> 1. I am not talking about leaks. I am talking about a clear published > statement with reasons for their choice and with a rough time-schedule > of future products.
But Boz, this can never happen. It ignores the reality of producing products for a market. The company cannot make the decision as to which way it will go. It has to be responsive, not prescriptive. Look at Olympus--in 1984, Olympus was one of the largest SLR systems, official camera of Magnum Photo agency, and vied with Nikon for allegiance among serious SLR shooters. Then they made the decision not to go with autofocus. (Why? The bean-counters said it could not be profitable, because three other companies, Minolta, Canon, and Nikon, had already gone to AF, and "saturated the market.") Result? By 1987 Olympus OM line was in serious trouble, and now it is defunct. What if Pentax said in 1982 "We make interchangeable lens SLRs. We will not make point-and-shoot one-piece cameras." Goodbye! What if it said in 1996 "We make film cameras. We do not make digital cameras." Road to ruin! A company cannot make promises for the future. It cannot know what the market of the future will want to buy. Also, we may mistake the reason why companies conceal their new products. It's not to keep their customers in the dark. It's to avoid tipping off the competition to their plans! Nikon caught Canon napping with its D1 digital SLR and stole that market for more than a full year. Olympus guessed right in 1971 that buyers wanted smaller, lighter cameras and it catapulted its whole line to success. Canon successfully guessed with the AE-1 that polycarbonate would be the material of the future and sold more AE-1s than any camera had ever sold up to that time. There are dozens if not hundreds of examples of new innovations catching the competition unawares and earning market share for the innovator. This doesn't last forever. The competition catches up sooner or later. They must make their profit while they can. Manufacturers want to hide what they are doing FOR AS LONG AS POSSIBLE so as to extend the critical period during which their new products may have an advantage over competitors. THIS is why companies do not announce their future plans! --Mike
