Re: investing in sabatoge

[rd@cottonwood.com (Rick Dahlgren)]

When Jobs came back to Apple and reached some settlement with Microsoft
that included MS investment in Apple, suddenly and inexplicably,
development of Apple's Rhapsody OS, including a version that was Intel
based, went away.  The implication of an OS that was both Power PC and
Intel friendly was enormous for developers like Macromedia, Adobe, etc. 
The bet was that Rhapsody as a development platform would mean that a
Rhapsody version of say, Photoshop would operate on both Intel and Power PC
machines.  

When Apple abandoned Rhapsody, also suddenly and inexplicably, Macromedia
ditched Final Cut Pro video software.  When I called to see what was going
on with Final Cut at Macromedia, the only answer given was "you'll have to
contact Apple"....Apple has now released Final Cut Pro on the Mac OS
platform....but the transaction that transferred Final Cut from Macromedia
to Apple was never hyped in the press.  In fact, I was a Macromedia
shareholder at the time and nothing was ever disclosed publicly to
shareholders in the annual report.

Rick Dahlgren
rd@cottonwood.com

>I would argue that most copy protection of software fits that description,
>or at least I think that a good arguments for it could be made.  The 486
>chip without the math coprecessor was also an example.  I was told that
>Intel had to destroy the math coprocessor part.  
>
>At 07:18 PM 5/29/99 -0400, you wrote:
>>A Univeristy of California researcher claims Amgen did not want to use a
>>technology that would reduce by half the dose of EPO patients need.
>>jamie
>>
>>
>>On Sat, 29 May 1999, Michael Perelman wrote:
>>
>>> I am interested in learning about examples of corporations investing in
>>> technologies to restrict the usefulness of their products.  Monsanto's
>>> terminator technology, for example, makes seeds less useful to farmers.
>>> I recall that IBM added circuitry to its PC Jr. to make it difficult to
>>> install a second hard time.  Microsoft is accused of similar mischief.
>>> --
>>> Michael Perelman
>>> Economics Department
>>> California State University
>>> Chico, CA 95929
>>> 
>>> Tel. 530-898-5321
>>> E-Mail michael@ecst.csuchico.edu
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>
>>-------------------------------
>>James Love 
>>Center for Study of Responsive Law | Consumer Project on Technology 
>>P.O. Box 19367, Washington, DC 20036 | http://www.cptech.org
>>Voice 202/387-8030 | Fax 202/234-5176 | love@cptech.org
>>
>>