Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!van-bc!rsoft!mindlink!a186
From: a186@mindlink.UUCP (Harvey Taylor)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga
Subject: "I want a VisiCalc"
Message-ID: <3082@mindlink.UUCP>
Date: 6 Sep 90 13:57:57 GMT
Organization: MIND LINK! - British Columbia, Canada
Lines: 42


  [Subject: "I want a VisiCalc"]

  It is the stuff of legend that when VisiCalc was first released (1980ish)
fat wallets would walk into computer stores and say things like:

Businessman: I want a VisiCalc.
SalesDroid:  You will have to buy a computer to run it on.
Businessman: Uh whatever. I want a VisiCalc.

  The moral being that the application sold the computer, at that time
the Apple ][.

  It may be that CDTV is a sufficiently neat, accessible product that
a similar logic will kick in for the home consumer. We have recently
witnessed the excitement generated by the concept of the Fred Fish
Compact Disk. This is fine for the techno weenies who read usenet, but
it ain't gonna sell in Peoria or Saskatoon.
  My personal dream is to get a bunch of NASA CDROMs with Voyager and
Mariner imagery and write a program that displays this data. Again this
will only appeal to a limited number of spaceniks.

  So here's the challenge: What is the `magic VisiCalc' application that
is going to sell CDTVs like hotcakes?
  Secondarily, what do you really want to see as an Amiga CD application?

  <-Harvey

  PS.
  If you are a developer who thinks you have such a product, I don't expect
you to tell us all about it. I am however trying to flex the collective
imagination into contemplating what might be great CDTV products.
  PPS.
  I know CBM has mentioned a 100 software titles for CDTV. It will be
interesting to see just what they are.

"The social addiction to armaments races is not fundamentally different
                    from individual addiction to drugs." - G. Bateson

    Harvey Taylor      Meta Media Productions
     uunet!van-bc!rsoft!mindlink!Harvey_Taylor
             a186@mindlink.UUCP