know probably never
will be.  I've already sent a registered letter to AmigoTimes' published
office address revoking their rights to my writing for #1.10 and I've
resold the article to another magazine. (It was a review of ASDG's
Dual Serial Board). 

This is a real sad situation, not only for the staff and authors of
AmigoTimes who have been shafted, but for the Amiga community as well.
During the course of the last few months, AmigoTimes, Amiga Transactor,
Amiga Sentry, Ahoy's AmigaUser, and AMnews have all bitten the dust.
(The Amigan, too, but that one due to the publisher's poor health, not
due to financial ineptitude).  Talk about a publishing shakeout! In
about six months we lost HALF of our dedicated-magazine base!

As for who's left... I see Amiga World, Compute's Amiga Resource, 
Antic's AmigaPlus, Amazing Computing and JumpDisk as the survivors.
(I'm counting Amiga-specific magazines here, not general interest
computer mags which happen to also have an Amiga columnist, such as
Computer Shopper and Compute). Oh, and INFO, which hopefully is still
going monthly in a few months.  What's happening with INFO's planned
merger with AmigoTimes at this point, I don't know.  I'd sure like
to find out, though.