{center}
{subhead} Jim Collas letter to the community{def}{p}
Article by Jim Collas
{left}
{p} {p}

   Executive Update{p}
· ·  OPEN LETTER TO THE COMMUNITY{p}
May 1999{p}
Dear Amigans,
{p} {p}
April was a very busy month for Amiga with much activity and good
progress. I received over 1200 emails from people around the world,
I met with key representatives of the Amiga community in Germany and
the U.K, we added to our executive staff, we established
relationships with key technology partners, and we finalized our
1999 product plans.
{p} {p}
The amount of emails I received from the Amiga community has been
overwhelming. Most of them were emails of support and encouragement
while many others gave me suggestions and input on technology and
products. These emails have been wonderful. They are uplifting,
insightful, interesting, and fun to read. People in this community
have a great personality. Many were short emails of encouragement but
just as many went on for several pages listing insights, suggestions,
and opinions.  Thank you very much for your emails of support. They
have been tremendously encouraging to the Amiga executive team and
me. There were, of course, also some emails sent by Amigans who are
frustrated by the situation. These emails were also valuable in
giving me insight into the mistakes of the past so that I could avoid
them as we press toward the future.  Please keep the emails coming.
{p} {p}
I apologize for not responding to all of the email sent to me. I have
personally responded to over 600 emails but was unable to keep up
with the volumes. I want to assure you that I read every email sent
to me and that they play an important role in defining our future
plans. I will continue to respond to as many emails as possible on a
personal basis. This brings me to the main subject of this month's
letter: communication. It is important that we set up an effective
process for communicating with the Amiga community. Emails and
requests for meetings are overwhelming Amiga executives at this time.
This volume of communication is very encouraging but I am concerned
that we can't personally respond to every one of them and it will
become frustrating to the community.
{p} {p}
We are working on plans to improve communications between Amiga and
the community. These plans will consist of multiple programs
including: the current executive update, an email response team, a
new Amiga Advisory Council, polls on future product features, better
monthly user group communication, and improved communication to the
Amiga press. Detailed information on all of these programs will be
posted on our web site in the next several weeks. In addition to
keeping the community up to date on Amiga activities, the main goal
of these programs is to involve the community in setting future Amiga
plans. All of us need to work on this together to make sure we are
setting plans that will help the community and allow Amiga to drive
the next computing revolution.
{p} {p}
One of the planned communications programs is a new "Amiga Advisory
Council or AAC. The idea for this program came from my discussions
with people in the Amiga community.  It is difficult to get thousands
of people involved in our planning process so we need to establish a
more manageable forum. The plan is to set up an advisory council
consisting of people that are viewed as leaders in the Amiga
community. Members of this council will be "elected by the Amiga
community. We are currently working on the details of the "election
process. This council must represent all major constituencies of the
Amiga community so that we can get a full set of concerns and inputs
regarding future Amiga plans. We will set-up special message boards,
email lists, and meetings allowing the AAC to communicate
effectively. Information on AAC meetings and decisions will be
communicated to the Amiga community. Keep watching our web site for
updates on this program. We will also make sure information gets
published to Amiga magazines a nd user groups.
{p} {p}
In late April I traveled to Germany and the U.K. to meet with
representatives and leaders of the Amiga community to discuss Amiga's
future plans and get the community's help in setting these plans. I
apologize to the people that did not have the opportunity to
participate in these meetings but I had to keep the meetings to a
manageable size. There were about 30 to 40 people in each country
representing developers, dealers, distributors, user groups, and
press. I think that these meetings were very informative and
productive. They will allow me to optimize our future plans while
taking the requirements of the Amiga community into account. To give
you an example, we spent a considerable amount of time talking about
how to bridge the community from the current Amiga platform to the
next generation. The current Amiga platform has several years of
useful life remaining but people are not investing in it because it
is dated and the next generation is around the corner. One suggestion
is to port the next generation  AmigaSoftTM Operating Environment
(OE) so that it runs on a current Amiga configured with a Power PC
expansion card.  This would not be an optimum configuration but it
would extend the life of current PowerPC Amigas. We are looking into
this possibility and will keep you updated.
