Xorg@cup.portal.com (Peter Ted Szymonik) (04/13/89)
From GEnie:
Mr. Louie,
You did not in fact write your open letter to address the
impact of piracy - you wrote your open letter *specifically accusing*
the ST community as a whole as being the most tolerant of piracy. A
quote directly from your letter:
> "In addition, ST pirates seem better organized and
> piracy seems more accepted (or, should I say, tolerated)
> by ST users."
Not only is this complete nonsense, but it is also highly
slanderous. It paints a distorted and mythical image of the ST
community. An image which I and many other ST owners have been
fighting for YEARS to put to rest.
You also are completely ignoring the root cause of ST FALCON's
previously slow sales - ADVERTISING. I have only a basic business
education but I can tell you that without advertising NO product will
sell. You quite erroneously state:
> "Some of you point out that we haven't taken out many
> ST ads."
The truth of the matter is that your company didn't take out
*ANY* ST advertising before February of this year and you had ALREADY
proclaimed that slow sales were due to piracy!! Do I really need to
take you by the hand and go back through the message base to show you
what you wrote?
> "Many of you feel that we should just shut up about the
> whole issue and go back to the IBM and MAC market."
This is nonsense also. I defy you to show us even ONE post
where anyone has asked you to leave the ST market. What we would like
you to do is stick to selling and supporting your software rather than
posting slanderous 'open letter's in non-ST magazines that are based
on nothing but rumor and myth.
> "FALCON ST has climbed to the top of the charts..."
Not only does this directly CONTRADICT what you have been trying
to ram down our throats about piracy, but isn't this EXACTLY what I
and many other ST owners predicted MONTHS AGO!! If you'd like me to,
I can take you by your hand again and show you what you posted back in
February when everyone was telling you that FALCON **would be** the
best-selling ST program and that your company had nothing to worry
about.
[Items about advertising and editorial coverage, reviews...]
"So I can't buy your agrument that nobody knows about the
product...]
Again, you are referring to items which appeared **AFTER** you
had ALREADY proclaimed slow sales due to piracy and started spreading
your 'open letter' to non-ST magazines. My argument was that the
majority of the ST user base was unaware of FALCON's release due to
your company's non-advertising and the lack of reviews. I pointed to
that as the cause behind FALCON's slow sales back in January and
February. Now everything is fine and sales are up to speed aren't
they? Just like everyone here said they would be...
"Be realistic..."
I'm being very realistic. If you realized the damage that your
letter is now causing the ST community in the computer world you would
be quick to understand the outrage at your letter here on GEnie, on
UseNet, and in FOREM FNET. If you were an honorable man you would post
a retraction of your original comments or in the very least post an
update or correction stating that sales have improved dramatically
since the advent of advertising and press reviews.
Peter Szymonik
Xorg@cup.portal.com (Peter Ted Szymonik) (04/18/89)
THE Mr. Gilman Louie's failure to accept the fact that his
ISSUE: original comments on the ST piracy were based on
nothing but RUMOR and MYTH. (The comment being that
the ST community is more tolerant of piracy than their
MS-DOS or MAC counterparts.)
THE A letter which I uploaded about a weeks ago. In this
REBUTTAL: letter I used very basic concepts to point out that in
order for Mr. Louie to properly and realistically address
the effects of piracy on any machine, he must address the
factor of MARKET SIZE in addition to the number of units
sold per machine.
THE Mr. Louie's ORIGINAL UNALTERED 'open letter' which has
EVIDENCE now appeared on all the major services and in every
EXHIBIT A: ST and most *non-ST* magazines. This letter is printed
in its original UN-ALTERED form in the April issue of
Current Notes and many other magazines.
EXHIBIT B: Mr. Louie's * ALTERED * 'open letter' in the current
issue of Atari Explorer (May/June) in which the
original letter appears with the * DELETION * of the
paragraph in which Mr. Louie stated the number of sales
to be expected for a "good-selling" program on each
type of machine. These figures were used as a basis
for my rebuttal.
This paragraph:
"When MacIntosh and IBM versions were released, they
sold four times the volume of product over the same
period of time. Based on the current sales trends,
the ST developer will be lucky to break even. A good-
selling Amiga or MacIntosh product will sell 20,000-
40,000 copies in its first year. And IBM title will
sell 40,000-100,000 copies, yet a top selling ST
program would be lucky to sell more than 15,000."
Has been carefully and curiously EDITED OUT of the
original text of the 'open letter'.
THE BIG
QUESTION: >>> WHY?? <<<
Sales of ST FALCON have soared since the advent of advertising in ST
magazines and the reviews currently being printed in the ST press. In a
4-6 week period over 7,000 copies of ST FALCON have been sold making it
the best selling ST game program both in the United States and Europe.
I and many other ST owners defended our machine and predicted that ST
FALCON would be the number one best selling program and that ST FALCON
would reach the 12,000 sales needed for it to break-even with ease once
advertising and reviews used the ST user base.
I expected that Mr. Louie would accept the facts and events as they
have unfolded in the past two months. I expected that he would take
the opportunity to show his company's self-proclaimed dedication and
support of the ST to post a retraction, correction, or update of his
previous comments about ST users, especially in light of the fact that
his letter has appeared in non-ST magazines, further damaging the
reputation which and many many ST owners have been fighting to uphold
for years.
I leave you with the evidence above to draw your own conclusions.
Peter SzymonikXorg@cup.portal.com (Peter Ted Szymonik) (04/22/89)
Lets put it this way: Every other issue in which the 'open letter' appeared had the full text. Only this magazine - which appeared after my rebuttal of weeks ago, were the figures edited out of the letter. This was not a 'make it fit' edit, this was a delibirate omission of the figures which proved Mr. Louie's point wrong. The part which was left out was not lengthy (two or three lines at the most) and the paragraphs around the missing part were nicely 'smoothed'. Peter Szymonik Xorg@cup.portal.com
Xorg@cup.portal.com (Peter Ted Szymonik) (04/22/89)
ST FALCON does not run on a mono system. Peter Szymonik Xorg@cup.portal.com