Thursday, October 28, 1999
Hello Paula,
Thursday, Thursday, October 28, 1999, you wrote:
(snip)
Paula> A democratic nation that ignores the fact that the majority of its
Paula> citizens are not voting at all will be in trouble eventually; a business
Paula> even more so. If the vocal minority is representative of the market,
Paula> fine. If they are not ... well ... I've been computing for alot of years
Paula> and could give you a long list of truly great programs that are no
Paula> longer around, despite a core of avid, if not fanatical, fans, because
Paula> that market wasn't enough to feed the programmers, who do have to eat
Paula> like the the rest of us.
Agreed, but most users donot know one end of a pc from the other end
and they use what you preinstall...
If the bat could be installed with lets say 6 month running before
asking for registration then after 6 months of use, almost all those users
will fork out the money instead of wanting to learn a new program,
moving all their files etc.
That $35 is cheaper then relearning a new program.
As they are competing with free internet mail/outlook, one has to get
people to use it and that means marketing, not really added
capabilities.
>> I do have to say that I wish more people were tolerant of "unpopular
>> wishes"...
>> If you think it might be a better way, then ask! You might catch some
>> flack, but hey, life goes on.
Paula> No criticism of the list was intended. It's a nice list.
>> Computers are not going away, they will continue to become a more and
>> more integral part of our daily lives. Computers aren't intuitive, and
>> like the great majority of other skills in the world, they must be
>> learned and practiced.
Paula> Not to digress too much, but I work with a man who recently purchased a
Paula> PC for his home. He knows very little about PCs.He first bought a HP,
Paula> when he struggled with setting it up because HP did not provide an easy,
Paula> setup guide and he couldn't get his printer to work with it, he packed
Paula> it up, returned it to the store and got an Compaq instead (ewwww!) which
Paula> is real good at thinking like people who know nothing about PCs. He's
Paula> delighted with it; his wife is delighted with it; his daughter is
Paula> delighted with it. This represents the future of computing.
Well, did he ask advice??
Does he have any decent local shops??
Why does he end up setting it up himself?
I thought setting up an HP and similar systems means sticking a cd in
and letting it run... You get a system full with unwanted software but
it is easy...
In general buying these brand name systems LOOKS nice but it can give
you a big headache when it comes to repairs / service.
I have seen Compacs. Look nice but when you check whats inside the box
I guess you pay at least 20% extra for those looks.
Add a lousy Bios (compaqs is famous) and its one of the machines we
seriously considered NOT wanting for service. You can add Acers, Leo and
IBM to that list. And Siemens as a machine with their name which
died was a twin of an Acer... Same case, bios, the lot.
Any time you have a problem, you have not just windows problems but
Bios/driver problems.
Anyway, he shouldnt have had to setup the machine himself.
You cannot blame the factory for lazy sales people (unless its cash
and carry and then he got as ignorant computer buyer exactly what de
deserved). Service is much more important then the box/name if you
donot know the basics of what you are buying.
The fact that they swapped it indicates to me they donot know what
they are selling either...
Future of computing? I doubt it, I havent seen anyone here who
buys a second Compaq if the first breaks down...
HP printers are easy to setup, but again the shop should have
done it. We always set them up. Not just to help the customer, but to make
sure it works so that when they mess it up we KNOW it was working when
it left.
Paula> Computers will become a more and more integral part of our lives, but
Paula> they will look and behave nothing like these primitive, difficult to
Paula> use, unreliable, frustrating tools we use now - and it won't be that
Paula> long - but in the meantime, there are livings, even fortunes, still to be
Paula> made.
Buy a MAC. seriously, we sell those as well, and sofar all the buyers
come, get the system; they install the software and we never see them
back unless for addons. Compare that with pc's and the difference is
very obvious.
>> This is the only argument I can't refute. In a business aspect, it
>> would most likely behoove RIT Labs to cater to the larger and less
>> savvy market. I love TB, but wouldn't hesitate to look elsewhere if it
>> became bloatware.
Paula> If RIT Labs thought they had a chance of putting TB on even a small part
Paula> of corporate desktops, do you think there would be any contest?
I doubt they even considered it, as to do that you have to get people
to use it and thats by spreading it via all those magazine/shareware
sources, preinstalls etc.
As long as to the outsiders it looks like a hobbyistic mail program,
you havent got a chance to get it used my a large company.
Several reasons but main one is they want everybody to use the same
program.
That may not be the best program but it very very likely is a MS
program since everybody more or less knows how to use it and, its
FREE. And no learning curve...
Paula> It all boils down to whether the niche market is enough to pay the bills
Paula> and where RIT Labs wants to go. Somewhere in something written by RIT
Paula> Labs, they say the program is intended primarily for businesses. I
Paula> remember being surprised by that at the time, because I don't think I
Paula> would have named my program The Bat! complete with animated logo if that
Paula> were the case.
marketing....
Like one of the best firewalls I ever saw looked like a hackers project
dooming any USA sales from the start.
Paula> I think - having sort of forgotten now - that my point was that a
Paula> software company has more to consider than a few e-mails posted to a
Paula> user list with respect to providing news reading capabilities or
Paula> anything else about the development of their product.
agreed.. but have you ever seen any ads on the net/for the BAT??
I can preinstall the thing here but I need Thai.
I am sure in other countries smaller companies would prefer the bat to
any Ms stuff as if you get a windows corruption at least you can
delete windows directoy without having to worry where the email etc
is.
with Ms and various upgrades people can do it can be anywhere and
multiple versions of mail/addressbook may exist!
Best regards,
tracer
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