11 Oct
2011
11 Oct
'11
8:37 p.m.
On 11 Oct 2011 at 19:58, Fred Cisin wrote:
Gary's pals sometimes imply that IBM's visit
was a SURPRISE! That is
seriously doubtful, and documented to be false. And, the report that
the people there thought that it was a drug raid, is very doubtful,
but a great story of the culture shock that was involved (IBM's suits
V shirtless, shoeless,braless bicycle riding hippies). He knew they
were coming, but CHOSE to fly up to Oakland to hang out with Godbout.
(That ha sometimes been misreported as "going sailing"). His
apologists say that it was important legitimate business, taking some
documentation to a client. There was nobody of lesser importance who
could take a half a day to deliver a box of binders? His actions,
indisunirregardless of attempts to spin them, provided a clear message
to IBM of, "Wait in line with the rest of the customers."
I wasn't there, so I can't say. But there's been a lot of apochrypha
about the meeting. However, consider:
* IBM most likely wanted DRI to tailor a BIOS and the printed
documentation to their specifications. DRI was not in the habit of
writing other people's CBIOSes.
* Were it otherwise, IBM could have purchased an OEM license for
CP/M-86. I have the OEM price list for that time and it wasn't
terribly expensive--less than Microsoft asked its OEMs for DOS 1.25.
* IBM had no idea how many of these things would sell. Apparently,
Marketing had initially predicted something like 200K over the life
of the product. It might well have turned out to have the volume of
the 5100.
I worked on licensing an MP/M II OEM license with DRI for a client at
almost precisely the same time that the IBM incident occurred. I
found DRI to be very accommodating and friendly.
--Chuck