Would Atari had been better off if Bushnell hadn´t sold it?

[Lord Mushroom]

Would it?

Edited August 6, 2021 by Lord Mushroom

[Lord Mushroom]

"So I think the 7800 doesn't exist in this timeline."

 

I agree. What I meant was that the delay of the 7800 was one of the things which brought Atari down, and that wouldn´t have happened if Bushnell owned it. Most likely because it wouldn´t have existed at all.

[zzip]

So the taco guys were upset that their thread was hijacked?  The irony!  ?

 

anyway to the question,  Nolan clearly thinks so:

https://www.gamespot.com/articles/atari-destroyed-by-sale-to-warner-says-founder/1100-6421905/

 

But it sounds like by "destroyed" he means Warner got rid of his hottubs and beer taps.

[zzip]

11 minutes ago, Lord Mushroom said:

I agree. What I meant was that the delay of the 7800 was one of the things which brought Atari down, and that wouldn´t have happened if Bushnell owned it. Most likely because it wouldn´t have existed at all.

I think the mere existence of the 7800 was a problem.   Because of it, Atari discontinued the 5200 less than 2 year after it it was introduced.  This pissed off a lot of 5200 owners.   Considering the 5200 early adopters were some of the most loyal to the brand-  that was not a good move.

 

So any world where the 2600 only has one successor is probably a better world for the company's long-term prospects.

[high voltage]

And, maybe the 5200 would've made it to Europe after all.

[Mikebloke]

I voted don't know. 

 

One reason is I really don't know and I'm usually happy to do Crystal ball thinking. 

 

Second reason is that take over failures is not necessarily the result of the take over itself. Take overs can lead to realising a business is not going to stay afloat despite investment. Often one has to buy a company before that can be fully realised. 

[toiletunes]

It depends.

Would Bushnell had included Netflix for moms?

[Lord Mushroom]

3 minutes ago, toiletunes said:

It depends.

Would Bushnell had included Netflix for moms?

He would probably have invented it and called it Atariflix.

[toiletunes]

"Game, Stream, Connect like never before" would become "Game, Stream, Connect in a hot tub with a cigar"

[zzip]

4 minutes ago, Lord Mushroom said:

He would probably have invented it and called it Atariflix.

Except his version would have been a collection of robotic animatronics that act out popular movie scenes in your home.  

[Lord Mushroom]

16 minutes ago, Mikebloke said:

I voted don't know. 

 

One reason is I really don't know and I'm usually happy to do Crystal ball thinking.

It says "probably yes" and "probably no", so you should only choose "I have no idea" if is exactly 50/50.

 

What I am saying is that those who chose "I have no idea" are wrong.

 

An unrelated question, and I hope I am not hijacking my own thread here, is it common to make it public who voted what or not?

[Lord Mushroom]

21 minutes ago, Mikebloke said:

Second reason is that take over failures is not necessarily the result of the take over itself. Take overs can lead to realising a business is not going to stay afloat despite investment. Often one has to buy a company before that can be fully realised. 

I think the takeover itself was very successful. They were making a ton of money for a couple of years. It was their own actions which led to the following huge losses.

[+GoldLeader]

Is the Pope Catholic?

[Lord Mushroom]

28 minutes ago, GoldLeader said:

Is the Pope Catholic?

I was starting to regret not having the poll answerers be public when I saw someone agreed with me, but now I have a sneaking suspicion of who it might have been.

Edited August 6, 2021 by Lord Mushroom

[pacman000]

Voted no. Bushnell's a visionary, but he's not a good business man. Atari needed someone who was both, & I'm not sure they ever got it.

 

Jack Tramiel might've been close, but by the late 80's he seemed to be repeating what he did in the past. That's the opposite of visionary. And he had a tendency to burn bridges, which hurt him on the pure business end of things as well.

[zzip]

13 minutes ago, pacman000 said:

Jack Tramiel might've been close, but by the late 80's he seemed to be repeating what he did in the past. That's the opposite of visionary. And he had a tendency to burn bridges, which hurt him on the pure business end of things as well.

Jack was a one-trick pony.  The only thing in his playbook was "sell it cheaper than everyone else, cut corners if you have to", and as you say, he did that over and over.    But he failed to invest in other areas that make a product world class.   That's why you got cheap devices with poor software support and weak marketing

 

1 hour ago, Lord Mushroom said:

What I am saying is that those who chose "I have no idea" are wrong

Well I honestly don't know.   It's not uncommon for entrepreneurial types to be terrible at running the day-to-day operations of the companies they started.   That's why they bring in the "suits" with their MBAs to handle that stuff.   But often those people end up being short sighted.   I think you need a balance of both personality types to have a successful company.

