Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!asuvax!ncar!news.miami.edu!mthvax!rsherman From: rsherman@mthvax.cs.miami.edu (Roby Sherman) Newsgroups: comp.sys.apple2 Subject: Apple II FOREVER! (an open letter to software companies) Message-ID: <1991Apr14.193943.28540@mthvax.cs.miami.edu> Date: 14 Apr 91 19:39:43 GMT Organization: The Tao of Programming Lines: 117 I have composed the following open letter which I am mailing to incider magazine, Nibble, and a few select Software Developers. I would like to try and get this open letter distributed as widely as possible, so please, folks, let's help out in getting this message out. RE-POST! Thanks, Roby Comments/suggestions are welcome... Please keep your FLAMES to yourselves. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Dear Mr. Software Company : I don't understand your reasoning. You tell me that your company will no longer write software for the Apple II family because 1> THEY ARE NO LONGER SUPPORTED BY APPLE - Yes, Apple doesn't actively market the Apple II line, but the Apple II product has earned a reputation over the years, a reputation that gives the product a sense of MAGIC when you own one. And that reputation SELLS Apple II's, even TODAY! Also, WHY would Apple HIRE programmers, paying them top dollar, to work on a product that they were going to "kill?" I don't know about you, Mr. Software Company, but I certainly would not go to work for a company if there was no sense of JOB SECURITY. And yet... every month, Apple hires NEW people, whose sole purpose in life is work on Apple II's! Now, let's just say for a moment, that Apple *DID* drop the II line? If Apple came out tomorrow and said, "WE WILL NO LONGER PRODUCE APPLE II'S..." SO WHAT? Would 5 and 1/2 million people throw out their II's the very next day? The answer is NO. Apple II's are not going to be chucked out the window, or buried in the back yard, just because Apple drops the line. Now I DO agree that YES some people would sell their II's, HOWEVER, did it ever occur to you, Mr. Software Company, that if 400,000 people sold their Apple II's that they would be selling them to 400,000 OTHER people??? And did it also occur to you, that these people, would soon be looking for SOFTWARE and HARDWARE products for their "NEW" computer??? 2> APPLE WON'T ISN'T HELPING US DEVELOP SOFTWARE / THERE ISN'T A BIG ENOUGH MARKET. Well, I'd like to bring up the Commodore Amiga. You complain about the lack of Apple's support, but you turn right around and write program after program for the Amiga. Commodore DOES NOT support developers AT ALL (Meanwhile, Apple buries YOU in technotes!) and yet you "MANAGE" to write software for that machine, selling to an installed base, SIGNIFICANTLY less than the Apple II installed base, but there is more of a "MARKET" there than the 5 1/2 million Apple II's HERE? 3> THE APPLE II LINE IS TOO SLOW / TOO DIFFICULT TO PORT SOFTWARE TO - Well, Mr. Software Company, all I can say is this : * Is it MY fault that your programmers are too lazy or lack the know-how to re-write a program for the Apple II? If your hire programmers who only know how to write in C and not 65xx assembler, am *I* to blame? Rather than trying to save a buck, why don't you hire some extra programmers who NOT ONLY can write Apple II software, but can WRITE it WELL! Hire the Doug Smiths, the Bill Budges, the people who can make that computer sing, rather than some old IBM hacker who writes messy, inefficient code, which makes the program slow and a pain to use. And the people will buy your products. * Is it MY fault that you try to cut corners by "porting" software, rather than writing specifically for MY machine, taking advantage of IT'S features? Yes you can argue that the CPU speed is only 1 mhz or 2.8 mhz. Again, I ask, SO WHAT? I've seen demos written for both the Apple II and the IIgs that run circles around other machine platforms. How is this possible? Because the code was written FOR that machine, it wasn't ported from some poorly written C code. It seems to me that programmers have gotten so hung up on these faster "BOOM! ZAP! KAPOW!" machines, running 20-33mhz, that they have gotten lazy, and have forgotten what it's like to write "EFFICIENT" code. They much rather use a high-level language which is slow and sluggish on anything less than 20 MHZ. And *IF* you find you must use a C compiler and you don't like the ones around on the Apple II, do what they used to do in the "old-days." WRITE one! and sell IT, too and make MORE money! Stop looking for everything to be HANDED to you. When a machine first comes out, did the languages come with it? NO, someone had to write it. If they did a bad job, SOMEONE ELSE wrote another version. 4> THERE ARE NO TRUE II MAGAZINES OR OTHER CHANNELS TO ADVERTISE APPLE II PRODUCTS - Well, SEND press releases. Post THEM to the Internet, send them to user-groups, SEND them to dealers, schools, magazines! If a II user knows that he/she can receive information via this channel, they will GO BACK to that channel in the future. And when I say send releases to the dealers, I mean also GET THE DEALERS OFF THEIR LAZY BUTTS! Send field rep in and put up displays, get them to order your products through Merisel and Micro D, or Roger Coats, or DIRECT! Show them that by selling your products, it will increase the margin in the sale and increase the money that THEY take home! And once a demand for your products is created, the distributors will fulfill that need. How? By Advertising in Magazines. And when they are not enough magazines to hold all of the distributor's ads, MORE magazines will spring forth! 5> SOFTWARE IS PIRATED SO HEAVILY ON THE APPLE II THAT WE SIMPLY CANNOT MAKE ANY MONEY FROM AN APPLE II PRODUCT - Pardon my french, but that is utter bullshit. I have friends with IBM's and Amigas and BOTH of them have MORE pirated software than ANY Apple II person I know. Piracy is wrong, I agree, but it is something that will continue to exist on EVERY machine for a long time to come! But to sit there and say that Apple II has the worst case of piracy, over IBM and AMIGA, is just blatant lying. Piracy is just as bad on EVERY PLATFORM as it is on the Apple II, and YET you STILL write software for these other machines, why? So, Mr. Software Company, in closing I would just like to say, that these "excuses" you've given the Apple II community are just that, EXCUSES. If you continue to support the Apple II, then the Apple II community will continue to support you, by purchasing your products. Thank you, Roby Sherman -- Internet : rsherman@mthvax.cs.miami.edu |-----|-----|-----|-----|-----|-----|-----|-----|-----|-----|-----|-----|-----| .signature : This message is from the Robester; the Robe Man; the Robo-ski; The Robedude, doing that Internet thing.. Robe-o, Robe-o, ROBE-O!