tsouth@pro-pac.cts.com (System Administrator) (02/26/89)
In the latest issue of Compute magazine, March 1989, the "COMPUTE specific"
section mentioned a number of things that I think should be voiced in this
forum. Trying to walk the thin line, since there was no phone number
available for the editor staff, I want to state a few excerpts from this
section, written by Gregg Keizer, which should be quite interesting to the
net, and specifically to the Apple Inc. employees who regularly read the
info-apple.
In Gregg's section, "Has Apple Lost?", he takes an interesting look at the
seeming downfall of Apple in losing the educational software market.
"Numbers, so they say, don't lie. Ands the numbers from the
Software Publisher's Association (SPA) don't look good for the Apple II."
He goes on to provide substance to this argument:
"...software sales from the first three quarters of 1988 showed
the Apple II losing ground on all fronts. Compared to the same period
in 1987, total sales of Apple II software were down nearly 6 percent."
Now, this may not seem like much, but to you and I (and Apple) it should
forewarn against a trend that is likely to keep up. Further more, Gregg
describes how almost every bit of the lost revenues are going directly to
MS-DOS sales. During the periods mentioned, Apple II sales were down
approximately 6.8 percent, while MS-DOS sales were up 6.4 percent. And,
as noted, one of the major reasons that parents purchase Apple II's for
their kids is that they are able to use them as they do at school. With
a trend towards MS-DOS, the home market could well be turning away from
Apple II sales if there is no school incentive.
Gregg wraps up his article with a foreboding tone:
"So does the Apple II line have a full future? It has to be a
tossup if the downhill trend continues. What could Apple do to turn back
the tide? Drop its computer prices, especially the overpriced IIgs.
When educators and parents are forced with the hard economic choice
between _one_ IIgs or _two_ MS-DOS machines, it doesn't take a rocket
scientist to predict the decision most people will make."
As for my own comments, I sincerely feel that Apple should take a look
at just what they are doing to the IIgs market with this price increases.
The single fact that Mac prices, in some areas have gone back down, but
_no_ Apple II prices have even been mentioned for reduction is making
educators highly biased, in my opinion, towards the low cost MS-DOS
markets. We can preach quality, software base, and support all we want,
but this matters little when most lower, middle, and high school CS
departments are looking at the cold hard facts of budgeting.
Todd South
P.S. For those of you that do not regularly read Compute magazine
I recommend that you pick up the March 1989 issue, as it
really provides a bounty of Apple information as compared to
previous issues' average information towards the Apple II.
--
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INET: tsouth@pro-pac.CTS.COM - BITNET: pro-pac.UUCP!tsouth@PSUVAX1SEWALL@UCONNVM.BITNET (Murph Sewall) (02/27/89)
>When educators and parents are forced with the hard economic choice >between _one_ IIgs or _two_ MS-DOS machines, it doesn't take a rocket >scientist to predict the decision most people will make." There ARE other choices (beside Amiga, which probably is a better deal than either of the above). There are a LOT!!! of pretty good to *extremely good* programs for K-12 (K-8 for sure) that require an Apple 2 but ===> NOT <=== a IIgs. Soo... buy Laser 128's (I had a friend that would have done that if 47th Street Computer not offered him an even better deal on a //c -- NOT a //c+ -- system). Schools have an existing investment in software that's still perfectly good stuff (except for copy protection and routine "wear and tear" on *arrgh* "out-of-print" titles). Laser's fit the budget better than MeSsy DOS machines. How is it that Laser can make a profit selling "basic computing" at prices Apple seems unwilling to compete with? Murph Sewall Vaporware? ---> [Gary Larson returns 1/1/90] Prof. of Marketing Sewall@UConnVM.BITNET Business School sewall%uconnvm.bitnet@mitvma.mit.edu [INTERNET] U of Connecticut {psuvax1 or mcvax }!UCONNVM.BITNET!SEWALL [UUCP] -+- I don't speak for my employer, though I frequently wish that I could (subject to change without notice; void where prohibited) According to the American Facsimile Association, more than half the calls from Japan to the U.S. are fax calls. FAX it to me at: 1-203-486-5246
jm7e+@ANDREW.CMU.EDU ("Jeremy G. Mereness") (02/28/89)
A little note on top of this....
The last several issues of MacWeek have described how Apple is in
rather serious financial trouble right now. Apparently, the rise
in memory costs and their subsequent, across the board price-hike
has caused sales last quarter to plummet.
I want to buy a Apple3.5 for my new GS, but $369 is out of my reach.
Worse, the price for the same device was as much as $50 less two
months or so ago.
jeremy mereness
jm7e+@andrew.cmu.edu (arpa)
r746jm7e@cmccvb (bitnet)
p.s. Incider has given the TranswarpGS high praise; maybe this will raise
the standards of Apple // computingmartillo@cpoint.UUCP (Joacim Martillo) (03/02/89)
In article <cY2RRLy00WE14-Llop@andrew.cmu.edu> jm7e+@ANDREW.CMU.EDU ("Jeremy G. Mereness") writes: >A little note on top of this.... >The last several issues of MacWeek have described how Apple is in >rather serious financial trouble right now. Apparently, the rise >in memory costs and their subsequent, across the board price-hike >has caused sales last quarter to plummet. I have seen this item as well. In several articles the observation was couple with the announcement of hiring several IBM executives to top posts at Apple. If anything, hiring IBM executives must be considered the true beginning of the downfall of IBM. Now, I must state unequivocally. I like IBM machines and think they are generally well designed but IBM executives rarely seem to understand why IBM is a great company and how exactly the Watsons architected the firm and under what assumptions the architecting took place. Thus, IBM executives moving to much smaller firms apply management and marketing principles totally inappropriate to smaller firms like Prime, Lotus, DG or Gould. It is not surprising that these firms are all going down the toilet. Gould has more or less already been flushed.