Change of product direction, good and bad news!
Posted: Tue Aug 31, 2021 10:16 pm
I'm seeing a lot of debate in this thread over what might happen to "future sales" depending on what gets released and when. I'm just going to point out that none of that really matters if there isn't a vibrant developer community making things for the platform. A computer without a developer is a violin without a musician. I just checked the downloads section of this website and to date there are mostly demos, a few games, and a few utilities available for download. Not nearly what would be necessary to sustain a platform. On the current trajectory - and I say this with ❤️ in my heart for everything the team is trying to do - the most likely outcome is that some form of the computer gets released, a few thousand hobbyists buy one, maybe a few dozen of those release some kindof software for it, and the whole thing kindof goes nowhere.
I'm going to propose something that may be controversial. Why not set up an app store for the commander platform? One that will allows devs to either release their apps for free or charge a small fee. It would encourage third party devs to make cool things for the platform, provide a revenue stream to the hardware folks, and provide incentive for folks to buy the thing because there's more stuff you can do with the thing.
Let me put this another way. I'm a professional dev with other 20 years of experience hacking on everything from system/Z to PCs to mobile and cloud. From a capability standpoint I absolutely can make cool stuff for the Commander. The reason why I'm not doing that is because I can't afford to spend the time doing so. I have a demanding full time dev gig, a family, and all the adult responsibilities that come with being someone's dad and provider. If I didn't have to work I would totally spend my days hacking away at the X16/8. -But- I do have to work and as such my time very limited which leaves me asking myself questions like "can I afford to spend [x] units of time hacking on the X16/8 when I could spend that time learning new industry skill [y] that will translate into $$$ I can use to support my family?" Sadly, at present the answer to that question is no.
Give me and others like me a reason to turn that 'no' into a 'yes'. Even if it's just for beer money. Set up a marketplace now before the hardware is released and put some energy into growing the developer community. The emulator is released so there is already a ready-bake user base for devs to cater to. If you want the x16/8 to thrive as a platform (and I most certainly do), it's the developers you need to worry about - not how phase one or three will impact future sales.
obligatory Steve Balmer "developers" video because I think it's funny