-=========================================================================- _ __ _ <>_ __ _ || /\\ |\ /|| || / ` /\\ || Amiga Update -News and Rumors /__\\ | \ / || || || ___ /__\\ ||(A Very Occasional Newsletter) / \\_ | \/ ||_ _||_ \__// / \\_ || BACK FOR THE FUTURE || -=========================================================================- AMIGA and the Amiga logo are trademarks of Amiga Technolgies, GmbH --------------------------------------------------------------------------- 960429 W H A T T H E B L A Z E S ? V I S C O R P I S S O L D ? U P D A T E O N V I S C O R P I B M E R S H A V E C H I C A G O , W E H A V E M I A M I About this issue: We found the article about Blazemonger Inc. some days ago and immediately contacted the author after reading the surprising report. Full details are below. Read with caution. We have been keeping a close eye on VIScorp itself since the intended sale was announced. There were several developments in the last few days that we thought you'd like to know about, so we put together another issue. We also got wind of a new tcp/ip networking stack being developed by Holger Kruse, a premier Amiga networking software developer. Anyone who uses an Amiga to "surf" the Internet will want to keep an eye on the new stack, named "Miami". First, the information about VIScorp. We have a series of VIScorp announcments. Our comments will be separated from the announcements by {}. --------------------------------------------------------------------------- VIScorp Purchased By BLAZEMONGER INCORPORATED Yes, Amiga fans, the rumors are true! As of six hours ago, VIScorp has been purchased in a surprise takeover by BLAZEMONGER INCORPORATED. VIScorp chief honcho and generally cool guy Carl Saskatchewan is reportedly "delighted" with the acquisition and looks forward to an "er... unusual product line" to be introduced at next month's WORLD OF BLAZEMONGER conference in Chickenmilk, Wisconsin. Among the products to be introduced at the W.O.B. are: The Amiga ST: a set-top computer that, when attached to any television set, automatically converts all incoming programs into reruns of "Gilligan's Island." Sidecar II, an IBM PC emulator roughly the size of the Queen Elizabeth II luxury liner. Comes complete with torpedos. BLAZESCAPE, the ONLY World Wide Web browser capable of connecting to ALTERNATE DIMENSIONS. Features multithreading, HTML 6.0, and new Virtual Java (TM) which beams cool animations DIRECTLY into your CEREBRAL CORTEX with a sledgehammer. The AmigaBICEP 5000, their new top-of-the-line computer. In direct contrast to the original Amiga 1000, which used an off-the-shelf CPU and a custom graphics chipset, BLAZEMONGER INCORPORATED has decided to use an off-the-shelf graphics chipset and a custom CPU. Known as the BLAZEIUM chip, this little speed demon runs at a blazing 2,000,000 tychohertz (10 to the power 8275, base 19) and features over EIGHT BILLION REGISTERS for the ULTIMATE in hardware banging!!! And of course, BLAZEMONGER MCXLVII: "FATAL DEATH KILLERS OF ARMAGEDDON." [Availability is pending the overturn of the Communications Decency Act, and possibly the Geneva Convention.] See you in Chickenmilk!! Dan ////////////////////////////////////\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\ |Dan Barrett -- Computer Science Dept, University of MA, Amherst, MA 01003| |http://www.cs.umass.edu/~barrett/public.html -- barrett@cs.umass.edu| \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\///////////////////////////////////// --- Copyright 1996 by Daniel J. Barrett. This article may be freely distributed as long as it is distributed in its entirety. It may not be included in any publication without the written permission of the author. So nyaaah. { The above was printed with due permission from the author. He was last reported hiding in an abandoned Atari warehouse, hoping to escape the wrath of a mob of miffed Amiga owners. Somewhat more reliable information on VIScorp follows. Brad} --------------------------------------------------------------------------- A N N O U N C E M E N T S F R O M V I S C O R P { We were a bit concerned when we came across this announcment late last week: } Press Conference Cancelled Message to Amiga Developers & Amiga press. 24 April, 1996 We had to cancel the press conference scheduled on the 24th of April in Frankfurt. We would like to apologise for this. The new date will be made public as soon as possible. Target is end of May. The project initiated by VIScorp with the Amiga developer community is currently being proceeded. The completion of this process will be determining the date of our press conference. You will be notified in time, please stay tuned. Info: Gilles Bourdin - AMIGA Technologies GmbH - Berliner Ring 89 - D-64625 BENSHEIM Tel +49 6252 709 195 - Fax +49 6252 709 520 email gbo@amiga.de - HTTP://www.amiga.de { We aren't certain what the press conference was intended to deal with, but any time one is cancelled it is bothersome. The "project" mentioned in the announcement was presumably the one described in this earlier announcement. This seems like a very positive move on VSIcorp's part: } Message to Amiga Developers 23 April, 1996 Recently, a number of Amiga-developers have contacted VIScorp to make proposals about the future of Amiga. VIScorp is ready to listen to all suggestions coming from the Amiga developer community. In France, an Amiga developer asked if VIScorp would like him to represent officially the company to the french developer community in order to centralize their ideas and proposals. We found this to be an excellent idea for supporting the Amiga and would actually like to extend this system to all countries where Amiga developers are active, so that there are VIScorp representatives in each country. If you would like to represent VIScorp in your country, feel free to contact David Rosen (drosen@vistv.com), VP, Business Development or Raquel Velasco (raquel@vistv.com), Director of Sales and Marketing Europe at following