(Insert stupid Blog name here)

True words.

That's "part of" the concern isn't it?

I'm avoiding the forum discussions about this, because I don't see any point in adding my voice to the noise there. I'd rather let Artie comment, since he has a longer history with Atari than I do, since he was built by them.  

 

That said...

 

My concerns are: who is really running Atari, what are their actual goals, and what happens if they fail to meet them? Does Wade Rosen have free reign, or is he on a leash with Atari's board of Directors? What is he expected to accomplish, and in what time frame, and what happens if that fails? Are they expecting to attain a certain level of profitability in a given number of years? And even if they do, is the goal to maintain and build on that, or make Atari an attractive property for eventual buyout? Is Rosen in this for the long haul, or if he gets a better/more prestigious offer from another company, is he going to jump ship? Is there a succession plan in place for that possibility? These are questions that there are already answers to, because these discussions have already happened (or they're not doing their jobs). But we'll never know the actual answers, until the events play out. They can "say" anything in interviews or press releases. But that means nothing.

 

AtariAge is a small piece of the Atari puzzle, and one that could be easily discarded or abandoned in a heartbeat. "Sorry Al - but the numbers just aren't adding up this quarter for us to keep you around."

 

I'm not criticizing Al's decision to sell to Atari. I think it's (potentially) a great opportunity for him, and I know that AtariAge has pretty-much taken over his life. He certainly didn't intend for that to happen, and burnout is going to be inevitable. Some may think, "Yeah - but that's the dream! Getting to do your hobby for a living!" but the problem is, AtariAge isn't a reliable, predictable, or sustainable source of income. It's wholly reliant on programmers being willing to donate their time to create games, and a community being willing to pay money to purchase enough of those games to cover not only the production costs of the games themselves (which is considerable), but pay to keep AA itself up and running, and then put food on the table. It's a terrible way to try to earn a living. A steady paycheck has to be of tremendous relief to Albert, not to mention the possibility of getting some much-needed help.

 

Clearly, Al's had enough interaction with Atari to trust them to take over ownership of AA. But Atari now owns this forum, which includes the software driving this blog (I maintain that I own the content, however). And they can pull the plug tomorrow if they choose to do so. I think that's the big, overarching fear most people have. Or that Atari will irreparably damage the forum through censorship, ads, or other means. However, I'm not as doom-and-gloom about that as some others may be. This is the very nature of the internet. Communities come and go all the time. Usually, the people who want to keep together simply move on to another location and continue on. Been there, done that. Several times. I hope AtariAge will continue on though. But the world won't end if it doesn't. Everyone who wants to, will turn up somewhere. People are resilient like that.

 

Unlike Albert, I do not trust Atari. They have too checkered of a history to warrant it. As far as I'm concerned, Atari has yet to prove they're a different company. They may be. But the 2600+ is a yet-another example of a product from a company that just doesn't "get it". They're not paying attention to the details, which means at some level, they don't care enough. And if they don't care enough about that... what else won't they care about?

 

Optimistically, maybe this is still part of their learning curve. Certainly, Atari has a lot of learning to do to pull itself out of the mire. Maybe Rosen will turn into the visionary Atari has been lacking for 40+ years. More than anything else, a company like Atari needs someone with a clear and correct vision and the ability to act on it. We'll see how it goes. I'd like to see the return of a competent Atari. It'd be fun to want to buy one of their products again.

 

But I'm going to start backing up my blog entries.

5 minutes ago, Nathan Strum said:

But the 2600+ is a yet-another example of a product from a company that just doesn't "get it". They're not paying attention to the details, which means at some level, they don't care enough.

The 2600+ was done by Plaion, not Atari. Last year we (the Stella team) got contacted by an employee from Plaion, asking for our help. At that moment, some decisions were already made (emulator based, with a dumper port). We were offered payment for support, but we skipped. Nevertheless we gave Plaion quite some tips how to improve over the R77 (everything should be updatable, high compatibility, strong enough CPU etc.). From what I have taken from the talks, Plaion was listening, but their target price (then $99 IIRC) , given by Atari, was probably too low follow all our suggestions. 

 

IMO the 2600+ is a marketing driven device, aiming at a certain group of people (not us!), trying to find the sweet spot for profit. This is how business works, and I don't expect any company to be any different. IMO it is not that they don't "get it", IMO they are not even interested. For Atari, AA is an acquisition, which is good for Atari's image and thus marketing.

 

Only very lately some people from Atari have significantly happend at AA, mainly due to the 2600+ and the acquisition. If they were really interested into our community, they would have been here much, much longer.

 

 

 

24 minutes ago, Nathan Strum said:

But I'm going to start backing up my blog entries.

My first move was to ask Al for paying me all the royalties I had collected over 20 years, ASAP. The money was sure helping Albert, but I am not going to lend to risk any money for Atari.

15 minutes ago, Thomas Jentzsch said:

The 2600+ was done by Plaion, not Atari. Last year we (the Stella team) got contacted by an employee from Plaion, asking for our help. At that moment, some decisions were already made (emulator based, with a dumper port). We were offered payment for support, but we skipped. Nevertheless we gave Plaion quite some tips how to improve over the R77 (everything should be updatable, high compatibility, strong enough CPU etc.). From what I have taken from the talks, Plaion was listening, but their target price (then $99 IIRC) , given by Atari, was probably too low follow all our suggestions. 

Did Plaion initiate the project, or did Atari hire them to create it for them? Even if Plaion came up with the proposal for it, Atari was still dictating the terms that impacted its design.

 

More to the point, is Atari taking the initiative on any of these products, or are they sitting around waiting for people to hand them ideas?

15 minutes ago, Thomas Jentzsch said:

IMO the 2600+ is a marketing driven device, aiming at a certain group of people (not us!), trying to find the sweet spot for profit. This is how business works, and I don't expect any company to be any different. IMO it is not that they don't "get it", IMO they are not even interested.

I fully understand all of that. And I fully agree they aren't even interested. That is precisely what I mean by "not getting it": that it's still a fundamentally flawed and deceptively marketed product. It's not a 2600, because it's not fully compatible. This is a more expensive Flashback. Period. And it should be marketed as such. (But that's my reality. Not theirs.)

15 minutes ago, Thomas Jentzsch said:

Only very lately some people from Atari have significantly happend at AA, mainly due to the 2600+ and the acquisition. If they were really interested into our community, they would have been here much, much longer.

I'm not sure of what their level of interest is or isn't, because I haven't been in direct communication with any of them.

 

Hope they're enjoying the comics though!  

5 minutes ago, Nathan Strum said:

Did Plaion initiate the project, or did Atari hire them to create it for them?

I have no clue. I guess it is the latter.

23 minutes ago, Thomas Jentzsch said:

My first move was to ask Al for paying me all the royalties I had collected over 20 years, ASAP. The money was sure helping Albert, but I am not going to lend to risk any money for Atari.

Yep - get the money out while you still can.

 

I've never asked for royalties, or other monetary payment for my work for AA (apart from copies of games from the AA store - which would amount to a tiny fraction of the work I actually put into projects). For me, this has always been a hobby, and taking money for it would cross the line into "work". Also, I've always felt the games belonged to the developers, and they should be the ones being paid for their games. Not me.

 

And while I'll still be willing to work that way for developers on an independent basis, I will not be doing any unpaid work for Atari. What form any future work with them takes will have to be determined.