Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!swrinde!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!van-bc!ubc-cs!manis From: manis@cs.ubc.ca (Vincent Manis) Newsgroups: comp.lang.smalltalk Subject: Re: IBM and Digitalk's Smalltalk /VPM Keywords: IBM Digitalk Smalltalk ParcPlace Message-ID: <1990Nov27.203251.27742@cs.ubc.ca> Date: 27 Nov 90 20:32:51 GMT References: <5467@taylord> Sender: news@cs.ubc.ca (Usenet News) Distribution: comp Organization: Institute for Pure and Applied Eschatology Lines: 29 In article pallas@eng.sun.com (Joseph Pallas) writes: >>As far as I can recall, everytime a big company like >>IBM or AT&T has embraced a small company's product as their standard then >>it has been the kiss of death (or at least of long and lingering illness) for >>the company and the product. >Perhaps you've never heard of a small company called Microsoft? :-) I think that the original comment only applied to companies which were developing new technologies. :-) On the other hand, IBM owns a chunk of Intel... I for one am delighted about the agreement. Let's suppose that IBM throws a few million at Digitalk, then gives up in frustration and buys Bill Gates' wonderful new Basic product, whatever it is. So Digitalk has had a substantial cash infusion, has been able to develop some good products, and has received a lot of visibility. Maybe that would skew their efforts away from the Mac (I can't comment on how good the Digitalk Mac support is), but Apple is obviously able to make the same technology investments as IBM. In any case, look at NeXT and Metaphor, among others, if you want to see how seriously IBM is taking object-oriented technologies. They're putting a lot of money into companies which have staked their future on OO technologies. Maybe we ought to be a bit less cynical? -- \ Vincent Manis "There is no law that vulgarity and \ Department of Computer Science literary excellence cannot coexist." /\ University of British Columbia -- A. Trevor Hodge / \ Vancouver, BC, Canada V6T 1W5 (604) 228-2394