But I was successful on that so I decided to go to 
the next step and that is, I'm going try to learn how to think like an Okie. Now
this is tougher than you might think, because those Okies have funny rules.
Okay. One of the toughest ones is the idea that you take a bath once a week
whether you need it or not. That's ridiculous. Any good software programmer will
tell you that once a month, at most, is all that's required.

But you don't really want to hear me go on about the bathing habits of Okies or
of software programmers. And I think what you'd really like to hear are the
answers to questions like, is N-T going to mop up the floor with O-S two. Or is
O-S two going to clean up in the marketplace and come out smelling like a rose.
So I'll give you my observations and opinions over the next few moments.

We can ask, how is O-S two doing today. And how is it going to be doing in the
future. But let's address how it's doing today first. And this is a simple
question. How is O-S two doing today. Unfortunately the answer is not so simple.
It's a very fragmented and confusing answer that I get. When I read the trade
journals such as P-C Week or Info World, all I read about is N-T, N-T, N-T. And
the articles describe how O-S two is dead and buried. The Mac is barely hanging
on for life and Unix is the next target to be done in by the great Microsoft
operating system. And yet when I go to Egghead software or CompUSA, what I see
predominantly are Windows three dot one applications. Not N-T and not even much
Windows ninety five. But when I look at preloads on machines that are shipping
today, it's mostly Windows ninety five, with some win three dot one and a little
bit of O-S two. So it might look pretty bleak, O-S two today. But I was at a
trade show last week here in Chicago. CAMP, the Corporate Association for
Microcomputer Professionals. A very nice expo and I think I recognize several of
the people in the audience here as being at CAMP. And at that show, I walked
around and looked at a


ll the table top exhibits, and I counted six tables that had the words windows
N-T on their sign. And I went back to the O-S two pavilion, where we had a
table, and I counted thirty four tables that were showing O-S two warp, warp
server, O-S two applications like Chip Chat and others as well.

So I see thirty four tables to six tables. And our O-S two pavilion was very
well trafficked, many people were walking through there. And then I see where
Info World took a poll and for the fourth year in a row, O-S two won product of
the year. Voted on by computer professionals who subscribe to Info World.

So on the one hand, the press is talking about N-T, but on the other hand,
computer professionals who want to make something work well, are using O-S two
and are very satisfied with it. So I would say that the present status of O-S
two, when you ask that question, the answer you get depends on who you ask, how
you ask, and when you ask. And I don't think there's anything more I can say
about the current status of O-S two from my standpoint, other than there's a lot
of people that like it and use it. But there's a lot of confusion in the
marketplace with respect to what's going to happen next. And what will happen
next.

I view it as like a three legged stool. And a three legged stool can't stand on
just two legs, it takes three legs. And the three legs I think of are, one leg
is I-B-M O-S two. You have to have a good product and good support from the
manufacturer. And the second leg is software developers, products like Chip
Chat, Relish, Clear Luck. And the third leg are the O-S two users. And here in
the audience you represent one of the legs on this stool. O-S two users. And I
represent another leg, O-S two software developers. And the main speaker for
tonight, Mr. Soyring, represents yet another leg of the three legged stool,
I-B-M O-S two.


All three legs have to be strong and level in order to support a good platform
that will go into the future. And I think what happens is the users look to see
what are softwar

e developers doing. And software developers look to see what is I-B-M doing. And
I-B-M looks to the marketplace to the O-S two users and it says, what are they
doing. And I think by the strong turnout here, a message is clear, that there is
a lot of interest in running O-S two in the corporate marketplace and, maybe, in
the stand alone connected consumer marketplace as well. So I think a key
question in my mind would be, how well are users adopting O-S two. And that's
reflected by how much O-S two are they buying. And I think a key question that
I'd like to see Mr. Soyring answer tonight is, how well are sales of O-S two
doing. And that is, not just sales, but what's the bottom line look like. Is
I-B-M making money on O-S two. Because if I-B-M is making money on O-S two, they
will continue to work with O-S two and will not think of dropping a product that
they make money on.

So one of the key things that I'd like to see, and if I don't ask the question,
I hope somebody here does, is, Mr. Soyring, is I-B-M making money with O-S two.
Will I-B-M ever make money on O-S two. And I think that's the critical question
to ask as to whether I-B-M will continue to support O-S two or not.

One thing here that came to my mind, and that is the slogan. I went out there
and I tried to generate some interest at a local shopping mall. And the current
O-S two slogan is, get warped. So as people came walking in, I held up this
poster of O-S two and I said, get warped. And the response was, actually it got
scratched out here because I can't say it in front of a public group. And so, I
went on and I tried it over and over and I found that people did not respond
well when I told them to get warped. They didn't understand. And I think a good
slogan is important and that's something that can be improved.


For example, I bought this cowboy hat and after I bought it, another Okie down
there, between spits of tobacco juice, said, he liked my hat. And I said, well
thanks. And he said, he's got the same kind of hat. And he said it's a Charl

ie One Horse. And I said, yeah, it is. It says on the inside, Charlie One Horse.
And I said, is that a good brand of hat because I don't want to look like a two
bit Okie. And he said, oh, it's a great hat and he says it's got a great slogan.
And I said, what's that. And he pulled out the tag and I read it. It said, if it
doesn't say Charlie One Horse, it ain't worth dot dot dot. I said, and I'm a
dumb Yankee, so I said, what is that. And he says, listen, it means. I have to
ask the ladies to cover their ears. Because I'm going to use language that
you're normally not exposed to. Unless you watch network television. So anyway
the slogan is, if it doesn't say Charlie One Horse, it ain't worth shit. And he
says he really likes it. So it really appeals to Okies. Now I'd like to propose
that we get rid of this get warped slogan and we replace it with something else.
And in a moment I'm going to tell you what I propose we replace it with. And I'm
going to ask that if you don't like my idea, boo and hiss and throw things at
me. And if you do like my idea, stand up and clap your hands and stamp your feet
and yell yahoo. And maybe the message will get to Soyring, take it back to
I-B-M, that they need a better slogan then get warped. So, here's my proposed
slogan. If it ain't running O-S two, your computer ain't worth shit.

