I wrote 'Nuke Redmond'

From: Richard Erlacher <edick_at_idcomm.com>
Date: Mon May 8 08:54:23 2000

WP v5.1 was widely accepted as the "cat's meow" among DOS-based word
processing software. WIth the release of 5.2, one could see the begining of
the end, however, since Lotus and MS had both put considerably better suites
out there. Since Lotus could do it and WP couldn't there was no reason to
believe any foulplay on MS' part was at work.

When Windows 3.1 came out I don't think MSOffice had been released yet. It
was a VERY popular product, since it had Excel, Word6, Access2, and
Powerpoint (the famous BS-Generator) incorporated in it. Works was not up
to snuff yet, though it was commonly bundled with Windows in OEM machines.
The sense I got was that WORKS was intended for home use and was donated
gratis to LOTS of different school systems in an effort to entice them to
give up the Mac, which was markedly easier to teach and for teachers to use.
Apple even ran a program here in the Denver area that involved selling Mac's
below cost to teachers and administrators. It didn't work over the long
run, though I did see a number of PC's, typically 2 or 3 per school which
were sitting unused except for a comm program to handle comms with the main
admin building downtown.

It really pointed up how uninformed teachers and administrators were about
these two competing systems.

Dick

----- Original Message -----
From: Chuck McManis <cmcmanis_at_mcmanis.com>
To: <classiccmp_at_classiccmp.org>
Sent: Sunday, May 07, 2000 6:16 PM
Subject: Re: I wrote 'Nuke Redmond'


> Has anyone mentioned WordPerfect. You know the Word processor that had
> over 90% of the market until Microsoft changed their OS licensing terms
> such that their OEMs had to bundle either Office (or later Works) with
> every copy of Windows they sold.
>
> --Chuck
>
Received on Mon May 08 2000 - 08:54:23 BST