 

 

[+wongojack]

I voted "probably no" because I've heard Bushnell say in interviews that Atari pre-Warner didn't have the capital to get the VCS out the door.  No VCS and we're not on a website called AtariAge 40+ years later.

 

Of course that could be total BS and my whole reasoning flys out the window.  If so then I think I'd move toward "I have no idea" because there are so many variables.

[zzip]

Just now, wongojack said:

I voted "probably no" because I've heard Bushnell say in interviews that Atari pre-Warner didn't have the capital to get the VCS out the door.  No VCS and we're not on a website called AtariAge 40+ years later.

 

Of course that could be total BS and my whole reasoning flys out the window.  If so then I think I'd move toward "I have no idea" because there are so many variables.

I think the presumption behind the thread is Bushnell raises the money in other ways, such as taking the company public.

[Lord Mushroom]

20 minutes ago, pacman000 said:

Voted no. Bushnell's a visionary, but he's not a good business man. Atari needed someone who was both, & I'm not sure they ever got it.

Not a good business man, put perhaps a good manager. There is a difference. Chuck E Cheese was doing well when he was running it. Could just be a coincidence as the video game crash happened shortly after, but I didn´t think the arcade market was as affected as the console industry.

 

While googling Nolan Bushnell I found out that he sold a company to Lucas which later became Pixar. When are you going to to learn, Nolan? Don´t sell!

[Lord Mushroom]

21 minutes ago, zzip said:

JIt's not uncommon for entrepreneurial types to be terrible at running the day-to-day operations of the companies they started.   That's why they bring in the "suits" with their MBAs to handle that stuff.   But often those people end up being short sighted.   I think you need a balance of both personality types to have a successful company.

Definately. That is why companies where the founder is still heavily involved (as CEO or COO) tend to do better than others. Probably because pony-tails can easily get help from suits, while it is very difficult for suits to find a suitable pony-tail to help them.

Edited August 6, 2021 by Lord Mushroom

[Lord Mushroom]

13 minutes ago, wongojack said:

I voted "probably no" because I've heard Bushnell say in interviews that Atari pre-Warner didn't have the capital to get the VCS out the door.

They could have released it in partnership with a company with deep pockets (for example Warner). Or raised money through an IPO. 

[Lord Mushroom]

15 minutes ago, zzip said:

I think the presumption behind the thread is Bushnell raises the money in other ways, such as taking the company public.

Not necessarily. People are free to question if they would find the money.

[+x=usr(1536)]

2 hours ago, zzip said:

So the taco guys were upset that their thread was hijacked?  The irony!  ?

Where'd you read that?

 

Seriously, man, you don't seem to be able to just let go of the whole taco thing.  I realise that it's left you disproportionately butthurt, but FFS, it's not healthy to get that obsessive over people not sharing your opinion.

[MrMaddog]

Me: Been there, done that....still got the old manuscript on my hard drive.

 

Anyway, there may have been one alternative open for Bushnell instead of selling out to Warner and that is venture captialists.  He actually recommended one for Steve Jobs and we all know how that turned out!

 

 

Edited August 6, 2021 by MrMaddog
Or I could be wrong, don't mind a bit of a healthy debate on this...

[Lord Mushroom]

1 hour ago, MrMaddog said:

Anyway, there may have been one alternative open for Bushnell instead of selling out to Warner and that is venture captialists.  He actually recommended one for Steve Jobs and we all know how that turned out!

I have done some googling.

 

They did have venture capital investments in 1975, one of which was from the guy he recommended to Steve Jobs. Before that, the only capital injected in the company was the start-up money from the founders. $250 each. They didn´t seek additional funding until they had sold Pong games for $10 million. It goes to show what is possible, even with insufficient capital.  

 

Before selling to Warner, they were trying and struggling to get additional funding, and especially Bushnell wanted an IPO. But when he heard the offer from Warner, and less importantly was told he would be given a lot of freedom and engineers would be well treated, he accepted. He has also said that he sold to Warner because he was tired. And that if he had taken a vacation, he would not have sold it to Warner.

Edited August 6, 2021 by Lord Mushroom