Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!swrinde!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!usc!ucla-cs!ucla-ma!joshua!barry From: barry@joshua.math.ucla.edu (Barry Merriman) Newsgroups: comp.sys.next Subject: Re: NeXT on Campus -- How's NeXT really doing at your school? Message-ID: <1991Jun13.065412.3133@math.ucla.edu> Date: 13 Jun 91 06:54:12 GMT References: Sender: news@math.ucla.edu Reply-To: barry@math.ucla.edu (Barry Merriman) Distribution: comp Organization: UCLA Dept. of Math, UCLA Inst. for Fusion and Plasma Research Lines: 49 In article melling@cs.psu.edu (Michael D Mellinger) writes: > >How well does NeXT seem to be gaining acceptance on college campuses? >What is the general attitude of the computing community? And are >people trading in their "Macintoys"(to quote Eric Scott) and PC's for >the NeXT? Absolutely. At least in the UCLA math department, there are now 7-8 faculty/grad students that have at least one (some of us have two :-) NeXT, and many of these are used for home machines. At the last SCAN (So. Cal. NeXT) meeting held at UCLA, there were around 60 people in attendance. And sales have been healthy at our bookstore as well, I'm told. > >The general attitude though is that NeXT isn't going to >survive. Oh, really? I'll give you 10:1 odds on that one! >It definitely seems to be an uphill battle. Yesterday a >faculty member walked into our Microcomputer Order Center and they >told him that it would be 6-8 months before he would receive his >machine. This definitely discouraged him(who wouldn't be?). Have >most people at least received their machines? The few people around >here that might buy a NeXT will most likely change their minds if they >have to wait six months. I'm certainly not going to wasted my time >convincing people to buy the NeXT if the company can't come through. I suspect the problem lies with your MicroComp store. These stores tend to give NeXT the cold shoulder, because it only interferes with their lucrative Mac/PC marketing. We have had similar difficulties here, but in the long run NeXT has sold well enough that they get a prominent display at our bookstore. Don't blame NeXT for the fact that your Comp Store is run by a bunch of short sighted, profit margin-grubbing, technologically insipid, and otherwise vapid, jejune, banal, inane bureaucrats (oops, I'm using the NeXT Thesaurus again :-). Barry Merriman UCLA Dept. of Math UCLA Inst. for Fusion and Plasma Research barry@math.ucla.edu (Internet) barry@arnold.math.ucla.edu (NeXTMail)