[Coco] Another Radio Shack Article

[billg999 at cs.uofs.edu]

>>" I don't know what they might have done differently once the Wintel
>> cancer metastasized. How could >they have stayed in the computer business
>> once PC clones were cheap, fungible commodity items?"
>
>
> Possibly continued to focus on hobbyists, hackers, and those interested in
> hardware and software projects?
> Commodity computing was hardly the death note to recreational computing,
> it survives to this day.
> As the average price of a Coco3 is now back up to about $100, and the
> price of production would actually be lower than in the past, why not
> build a few more?

Because Tandy is about making money, not making computers.  The
start up costs alone would price it out of any market.  All these
places can sell PC's because none of them actually have to manufacture
them.  Just package and sell.

>
>
> Sounds crazy? That explains all those Atari retro machines that have been
> built.

So do a Kickstarter and see where it goes.  If you could do a
modern clone of the COCO3 for $100, I would likely buy three or
four of them.  But I suspect the cost would be much closer to
$500 or even $1000.  Look at the P112.  $170 pledge got you a kit.
And it is much simpler than the COCO.  But I wold be interested if
it could be done.

>
>
> AND, Tandy had a strong foothold in the Wintel market.

Early on, there was money in PC's.  Sadly, Tandy's were always
at least a little non-PC compatable (except the 2000 which was
totally non-PC compatable.)  But once every mom and pop got into
the show PC margins became razor thin.  Hard to make a business
out of that.  Ask Gateway and Dell (and yes, HP, too.  They make
more money selling ink!)

>
>
> They decided to give up, no market force dictated it.

Yes, it was market force.  They saw the profit margin dropping
and bailed before it hit bottom.  And they did the same for Audio
equipment.  And they will do the same for cell phones.  Oh yeah,
and why do you thnk they don't sell the experimenter parts they
used to?

bill