From: William Donzelli <aw288_at_osfn.org>
<There seem to be some foolish people on this list, judging from two of
<today's posts. Kai made some great points a while back in his rant, so I
No it was just a rant. While the MITS box is collectable and interesting
in many ways my comments about it were somehow extended to the IMSAI and
those trying to manufacture it again. Fools, you say, victims of partial
reading I say.
<will not repeat them, but I would like to add one - that of "public
<relations". The two awful posts in question show that there is a problem
<brewing.
yes and right here in river city...
<The two posts were basically concerned with dealing with those people
<outside of this list. The first post was about the zdnet Altair possibly
<going into "corperate hands and from there it can be lost, damaged, ...".
Since the quote is from my post why not step away from ad hominin
commentary.
Since reading out of presented contects is going on... First: I worry
that material will be lost. Never did I say dell was a bad guy, they may
be offended themseleves by other bad guys actions.
<It seems this person (along with quite a few others) does not think too
This person has a name! Disagreement is acceptable and discussion over it
as well but sidewise swipes are not.
<highly of corporate institutions, even though quite a few have established
<(or at least made an honest effort) museums and protection for their
<historic holdings. In places where politics plays serious games -
Yes and yes, some very good, some are failures. DEC made an effort with
what lead up to TCM is Boston... what happend after DEC stopped funding
them is where matters apprently went awry. We should ask why.
<listen in on this list. I know for a fact that some of the higher echelon,
<including the President, of ANS (my former employer) were quite interested
<in the fates of some of the old NSFnet gear. If I had made some less than
<friendly remarks about ANS to this list (or anywhere public, really), I
<think the supply of old networking goodies that RCS was being given would
<have dried up in an instant. Now I do not know what kind of corporate
<support VCF gets, if any, but it could go away instantly as well, with
<just a few short posts. Of course, with all of the Microsoft and IBM
<bashing that goes on here, it would be a miracle if any support ever came
<from that pair ever again.
While there is the sound of truth in this I think this is a gross over
reaction. While your comments on political care are warrented, that does
not override someone elses personal opinion or concerns. The latter be
more important. No one was accused of doing anything bad, only concerns
of "what if".
<what my local scrapper does . [tomb raiding for gold]. . .". Now these
Interesting juxtapostion of two comments from two people that see things
differently. My Tomb raiders was NOT aimed at scrappers, I doubt they
make much of the gold fingers and the aluminum. I was aiming at the those
that break up rare systems for pure cash and little care of historical
value.
FYI: those that collect and trade for cash value are not hostile to
collecting. People rarely toss out something that has value. So to me
while a $40,000 Apple 1 is totally out of reach, it may convince someone
that the poly-88 in their basement is better served as collectors fodder
rather than the bottom of the trash bin.
<himself. Now if you go into a scrapyard screaming "bloody murderer", you
<can bet that the PDP-8/e you have been eyeing will be loaded into the
<Taiwan bound container first, probably on its face. Once again, just for
<spite.
No doubt true. the scrapper is doing a job, the dope that dropped it
there is the one that deserves the slap. But then again business has
priorities. Where we can help is to make it easy, maybe even a small
value to those that might otherwise scrap systems.
<Yes, this is politics. Just remember that its a good idea to have friends
<in high places. Having enemies up there does no good to anyone, but with
<a little responsibility, is easily avoided.
True, however your comments sound much like censorship. People don't like
that and most companies do not either.
Now, the original topic. DEll has gotten a few hits on their page from
me over the last day or so, while it's unlikely I'd buy a new PC from
them or anyone else for varied reasons none relecting on their products,
it was and informational visit. Besides, I happen to like dell, I have
three of their older 386/486 machines. One of which was salvaged from
the trash completely functional. Full circle, eh!
Allison
Received on Sat Aug 21 1999 - 22:29:47 BST