Email address: raquel@vistv.com. Regards, Bill Buck CEO, VIScorp VISCORP 111 North Canal Street, Suite 933 Chicago, IL 60606 { And finally, this message appeared just yesterday. If intentions count for anything, and they should, this should make for a happier Amiga community. Time will tell what VIScorp will actually be able to do but we like their approach so far: } Message to Amiga Developers and Users From Eric Laffont, VIScorp Developer/User Liason 28-Apr-96 I have been given the responsibility by Mr Bill Buck, CEO of Viscorp, to rebuild a strong Amiga Developer and Users Community. I know that the Amiga community is currently very fragmented and in the past nothing serious has been done for you. As a Commodore developer since 1983 (C64, then Amiga), I can understand all your wishes. First of all, we are listening to all your suggestions about software/hardware development, documentation, distribution, contact--just about anything you want if it's reasonable. It's a great mission to seek information from the entire world. So if you're interested in collecting suggestions and representing your Amiga community, contact us on the VIScorp Web Site, or (elaffont@pratique.fr) simply reply to this message. PS: Mrs. Raquel Velasco and Mr. Bill Buck apologize for not replying to the mail they have received because they are very busy, as you can imagine. They will reply when they return to the US around the first of May. But you can always reach me via email: elaffont@pratique.fr (Eric Laffont) VISCORP 111 North Canal Street, Suite 933 Chicago, IL 60606 {Small Wonders Research apparently does a stock market analysis of technology companies. We found this report on VIScorp's homepage.} R E S E A R C H R E P O R T O N V I S C O R P Author Michael Harrison Small Wonders Research Reports Visual Information Service Corp (VisCorp), traded on the NASDAQ Bulletin Board (VICP), has created proprietary technology for the first commercial "set top box" connecting the TV and the telephone. This inexpensive device will allow non-PC users to access the Internet, on- line services, E-mail, Fax, Voice-mail, and direct credit-card transactions, as well as all telephone functions, with a TV and remote controller. With prototyping completed, the company has formed key strategic alliances for technology, manufacturing, and distribution, that will assure a very rapid rollout of the product, both in the US and throughout Europe. Current field testing with Booth Communications in the Detriot area suggests VisCorp may very well win the race to (a very big) market with this hot new product. {The above analysis of VIScorp sounds very positive. The report was pulled from the VIScorp website, which contains a longer version as well. Following is information about Small Wonders Research, from their homepage on the Net. We run it here to give you a quick idea of the company which provided the reassuring rating of VIScorp (VICP in the chart below): } SMALL WONDERS RESEARCH REPORT Mike Harrison, Analyst Fax: 860-688-0226 Voice: 860-688-6297 Email: harrison@tiac.net Track Record as of April 19, 1996 Since changing our approach and publishing schedule back in September 1995, we have been relatively more successful. Prior to that time, we published on a daily basis. In addition to being overly hectic, that schedule allowed little time for the in depth analysis, frequently including site visits, that characterize our current recommendations. We now publish on a "when available" schedule, meaning when we have found an exceptional stock and have completed thorough due diligence. We're happy with this approach, and following are all our picks since September. Sym ---Date- - Price- Hi Cls - - Fri Cls - - % Hi- - % Fri - - 96 Target ISSM --9/13/95 - .75 - 2.06 - - 1.25 - - - +175% - +67% - - 5.00 RTL-V -1/16/9 - C1.70 - C1.95 - - C1.40 - - - +15% - (18%) - -C3.00 VICP --3/2/96 - 7.50 - 10.25 - - 10.25 - - - +37% - +37% - - 20.00 IVDO --3/21/96 - 1.50 - 4.12 - - 2.75 - - - +175% - +83% - - 10.00 Avg -- (6 mo) - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - +100% --+42% --------------------------------------------------------------------------- M I A M I - A N E W T C P / I P S T A C K From the home page of Holger Kruse: Miami is a new TCP/IP protocol stack to access the Internet by modem. The main difference to other existing protocol stacks (such as AmiTCP and AS-225) are: Very> easy to use. The configuration is completely GUI-driven, without any config files or environment variables to edit. Dialer (interactive and script-driven) and PPP/SLIP integrated. No SANA-II drivers required. Separate configuration program MiamiInit to automatically configure Miami for your Internet provider API-compatible to AmiTCP and AS-225, i.e. you can use most existing clients and servers with Miami. Several new features that make modem-based connections easier and more convenient to use, e.g. dialer for multiple phone numbers, phone bill display, localization for the GUI, automatic dialscript generator, dynamic DNS host name cache and other things. I expect a first release version of Miami to be ready in June or July 1996. { A tcp/ip stack is the key networking software which allows your computer to have network communication with others on Internet style networks, and on the Internet itself. Holger Kruse is the author of an excellent PPP device much used to connect Amiga browser programs to the Internet, and also of AmiWin, an excellent X-Windows package for the Amiga, among other networking programs. Brad} --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Copyright 1996 by Brad Webb. Freely distributable, if not modified. -=========================================================================- _ __ _ <>_ __ _ || Brad Webb/AmigaUpdate /\\ |\ /|| || / ` /\\ || webb@malamute.med.ge.com /__\\ | \ / || || || ___ /__\\ || bandr@globaldialog.com / \\_ | \/ ||_ _||_ \__// / \\_ || Portal -- XJumpdisk -=========================================================================-