dtynan@sultra.UUCP (Der Tynan) (11/04/88)
[Rather than include threads of this discussion, I'll summarize:
The argument concerns JoBS decision to only sell NeXT to students.
Some people have called this arrogant, hoping he 'comes around to
reality soon...' Or that he's trying to influence the future
market by converting todays students]
In reality, it runs a lot deeper than this. For some background, consider
that even the mighty IBM (known for their great service) got a big shock
when they introduced the PC. They were used to selling directly to customers.
People who already knew where the ON/OFF switch was (;-). Needless to say,
they were flooded. In fact, just recently, I tried calling them about parts
for an IBM keyboard. Forget it. I got somewhere between fifteen and twenty
"oh, call (xxx)-yyy-zzz, they'll help". Back and forth across the country.
I eventually gave up. But, I digress. When you sell to the college market,
support isn't really that important. Usually, at least one person has
actually read the manual, and can answer questions. Where I went to school,
the terminal room usually had three or four guru's ever-present, who didn't
mind answering questions. For computer sales to the general public, supply
an 800-number, with around fifteen operators who have a good understanding
of the system. How often has this been seen on the net;
"I called their support number, and the turkey who answered didn't
even know how many inodes to allocate on a Banana-300MX disk, when
running super-word and USENET. I mean, when are they going to get
some REAL support??"
Then again, around 75% (rough guess) of the calls want to know "why doesn't
my C program run?", or worse, "how do I edit a file?". The third-level
market is much better at accepting machines with poor documentation and
technical support, than the rest of the world (particularly when the price
is right :-) I think his decision makes sense. That's not to say that I
like it any better.
- Der
--
Reply: dtynan@sultra.UUCP (Der Tynan @ Tynan Computers)
{mips,pyramid}!sultra!dtynan
Cast a cold eye on life, on death. Horseman, pass by... [WBY]