wmartin@ALMSA-1.ARPA (06/27/84)
From: Will Martin -- DRXAL-RI <wmartin@ALMSA-1.ARPA> The following extract is from an article by Paul Richter, credited to the Los Angeles Times, and reprinted in the business news section of the St. Louis Globe-Democrat, Tuesday,June 26. Headline is AT&T CALLS ON COMPUTER MARKET. Most of the article dwells on AT&T's new personal computer and compares the marketing of it with that of the IBM PC. Anyway, in the last third or so is found the following text: "...during a spring interview, Jack Scanlon, plain-spoken president of AT&T's Computer Systems division, insisted that AT&T does not deserve a reputation for weak marketing. As an example, he cited AT&T's decision to give away thousands of copies of its UNIX operating system to students in dozens of universities across the country in the last decade. As a result, there are now an estimated 150,000 programmers and professionals who used the software in college. UNIX is expected to be a key common element in most of the line of computers AT&T will ultimately roll out." [more followed] Well, I would like a show of hands from all of you out there who received free copies of UNIX as a student in one of the "dozens of universities" cited above, during this fabled free "giveaway". Sure must irk the rest of you/us who had to PAY for UNIX, right? Where should the blame lie for this misinformation? Mr. Scanlon or Mr. Richter? If the latter, will someone in the LA area have him quietly put away before he writes again? If the former, will someone at AT&T have your PR people give him some training in dealing with the press? Anyway, I cry "Discrimination!" and demand my own "giveaway" copy of UNIX. To where shall I write? (Dear Abby, maybe? :-) Will
lauren@RAND-UNIX.ARPA (06/27/84)
From: Lauren Weinstein <vortex!lauren@RAND-UNIX.ARPA> Given the way that the popular press mangles virtually every story, particularly stories with any sort of technical content, the odds are that Jack accurately described the educational licensing procedure (which, for all practical purposes, was indeed free) and then the reporter "simplified" the statement for the story, damaging the meaning in the process. Have you ever been involved in an actual "news event" and then seen how the event gets reported? Science fiction, man. --Lauren--
edhall@RAND-UNIX.ARPA (06/27/84)
From: Ed Hall <edhall@RAND-UNIX.ARPA> As near as I can tell the article is correct, except for its mention of UNIX being given away to `students' rather than `universities'. For many years a distribution of UNIX, complete with printed documentation and reprints of technical articles, could be licensed for any number of CPU's at an institution of higher learning for a mere $300 fee. For example, a total of 27 CPU's in the California State University and Colleges were licensed for one fee--about $11 per CPU. (Only a minority of them actually ended up running UNIX, though.) I suppose you can quibble over whether this is actually `giving away' UNIX, but it is sure close to it. And so far as being a marketing ploy by AT&T, I don't know if that was the original intention, but it ended up working out that way. -Ed Hall Rand Corporation Santa Monica, CA
jeff@AIDS-UNIX.ARPA (06/28/84)
From: Jeff Dean <jeff@AIDS-UNIX.ARPA> Well, you've got to realize that, for a long time, AT&T equated the idea of selling Unix with giving it away. Marketing didn't want to have anything to do with providing Unix to the outside world. And Scanlon's claim that this university "give away" was good marketing is rubbish! Marketing had nothing to do with it (at least, not in the early days). Next thing you know, AT&T will be claiming their marketing staff asked the Labs create Unix because of the market potential for a good portable operating system. (You don't think that their marketing people could be serious about selling an operating that was developed by a couple of guys with beards in an attic?)
padpowell@wateng.UUCP (PAD Powell [Admin]) (06/30/84)
I quote the editor of one of the largest newspapers in North America:
"If we spell your name right and don't mention you were drunk,
consider yourself lucky."
Any resemblence between truth and newspaper accounts of highly technical
information is purely coincidental. By the way, if you think it is only
newspapers, the following line was one published in Spectrum:
"A micro-wave is an object about the size of a pencil, capable of penetrating
most solid objects."
Patrick ("Ignore that girl with me, she's a friend of the family") Powell