@Troels

man...rent a mac sounds catchy....shame thats not our name..

rent a amiga sounds dull

rent an amigaone sounds too lame aswell...

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I think it's a great idea, but I have to wonder about the funding. With Amizilla already looking for funding, talk of trying to set up a fund for Amiga's legal expenses and now this I have to wonder if anyone will have anything left over to actually buy their A1 with and to register the software they want to run on it.

Amizilla has over eight thousand dollars and has yet to produce any results. I realize that porting Mozilla is a huge task, but developing programs isn't exactly a short term project either. Have there been any past Amiga developers who have shown an interest in developing for OS4 who would be persuaded with the use of an A1? If so I would think that they should get the first crack at it if the fund is put together.

@DaveP

Brilliant idea mate - just wondering how you would go about choosing one developer over another?

Maybe we could set up an "Amigadev site" (Ian gets his PHP on ) and have people submit project plans. The people with the most sound plan get the A1 for a period of time.

If not enough progress is made then the A1 could go to somebody else?

Just an idea. :)

Cheers,
Ian

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@Sbaitso

Yeh I think there is a problem with the money idea -- but the idea of giving developers a machine which is paid for in small increments or returned -- is a really good one. DaveP might have meant loaning them a machine which is possible but hard to manage. On the other hand, with the agreement of retailers (they could not afford to shoulder the expense of buying boards and then waiting forever for money) but someway it might be possible top spread the financial burden so that a developer can be given a machine (without even a deposit) and pay small monthly amounts (rent/laybyy type scheme).

This is really importnt, my friend (in fact I would pay the rental/payments on it) is not in a good position, even a deposit would be beyond him at the moment, but if he could have a machine we would have two major programs (one is unique the other is a REXX controlled and very powerful emailer) in far less than a year (he has worked on Windows so his expectations are based on having to work with a bug ridden OS - he has no idea that Amiga is elegant to write for, so I suggest that a rewrite and adaption with extra features would take far less than 6 months - 3 months - on this his main program, but he estimates just over six months).

Another aspect of this, is that there are many many developers who have only ever developed for windows (many small people) and just cannot get any sort of return from the windows market. My friend has been top listed as best seller on Amazon.con frequently but his sales there have been a handful -- which should giuve you an idea of just how bad the market is -- people just don't buy programs for their windows machines and don't think trust any body who is small seeing how ill-behaved the products are from major software vendors.

This is really important, talented people can make little or nothing out of their efforts, think of all the shareware out there and the tiny number of people who pay and fully register. Think of a small fraction of them working on the Amiga, perhaps charging very little for their efforts (micro-payments) but being paid every time - most would dramartically increase their income from a much smaller user base.

We must make every effort to attract and give fair returns to developers -- especially the small ones, if Amiga is to make a proper revival and start to attack the massive MS base.

I am really devoted to this -- developers are like gold, we need them to come to us, we need their products and we need to set up an environment where they get marketed directly and payed securely.

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Greg Schofield, Perth Australia

@GregS

I agree with what you're saying about developers, but I still have to wonder about how to fund it. Instead of relying on simple cash donations to fund it, is there a better way? Maybe if a group of people got together and did some cleaning out of their closet's and put a few items up for sale on E-Bay and donate the profits to the fund? My concern is if too many funds start asking for too much from everyone out of pocket that people aren't going to register their shareware for OS 4 and the developers who we have both past and present won't get the funding they need to keep going and deserve for staying through the lean times.

@Toaks

Quote:

man...rent a mac sounds catchy....shame thats not our name..

How about.... rent A miga!

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Site admins are people too..pooff!

@tomazkid

Or even shorter..
Rent A1

Seems we all like the idea, how do we move on from here?

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@DaveP
A wonderful idea which i am thinking about alot.

You can have the Premium package for longer term projects like software packages, and the Loaner for smaller projects. Just think if there were 5 full mITX A1-lite systems on loan out to various people at any one time. All they would have to do is provide kbrd, mouse and monitor.

Talking about this with IanS on irc brought up a few things. A group would need to be set up to decide who gets what, and the developers would have to create a good project plan which would be used (along with references and previous work) to see if people were up to the task at hand.

You could even ask Hyperion what they would like done for contribs

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I fully understand that a developer would need to take the A1 home. Be one with the machine and all that, all I'm saying is that it may be a better idea to allocate the machine to a usergroup and they would then loan it out to the programmer for whatever time he needed it. That way, both the usergroup AND the programmer would be responsible for the machine - it adds extra security.

