>I understand discontinuing a product but could never quite figure out why
>you would actually destroy equipment. I mean what is the point?
I suppose this was apple logic, they wanted you to buy something OTHER
than the lisa, so they had the choice of sell off/give away all the
discontinued lisa's (they didn't want them being used, so that was out of
the question)... or junk them. If you just normal junk them (haul them to
the scrap yard and dump them in a pile), you risk the very real
possibility that the scrapper will salvage them and sell them off (makes
sense, they ARE in the buying and selling scrap business)... which again,
means they would be in the market, something apple didn't want... only
NOW they would be in the market and apple didn't get a buck.
So by destroying them beyond hope... they remove them from the market
100%.
I personally think this is stupid, but hey, I don't run apple, and they
seem to have their own form of logic.
And then there is always the chance it was just a Jobs thing. IIRC, he
was more or less in charge when this was done, and he worked more on the
mac then the lisa (even though, I think the original lisa specs were his
idea)... so to Jobs and the ever expanding ego, he wanted to rub salt in
the wounds of the Lisa team, by not only showing that the lisa didn't
sell as well... but that thousands of unsold ones were turned into dust
at apple's expense.
I that logic is why it might be a while before Apple comes out with
anything that might resemble a Newton (since the Newton was Scully's
baby, and Scully was in charge when Jobs was outsted). I don't think it
was a co-incidence that the first thing Jobs did on his return was
violently kill off the newton... and I think it will be a while before
his ego will allow a return of a similar product... the iPod is probably
paving the way to erase the Newton memory, so when one DOES come out, it
will be seen as an advanced iPod, not as a Newton II.
Just my 2 cents
-chris
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Received on Wed Nov 28 2001 - 16:11:32 GMT