Newsgroups: comp.sys.atari.st
Path: utzoo!lsuc!jimomura
From: jimomura@lsuc.on.ca (Jim Omura)
Subject: Predictions
Reply-To: jimomura@lsuc.on.ca (Jim Omura)
Organization: Consultant, Toronto
Date: Sun, 30 Dec 90 17:35:45 GMT
Message-ID: <1990Dec30.173545.7384@lsuc.on.ca>


     As far as I can remember, I don't think I've ever posted a
"New Year's Message" beyond saying "Happy New Year!" before on
any system.  So this is probably an all-time-first for me.  I
have however, though on very rare occasion, made public predictions.
I generally do this in cases where the prediction is significant
because it "flies in the face" of the opinions of the masses, yet
I'm fairly convinced that they are highly probable.  Ie, in cases
where I'm fairly sure that I'm right and almost everybody else
is wrong.  An example was my prediction, a few years ago taht
Communism would collapse "soon" (it happened sooner than I'd have
expected, but I never had sufficient "insider" information to
go beyond that).  Also, before Nintendo proved me right I said that
games on large capacity cartridges were a viable way to make
money even in North America (not hard for me to predict since the
1, 2 and 4 Megabit cartriges came out for MSX in 1986 -- before
Nintendo had established themselves in North America).

     So what am I going to predict?  Well, as you can see by my
above predictions, they may be startling to "most people", but
in fact they were actually fairly conservative, and this one is
going to be conservative too:

     I think the coming 2 years will prove that the STE and the
Lynx were, if not "wonderful" moves, good enough.  The STE in
particular was a mixed product for me.  I wanted an improved ST
and the STE sort of parallelled my thinking.  It's not the computer
I'd have designed.  There are many things I can point to, but
the most glaring is the 2 new joystick ports.  I wouldn't have
done that.  I'd have put my money into completing the implimentations
of the current IO (read/write Centronics, mouse support of the B
joystick port, adding the buss out from the Stacey to the 1040ST
package, true SCSI) and added a 2nd MIDI out or an STMPE connection.
In short, I'd have aimed, ostensibly, at serious applications
rather than games.  But having mulled over the new spec, I'm
satisfied that there are enough improvements "for now" to support
significantly better applications than those currently on the
market, and that's the key to its viability.  Significantly
better programs will be brought out over the next 2 years making
use of these improvements.  People who buy the STEs will, in general,
be glad that they did.

     Likewise, I think more than just the fact that the Lynx is
"a really nice game machine", Atari was right in focussing their
marketting on it and giving it an early *heavy* push.  The Sega
Game Gear is out.  I can buy one if I want one *right now*!
Same with the NEC Turbo Express.  Atari has cut a niche for themselves
and the future for the Lynx as a development target is good!
Let me put this prediction in perspective a bit more -- I'm likely
to be writing a game myself in the near future and I will probaably
*not* write a version for the Lynx -- so I'm not saying this with
any current expectation that promoting the Lynx will do me any good
at all.  And quite to the contrary, may hurt the sales of the game
I have in mind because I'll be supporting a competitor.  Again,
people who by the Lynx, and programmers who develop for the Lynx,
will be glad they did.

     So there are my predictions for the coming year, and in fact
2 years.  They are typically mine in that they are so extremely
conserative, yet among the things I've read from the Atari community,
and the general computer community, they are not popularly held.
Come back next year (and in 2 years really) and see if I'm right!

PS:  Eat your own flames!  Do NOT respond to this message!  DO post
     your own predictions and reasons separately -- I enjoy
     quoting people back their pronouncements when time proves
     they needed better glasses. :-)
-- 
Jim Omura, 2A King George's Drive, Toronto, (416) 652-3880
lsuc!jimomura
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