I think it also needs to be understood that a developer would need the machine for quite a substantial amount of time. Software development isn't fast, and if we're talking about the kinds of developments which specifically require an A1 for testing on (as opposed to a BPPC setup running OS4) then we're talking about some very complex programs I think!!!

If anyone IS going to chip into such a project, please be aware that a developer would be using the machine for quite some time indeed. I suppose that would be discussed with him prior to the agreement though, so that you're never under any illusions about how long he would want it for.

Brian

@DaveP:

This seems like a great idea and I would be willing to add my ?$.02? to it or some
variation of this concept. The variation could be to pay for a needed program that would
serve the community and the developer, who already owns an AmigaOne. By filling a
known need it would help AOS4 and perhaps launch a career by providing and incentive
and be a more stable and less risky approach.

GregS makes a compelling argument for supplying an AmigaOne but I see it as being too
difficult to oversee initially.

IMHO getting someone who knows what software is most needed, perhaps Steffen
(MagicSN) from Hyperion, to layout choices of most needed software. Have
AmigaWorld people make an evaluation of potential developers - give seed money to start and
the rest upon completion.

Unlike the huge effort required by the AmiZilla project (there may several people
working furiously on it in secret) These would be smaller projects at first like drivers etc.
If this effort is successful it could be expanded to include computers . You know, ?Little
steps for little feet?. Just my thoughts.

Bob C.

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Hey!

Good idea!

I have a Phree Board, and I think this whole concept is a great one!

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I've had my posts removed, I've been accused of trolling, and flaming. I have don none of these

@Coder

Quote:

How about MOL for OS4? Now that is something worth to go for.

Totally agree with you Coder

Mac On Amiga....a dream

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ikir

@tomazkid

Quote:

by tomazkid on 28-Feb-2004 2:10:18 @Toaks Quote: man...rent a mac sounds catchy....shame thats not our name.. How about.... rent A miga!

haha

well what about "Rent an Ameeeeega

or "Rent a ONE"

thanx to troels for pointing that out

i would def agree with that slogan

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@DaveP

Another great idea!

Count me in for some bucks
(NO! NOT bill! )

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Jean-François "voxel" Bachelet, Amiga NUTS since 1985.
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Welcome to Happy Computing : Amiga! (© 2

@Toaks

Rent ONE !

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Site admins are people too..pooff!

@DaveP

By the sounds of it Eyetech have already started doing just this !
In the video from the Newcastle demo (21/2/04) Alan says something about Richard Drummond and a long term loan. Check here :

http://www.amigaoneproductions.co.uk/media.htm

It's at 55 minutes 45 seconds in the WMV file

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Cheers

Doug.

@Toaks

How about
Amiga on Loan ............... ( AOL ) Ok maybe not

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Everything is proceeding as I have foreseen

Some people are like slinkies. Not really good for anything but they bring a smile to your face when pushed down the stairs.

A14U2 (A1 For You Too) haha.. well it gave me one more post, and pushed the topic back up.

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AMiGA

@DaveP

Very good idea and I naturally encourage all possible means to support developers ?However some issues are there, especially in the loaner sponsorhip:

- Developer must pay for HD, CDROM, gfx card and memory? If it is loaner sponsorship and developer is unlucky and his memory or gfx card is incompatible? Resolving these issues can take days, maybe even weeks if he is very unlucky.
- Even if developer is ex-Amiga user it can take a while to get familiar with new system
- If developer is current Amiga user he probably wants to transfer his favorite tools from his Amiga, setup cvs client.. After all it can take a while.
- When developer upgrades from old 68k based system to fast PPC system there is quite good risk he only plays Quake or Duke 3D all day long (because it just is so cool to run them at 1500fps) or running fractals real time...
- Also when upgrading to new PPC system user must learn to avoid certain hacks and software. Maybe his 20 years old text editor is not working anymore and/or he must update his tools.

Hi itix

On IRC we where discussing the idea the other day and found out that the MicroA1 should be the model to use for the project as it has allready everything onboard and is small and compact to send. We where talking about a full system incl. HD and CDROM but witout monitor, mouse and keyboard which is things people tend to have from older systems.

Offcourse it will take some time to get familiar with the new system and we where not talking about a loan for a short 14 day period offcourse.

Still the developers that enters the projects must be dedicated to the project they want to work on so some results can be reached.

But it is some issues we need to discuss much more before we eventually start the project.

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