October 21, 2000 - Executive Update
Dear Amiga Family:
I am writing this to you as I am flying back from a wonderful
two days in Melbourne Australia. It was indeed a great delight and
pleasure to meet with all of the wonderful members of the Amiga
Family downunder, and I look forward to the next opportunity of
coming down to visit.
I especially want to thank all of the dealers, developers and
end users who attended the seminars and the hundreds of you who
joined at the dinner.
Amiga truly is a global family, and to many an unknown
phenomena. It is the Amiga Family who has kept this amazing system
alive and growing.
I would like to take a moment and recognize the efforts of two
people especially who made my stay in Australia a delight, and
educational as well. Jeff Rose, of Unitech the d'Amiga Distributor
for Australia and Basil Flinter the Secretary of the Amiga Down
Under Group or A.D.U.G. I want to thank them both for taking the
extra time to help me truly understand what Australia and New
Zealand mean to Amiga, and what Amiga can do to help our Family
downunder. I can say that on the next trip, I will take the time to
visit New Zealand, and say hello.
There are many exciting things happening with Amiga, and I
wanted to tell everyone, what the attendees of ACE 2000
learned.
Alrighty then, here we go:
AmigaOS 3.9
Shipping this Christmas 2000 an upgrade for the AmigaOS! Version
3.9 of the AmigaOS will be shipping, and ready for your holiday
season. AmigaOS 3.9 is being developed in concert with Haage and
Partner GmbH, and a new web site that will include a feature list,
and other bits of information will be available shortly. OS 3.9
will be available for under $40.00. Watch the site for more
details. In the meantime, here's a screen shot.
While Amiga is still a Benevolent Dictatorship, and not a
democracy or even a republic, we do listen to you, the community,
and strive to create products that you would enjoy using, and even
(dare I say) purchasing.
It is because of the community that we are pleased to announce
the first in a series of new hardware that has been designed by
Amiga, and soon to be manufactured by Amiga OEM partners.
The first in the AmigaONE series of products are the AmigaONE
PPC 1200, and AmigaONE PPC 4000 cards from Eyetech. Available to
developers in December this year, these new products are designed
specifically for the Amiga Community.
We also are announcing another partner bPlan GmbH who is also
creating a new AmigaONE PPC based desktop computer. More details
will emerge shortly about bPlan and the products that they will be
offering.
Please visit the AmigaONE web site to learn more.
I would also like to announce new versions of the Amiga
SDK.
AmigaSDK version 1.1 will begin shipping on October 24, 2000. In
addition to an upgrade for the Linux version, we are please to
announce the Windows version of the Amiga SDK.
Now I made a mistake in the September 28 Executive Update. Amiga
SDK 1.1 does not include the sound, UI, or 3D pieces. These will be
found in version 1.2, will be out shortly. I am sorry for the
error, but know that any purchaser of an Amiga SDK will receive
free updates, and upgrades for 12 months from the date of
purchase.
Possible Amiga Community Investment Opportunity:
Another announcement made in Melbourne was the possibility of a
Registration A filing for Amiga. Since the announcements of the
Amiga, Incorporated plan and strategy we have continually received
questions, and offers of investing in Amiga.
We at Amiga have been trying to find ways to give something back
for all of your efforts, and continued faith in what we are doing.
We are investigating a method where we can offer 10% of Amiga to
the community in a Registration A filing.
Now as with any investment there is risk associated, and before
anyone should invest we will of course encourage people to read the
plan, prospectus, and risks.
We are investigating this in earnest, but before we continue
down this path much further, we wanted to see what the community
thought. We have established an e-mail address of
investor@amiga.com where members of the Amiga community can send us
a message with their interest. We are looking for no less than
$250.00 per investment. If you are interested please send an e-mail
message along with the dollar amount that you would be interested
in investing.
We have not decided on whether or not we are going to do this,
but to date we have investigated many opportunities and this looks
to be a great option.
Now each country has its own rules about Registration A filings,
so you would want to check with local authorities to learn what
rules may apply to each of you.
Closing:
It has been an amazing 10 months since we started Amiga
Incorporated. The community has seen the delivery of the Amiga SDK,
an upgrade, and an upgrade to the AmigaOS, and now the announcement
of three PPC based AmigaONE products.
Well, we have a long ways to go, and many more battles to fight,
but I am confident that with the community with us, and the
continuing enhancements to the product line that there is a long
and exciting future for Amiga.
Again thanks to Greg, and Michael, and the thousands of other
Amigans downunder who made ACE 2000 such a great event.
To the user group members around the world, it is time to start
calling the others who have drifted away, and let them know what is
happening, and that they can be part of continuing the legacy that
is Amiga.
Get Boinged!
Bill McEwen and the rest of the Amiga Team
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