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Unoffically instigated by Eric W. Schwartz
This is a little something to try to increase the name recognition of the Amiga platform.
Get this set of pictures from Here, the AmiNet, a CD, a friend, or wherever.
Print it out, Put it on a T-shirt (or buy the T-shirt from me! Check out the E.S. Productions page, Heh) or whatever.
Hang up the printouts at work, school or wherever. Wear the shirt wherever you can. And put the images on your Website if you have one (I included some small icon type images for just such an emergency.)
When People ask you about the picture, answer their questions (And try not to lie, exaggerate heavily, or lapse into an advocacy vehemence PC-bash fit.)
If you don't like the picture, you can always substitute one you prefer. The point is to get the Amiga that bit more recognition (Hopefully by name) that it deserves. My picture, "Survivor", is meant to symbolise the never-say-die spirit of the Amiga as an entity and Amiga users in general (you know, the ones that didn't switch) I have no idea what to expect from a campaign of this sort, but I think I'll be happy if I see a few appearances of the picture in places I didn't expect to see them.
Eric W. Schwartz *
erics@coax.net
E.S. Productions *
P.O. Box 292684 *
Kettering, OH 45429-0684 (U.S.A.)
The deal is now closed, so it must be true. This possibly could herald a new age for the Amiga. It's hard to be blindly optimistic anymore however, and the above picture represents what I think most of the Amiga folk out there in Cyberland feel like. Gateway's Amiga International is already moving forward with liscencing and negotiations, and there's already three companies who will produce officially liscensed Amiga 'clones'.
The Amiga concept was born around 1982 when computer engineer Jay Miner
tried to convince his bosses at Atari (Jay had previously done chip designs
for the Atari 2600 VCS and Atari 400/800 computers) to produce a
next-generation game/computer design based around a Motorola 68000. Atari
told him they had no interest, saying the whole idea was way too expensive.
Shortly after, Jay left to pursue his dream. He rounded up a number of
equally talented hardware and software people, got some startup capital
from a group of investing dentists, and formed the Amiga corporation. For
some additional money, and to confuse Silicon Valley industry spies, Amiga
produced a number of Joystick controllers and expansions for the Atari VCS
under the title "Power System by Amiga". One rather interesting product was
their "Joyboard" controller, which was a foot-controlled thing for skiing
and driving games, and the like. Supposedly, Amiga had an in-house game
called "Guru Meditation" where the objective was to sit on the Joyboard,
perfectly still. This is said to be the basis of the use of the words "Guru
Meditation" in Amiga system crash messages in OS version 1. (1.0 - 1.3)During development, the Amiga company found itself constantly running out of money. They were able to get a (relatively small) loan of sorts from Jay Miner's old stomping ground, Atari. The deadline for payback was fast approaching, and Amiga gave Atari several opportunities to buy the Amiga company, but Atari made ridiculously small offers that got smaller every time Amiga asked. Atari knew Amiga had little to no options, and never intended to maintain Amiga as a company, instead planning to confiscate the remains when Amiga defaulted on their loan, and scavenge all the new and interesting technology they were developing. That was Atari's plan, - BUT along came Commodore computers, fat with money from C64 and Vic-20 sales, and offering to buy Amiga Corp. for $4 a share. They refused, even though it was a fine offer, saying it wouldn't be fair to Amiga's employees. Commodore followed up with a new offer of $4.25 a share, which Amiga snapped up like a starving dog. Atari's loan was paid off mere hours from deadline, and the dream of Amiga was about to be realized.
To Be Continued
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Page and picture ©1996 Eric W. Schwartz. 'Amiga' name, logos, and designs ®Amiga International (Probably)