{p} {p}
On a personal note, I had a wonderful time in Germany and the U.K.
The trip was both productive and very enjoyable. The trip was packed
with excellent food and good people. I really enjoyed meeting with
people from the Amiga community. After six years of working with
executives in the PC industry, it is a breath of fresh air to work
with people that have so much passion and enthusiasm about what they
believe in. I especially enjoyed the extended conversations in the
bars and pubs. These tended to get even more passionate and creative.
To those of you who participated in the events, I thank you for
making my trip both productive and enjoyable. In case you are
curious, the most challenging part of my trip was sitting still while
Petro drove me on the autobahn at 240 km/hour. I thank god for solid
and stable German automobiles and good German beer.
{p} {p}
Before I end this letter I would like to cover a few more topics that
came up frequently in emails sent to me. First, I would like to
clarify our hardware product plans. Amiga is planning to come out
with a next generation multimedia computer in late Q4 of the year.
This computer will have a unique architecture, a great operating
system, awesome 3D gaming performance, and advanced multimedia
features. I am confident that this computer will meet your
expectations for a great next generation Amiga. Unfortunately, we
can't disclose details of the new computer yet since we are under
non-disclosure agreements with our technology partners. We also need
to be careful about alerting our competition to our plans. One thing
I can say is that the technology partners we are working with are
extremely excited about our direction and technology. There are
Amigans in all major technology companies and they are eager to
support us in driving a new computer revolution. These partners
include some major technology and componen t companies in the
computer industry. We should be ready to disclose more at the World
of Amiga and AmiWest shows in July.
{p} {p}
The new Amiga multimedia computer will also support a home networked
"information appliance environment that will allow networked devices
throughout the house access to the power and features of this
computer.  I need to clarify the term "information appliances which
is becoming a popular term in the computer industry. "Information
appliances are not digital toasters, refrigerators, and ovens with
LCD displays. They are devices such as wireless LCD tablets, Internet
terminals, game machines, and digital set-top boxes. These devices
will all be connected together through a single network and will be
integrated into a single comprehensive operating environment. This is
the reason why we use the term "operating environment, or OE, to
describe our new software rather than operating system. Our software
is much more than the underlying operating system.
{p} {p}
In addition to the full multimedia computer described above, Amiga
will also develop reference designs for a variety of "information
appliance companion devices such as wireless LCD tablets. Our goal is
to enable a full home computing environment rather than just a
computer. We will encourage others to develop and ship
Amiga-compatible computers and information appliances. To help
clarify our plans to the Amiga community, we are releasing our
initial product concept to the Amiga press to publish in the next
issues. I hope this helps clarify our product plans. We will continue
to disclose details as they become available and as is appropriate.
{p} {p}
The second topic that I would like to cover is Amiga support for
developers. The Amiga development community is important to us and we
will be taking an active role in support Amiga developers. We are
evaluating plans for financial support as well as in-depth technical
support. We will communicate more about this plan within 60 to 90
days when we also start releasing more technical information for
developers.
{p} {p}
I have also updated the "major activities" sub-section under the
"executive update" section on our web site. This will give you some
more detail on the status of Amiga programs so I encourage you to
read it. We have also added a Monthly Questions and Answers web page
to the "executive update" section. This page will answer the top
questions asked in emails sent to me.
{p} {p}
In closing I would like to say that I am more excited then ever about
the opportunities for Amiga and the Amiga community.  It has been a
long wait but the Amiga community is still the greatest community in
the computer industry and the time is ideal for a new revolutionary
architecture and platform. I will keep you posted on our progress and
promise to disclose as more details as soon as possible and
appropriate.
{p} {p}
Sincerely,
{p} {p}
Jim Collas
{p} {p}
President, Amiga