[openbeos] Re: To Whom may interest... (I wanna be a beta-tester...)
- From: "Michael Phipps" <mphipps1@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: openbeos@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Thu, 04 Oct 2001 20:13:37 -0400
>> I don't get your point. I think what you're saying is that Be's
>> marketing dept. said something like "we're gonna be an OS dedicated
>> to multimedia" but the reality of what they did was different.
>>
>> How does this relate to OpenBeOS?
>
>That OpenBeOS in some way has to be targetted too in order
>to survive or even make a remotely noticeable impact. There
I agree in some ways with you here, and in others I do not.
There are certainly some areas where we need to concentrate more
than others. But most things just can not be ignored at all.
For example - let's PRETEND (AND I AM NOT SUGGESTING THIS)
that we decided to avoid the whole media concept. People are
going to have a FIT when movies don't play in their browsers.
Or emailed jokes don't run. Or they can't listen to MP3s while they
work. OK, so media is required. Let's take something that Be ignored -
scanners. One of the reasons that I have to keep Win2K installed is
so that I can use my scanner (not supported by BeSane). If I were
an average user (my mom, say), I would ask why I would even use
BeOS, since I have to reboot and deal with 2 different disk formats to
even make my scanner work.
Sure, there are optimization decisions (dbg's book talks a lot about this),
but 90% of the work is the same, no matter what you want your OS
to focus on.
>just aren't enough qualified people willing to dedicate
>sufficient resources so that all possible "areas" are
I wouldn't underestimate the open source community.
>covered, but then again, OpenBeOS has always been about
>the technological aspects of BeOS, not the commercial,
>strategic or even psychological aspects, implicatons or
>realities that naturally come with it. Unfortunately, those
There is a season for all things. We could sit and debate marketing
and business and focus and every other such thing until our fingers
fall off. But the fact of the matter is that unless we have something
to sell/market, it is all empty discussion (and unprovable). I have
discouraged these sorts of discussions on here simply for that reason.
Not that they don't apply to OBOS. But that they do not apply NOW.
This is not the season to debate those things. It would be like a mother
and father fighting over what their new born child will study in college.
The extreme case is that the couple divorce. There is no reason to
even consider those things right now. Our burn rate is $0/month. We have
nothing to sell, at this point, except our dream. And going market price
on dreams is pretty darn low.
>-as we all know by looking at Windows and Linux- weigh a lot
>heavier than just having the most sophisticated technology.
Let's pretend that I have in my hand a mind blowing, overwhelming
commerical and strategic plan. Now can we put this all behind us?
Sure.
>Add to that the fact that the world isn't standing still or
>waiting for another OS to emerge, and you will appreciate
>that you got to focus (target) your efforts in order to be
>successful - if that is one of the goals of OpenBeOS, that
>is (and I'd like feedback and receive enlightenment on that,
>if possible).
Being successful is our goal. No, the world isn't standing still. Neither are
we.
And we are catching up to them. Microsoft has made little headway on their
REAL issues. XP isn't a huge improvment over ME, and many consider it to
be worse in many ways. We are making progress.
Feedback and enlightenment? I think that it would be a HUGE mistake to
focus on the business end of things right now. We would have to prognosticate
what will be necessary a year or more from now and start focusing on that.
If we are wrong, we all waste a year of spare time. Many people (myself
included)
think that the general purpose OS is a viable field, if you can overcome the MS
issue.
As of today (and I don't see IA, the latest challenger upsetting the field too
much), GPOS's
are the number one sellers in software, in terms of number sold. Think about it
- it has
to be. No one buys a copy of Office to sit on a shelf. That copy of Office runs
on a PC
that has an OS. Someone paid for that OS. GPOS is viable.
Anyway. This is distracting me from coding. That is the enlightenment that I
have.
I don't want anyone to be upset or distracted by this stuff. It is *WAY* too
early to mess with
it.
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