🚀 go-pugleaf

In group alt.fan.bill-gates, article <32F92E...@boeing.com>,
Chris Beamis <christophe...@boeing.com> wrote:

...

>There has been some work regarding complex dynamical systems which is
>relevant to this
>question.  One paper even used the VHS vs. Betamax story as an example. 
>I don't have
>the paper handy and can't remember the journal or author's.  Has anyone
>else read any
>of this research?  I seem to remember that the author's said something
>about how VHS got
>just a tiny bit of lead over Betamax, and the nonlinear system dynamics
>were such that
>this was enough to make VHS dominate, irrespective of marketing or
>technology.  I think
>they said that technologyies were not sufficiently different to
>influence the system.

The reason why VHS won out over Betamax, and why PCs won out over the
Amiga, and why Microblorp won out over Unix are not a secret.  They are
simple common-sense.

In every case, the winner won out with a product that was widely available
at a very low price, and was typically drool-proof.  Ergo even a cretin
could learn to use it.  Perfect for the American public. In every case,
their products require little or no intelligence on the part of the
end-user.  In every case these products are available anywhere.  In every
case, these products are cheap (in the case of MS products, they are
included with the computer, which, from the consumer's point of view, makes
them free).

With videotape and PCs, the winner was the one that farmed out the
technology to third-party manufacturers, and allowed market pressure to
drive the price down, while the loser was the one with the more
sophisticated technology that kept it proprietary and commensurately more
expensive.  In the end, the cheap thing will win in America, regardless of
whether or not it works.

Case in point:  I own an amiga.  I recently upgraded my PC to a 586/100
with 32 MB and 2Gb of disk space and Win95.  When I did that, it became my
favored machine.  Prior to that, it was a 486/25 with 4Mb and 220 Mb of
disk space and Dos/Windows. When it was in that configuration, my Amiga was
my favored machine because it was much faster, more user-friendly, and more
efficient.  My Amiga (to this day) has a Motorola 68000 processor, 3Mb of
memory, and 145 Mb of hard disk, with AmigaDos 1.2.

The point being that my PC has become my favored machine when it's power
and resources reached *an order of magnitude* more than my Amiga had.  At
that point, it became better.  The odd thing is that my PC, at it's order
of magnitude greater resources, is *still* cheaper than my vanilla,
original Amiga 2000.  The problem is that, if the Amiga technology had won
out, what I would have on my desktop would be the equivalent of a
Hewlett-Packard series 800 workstation, which is far and away more than I
even use professionally (I have a series 700 workstation at work).

The public has been jimmied with inferior technology and lousy software,
but they are happy because they can use it, and it's cheap.  They have
nice, simple, drool-proof computers that can be utilized by the moron
public.  I'm not complaining - I maintain these shit-brindle systems, and
make a very good living at it.  In a sense, Bill Gates has assured my
career for as long as I want it, because PCs are fundamentally broken, and
I can fix them.  However, as a dedicated hacker, I still complain that the
most popular system is still the shittiest system available, because I *do*
have to maintain them.  If the PC and Microgliph had not won out, I would
probably be out of a job.

-- 
               David C. Wright (wri...@autobahn.mb.ca)
                  http://www.autobahn.mb.ca/~wrightd

     An honest politician is one who, when bought, stays bought.