Okay. I'd like to briefly switch gears here. Just spend about another five
minutes talking about the great chess championship game that was played about
two months ago on the Internet. How many of you tuned into that. The I-B-M page
on the Internet. It was really something to see the chess champion of the world
break into a cold sweat because he was playing against a computer. And being a
real computer fan myself, I wanted to find out what hardware was it running.

What software was it running. So I found out, I explored these details by
clicking forever on these hot links. And I found that the chess program was
written in visual basic, and was running on a sixteen processor N-T machine that
was actual

ly fifty N-T machines all connected on a network and it never hiccupped and it
never choked and it ran great and almost beat the chess champ. Isn't that what
everybody else read too, about that machine. No? Oh, because it was a lie. It
wasn't visual basic running N-T, it was really 256 power P-C chips running in
parallel on a special version of A-I-X. Not running N-T. And not running O-S
two. 

And I'm going to come back to that in just a moment, but another thing occurred
to me and that is, the Internet. It's been around twenty six years but the last
two years it's really exploded and everybody wants to be on the net. And the
next big thing is, besides putting up these pictures and text web pages, is to
put little program applications in these web pages as well. So we all have to
agree on a standard language, a way to do it. And the way that we're all going
to agree to do it is using visual basic, right. Isn't that what everyone is
excited about, visual basic. No. Everyone is excited about java. A C plus plus
like program that is made specifically for the Internet, that's promoted by Sun
Microsystems. So the question that occurred to me is, why is it that the world's
most powerful P-C software company was not involved in the chess championship
game. Why didn't they write the software to challenge the chess champion. And
why isn't the world's most powerful P-C software company led by the great guru,
who's worth billions of dollars and can do almost anything he wants and loves
computers, why didn't they propose a language that would work on the Internet.
And it occurred to me that the reason they didn't do this is because their
product offerings are too narrow. And I'll say it now, in my view, Microsoft is
a one product company. And that product is Windows and there are windows add
ons. Like Excel and Access and Word. But their add ons don't work on Unix or O-S
two or any other operating system, except for, I concede Mac. But their
operating system is windows only. And their language offerings are basic and C
plu

s plus. And it strikes me odd that you would have this narrow of a product
offering from a company that touts itself as the world's greatest P-C software
company.

And I thought of an analogy. And an analogy here is Microsoft is like a ship
that's sailing with the wind. And it's rigged to sail with the wind. Only with
the wind. So as long as the wind is blowing directly in the way they want to go,
their boat can make great headway. But if the wind changes, they can't configure
their boat that well to sail at a different angle to the wind. Whereas many
other companies, Sun, I-B-M and I'll just take I-B-M. Instead of just a strategy
that is windows N-T only, I-B-M's product offering starts at O-S two, which is
comparable to windows N-T, and if you need more, it goes to A-I-X. And then to
A-S four hundred. And then to V-M and M-V-S. So that they have a broad range of
products, and it's like a sailboat that's decked out with lots of lines and
rigging and sails, so they can sail not only with the wind, they can sail ninety
degrees to the wind. They can even make headway into the wind because they can
tack back and forth. So the broader product offering allows them to evolve a
strategy which they are more versatile in the changing marketplace. And I'm very
interested to hear Mr. Soyring's talk on I-B-M strategy on how they will use
these product offerings in the future.

The reason I say this is that often people want to emulate the industry's
wealthiest man. But I think really we need to look at some of the industry's
smartest people in order to look for some direction. And Michael Cauwashaw, who
invented rex, the programming language, rex. And he wrote go serve, was

interviewed in a recent computer magazine in the last several months. And they
asked him what operating system do you use. And he says, I love O-S two but I
use other operating systems as well. And they said, what languages do you use.
And he rattled off three or four that he was an expert at. And he says, but I
try to be at least conversant with all the

 languages that are out there, all the major languages. And he said a real
computer professional is conversant with more than one operating system and more
than one language. And I think those are good words, it's a re-stating of the
phrase that a well educated person is well educated. And I think it's good for
each one of us to view ourselves as a personal sailboat with our own lines and
rigging and sails and let's not get trapped into the one product way of thinking
that other companies seem to be wrapped up in. And there are many other ways to
do things, O-S two is a great operating system, but Linex is out there and A-I-X
and others as well. Rex is a great language but there's Lisp, there's Pearl,
there's T-C-L, there's many languages that are good. So I think it is good for
all of us individually to try to rig our sailboat so that we can head in any
direction in the wind. Because although Microsoft is making great headway with
the wind at its stern right now, there's one thing you know about Chicago
weather or about the wind in general is, eventually it changes. And if your
sailboat is only rigged to sail with the wind, you will have difficulty in
accommodating those changes.

So those are my thoughts and observations on it. And I'll now step down and let
Mr. Soyring be introduced and continue. And I'll leave you with the three final
thoughts and that is, think well, work hard, and have fun.

_PAGE_10_




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