Re: Headed Commodore and Atari yet forgotten

>> "And Tramiel was a two-hit wonder."

I guess, technically, he was a "four hit wonder", if you want to argue the toss (PET, Vic20, C64, Amiga). All four were cutting edge at their time, and prolific (and relatively speaking, cheap). There was no competitor to the PET, the ZX80 and 81 were blown away by the Vic20 not long after they came out, the Spectrum wasn't a patch on the C64 (the BBC-B was about similar or slightly better, for non-gaming, but much worse for just gaming), and the Amiga was probably on par with the ST, but a huge hit and sold plenty.

>>"None of them saw the need to sell their existing product *AND* build on that success sustainably".

You don't think a 12-13 year span for Commodore, counts for anything (selling 10s of millions along the way)? The razor thin margins though does explain why they didn't last (along with the commoditisation of the (IBM) PC (clone) through the mid-late 80s and largely complete by the mid-90s).

Until the (affordable) PC came along (in the late 80s/early 90s), many small businesses were running themselves using Vic20s, then C64s, then Amigas! (not to mention the thousands of PETs installed in schools, as far back as the very late 70s).