Path: utzoo!hoptoad!amdcad!apple!bloom-beacon!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!cs.utexas.edu!natinst!bigtex!juniper!mentat
From: mentat@juniper.uucp (Robert Dorsett)
Newsgroups: alt.next
Subject: Re: NeXT Software Developers
Message-ID: <5701@juniper.uucp>
Date: 20 Oct 88 17:27:58 GMT
References: <12888@oberon.USC.EDU>
Reply-To: mentat@juniper.UUCP (Robert Dorsett)
Distribution: usa
Organization: Austin UNIX Users' Group, Austin, TX
Lines: 56

In article <12888@oberon.USC.EDU> robiner@ganelon.usc.edu (Steve) writes:
>First of all, I've heard rumors that the blank optical disks for NeXT
>will be in the $50 range.  Can anyone confirm this?
>
>Now, given that, how will software distributers feel about marketing
>stuff for a system which can only read media witha $50 fixed cost?  
>The only alternatives I can see are:
>
>1) bring your own CD disk down to the store with you and they copy it on
>   ( dangerous, especially if you have other valuable data on it already )
>
>2) download it with the 9600 'modem'.
>   ( time consuming and someone's still got to pay the phone bill )
>
>3) Tar tape distribution, and hope enough people are NFS'ed to mainframes.
>   ( limited to certain users, and still expensive )

In other words, an expensive computer produces a small market (evidence:
less than 50,000 Sun's, 30-40,000 Mac II's).  An expensive base media pro-
duces an expensive distribution (we're probably going to see the first four-
digit applications for a relatively mainstream computer).  The expensive
distribution will result in an even smaller market.  I really can't see 
developers getting all that excited about the Next (I refuse to mix case)
anytime soon.  I cannot see "stores" even stocking up on Next equipment or
software, due to the highly limited market (we'll see about as many "Next"
dealers as "Suns R Us" outlets :-)).  The base media (no floppies, remember) 
will further hamper public-domain distribution, unless it's on a network or 
via modem.  I see these constraints as CRIPPLING to the long-term viability of 
the machine.  It'll probably serve to limit the Next market to the areas 
already adequately serviced by Sun and Apollo, and is unlikely to provide 
significant competition to any Apple products (i.e., administrative, student 
consumer, CAI work).  The technical consumers who will buy a Next machine
in favor of a *Mac II* seem few in number (they exist, but will they be
"significant" in a market kind of senses?). 

Some small or independent developers will write or test software on the 
machine, but that would probably be the exception rather than the rule.  

Perhaps I'm being naive, but I can't think of any particularly good reasons
to jump on the Next bandwagon.  The machine is doomed without software or an
easy method of distribution.  This is *not* the same as comparing it to other
"new releases" without software--past computers have at least provided some
convenient MEANS to propagate materials.  I can't see the machine "breaking
into" education, but can see it doing well in industry--a market which Jobs
is snubbing.

Comments?  Dissent?  Flames welcome here!


"NeXT...the machine for the elite few."


-- 
Robert Dorsett        {ames,utah-cs,rutgers}!cs.utexas.edu!ut-emx!juniper!mentat
                                                             mentat@juniper.UUCP
University of Texas at Austin