Legitimacy of the Ten Year Rule.

From: Roger Merchberger <zmerch_at_30below.com>
Date: Wed Jan 27 00:17:14 1999

On or about 12:15 AM 1/27/99 -0500, Bill Yakowenko was caught in a dark
alley speaking these words:

>First, are you telling me that Vaxen haven't dropped off in popularity
>yet? Sure, some are still in use. But then, so are some valve-radios
>(by collectors). Being in use isn't a problem; being in *common* use,
>still being at the peak of popularity; *that* is what I would like to
>avoid on this list. This list is (for me) a refuge from the marketing
>crap that I get every day about current products.

Tho I'm not { erm... quite } disagreeing with you, define "peak of
popularity." The CoCo's were *never* as popular as the C64, but were still
*actively* sold in this decade, and marketed for more than just a "game
machine."

{ for those who are IMHO impaired, the following are solely opinions... ;-) }

To me, CoCo == CoCo == Classic, despite many models are not 10 years old...
To me, VAX == VAX == Classic, tho some models are not yet 10 years old...
To me, Pentia != 8080s ; therefore Pentia != Classic...
        *no* models of a Pentium PC are 10 years old.

To me, if a company were to gain rights to the CoCo and started
manufacturing them again, *I* would consider that brand new machine a classic.

If someone created a Pentium machine for the *sole* purpose of running CoCo
software, I would not consider that a classic.

My only argument is this: One cannot base a definition of a term using
undefined terms... e.g. classic == "popular" == ?????

>] Another example is the DECMATE-III sold up to the early 90s but they are
>] related too. Why, they run OS/278 and WPS both legacy software.

>Yeah, and my Pentium runs CoCo software (via an emulator). And Pentia
>are related to the 8080, so they have exactly the same two claims to
>classichood. So lets talk about Pentia!
>Not.

Personally, I would not be upset if someone were to talk about their
pentium box if the thread were about a CoCo (or other classic machine)
emulator -- benchmarks and whatnot... but only if the thread stayed
on-topic WRT a classic machine.

[[ which reminds me... I really need to find the time to check out the
emulator on my Pentium II & run a few benchmarks... ;-) ]]

Question: The CoCo emulator is not yet 10 years old, yet it *will* run on
computers over 10 years old (reasonably well on a 80386), and emulates a
computer that began production 20 years ago... could it be considered
classic or not?

>If they peaked in the early 90's, they are not yet classic. We can
>argue about how far off-topic they are, but it is more than zero.
>(x86 lose big here because they have not yet passed their peak.)

Not fair. The 80186 has most certainly passed it's peak. { Some might argue
it never *had* a peak... ;-) } But proggies written for an 80186 will run
on my Pentium II. Just because the entire family of x86 processors has not
yet reached the peak (and unfortunately, may never... :-( ) that the
Tandy 2000 is relegated to "non-classic" status???

Me speak with forked tongue now:

Just because the Moto 68000 family has not yet reached its peak
(children... can you say "dragonball???") does that relegate my Atari
1040STF ton "non-classic" status???

Basing status on a processor *family* IMHO is not a good way to define
"classic."

Just my $0.02... unforch, it's not worth that... ;-)
Roger "Merch" Merchberger
=====
Roger "Merch" Merchberger -- zmerch_at_30below.com
SysAdmin - Iceberg Computers
===== Merch's Wild Wisdom of the Moment: =====
Sometimes you know, you just don't know sometimes, you know?
Received on Wed Jan 27 1999 - 00:17:14 GMT