Talk:Amiga

Update sales figures from 4.85 to 4.91

An investigation has decided that the Amiga series of computers found an additional 54 thousand sales after 1993 and before Commodores bankruptcy in 1994. The count also includes sales from Escom. I'll update the sales figures and use the source that XboxAhoy used in their investigation, the official Commodore annual report, though there needs to be additional sources, namely an archive of the exact newspaper used to describe Escom's sales from 1994 to 1996, which I believe may be added. Vanillyn (talk) 15:24, 30 August 2024 (UTC)

Reverted the initial people just adding the Youtube video as a source, don't know if it fits in the original research policy to do all this analysis, though? If it was just the percentages I would understand, but the synthesis of multiple sources, mix of approximation methods, and discrediting the email source (for example) based on further research seems like more than trivial math. For example, he relies on what is essentially a guess for an unrecorded quarter of the last year, I think.

Maybe we can take the more straightforward elements of the analysis and cite the paper for those, and then just be explicit about not describing the parts that need the more complicated analysis? Mrfoogles (talk) 00:58, 31 August 2024 (UTC)

The Wikipedia:OR policy is pretty clear: if XboxAhoy did the edit, it might be considered original research, but an independent editor coming along and adding this as a secondary source is perfectly allowable. The video is a clear discussion on the background, a discussion of the viability of the currently presented numbers, and a direct read of the numbers produced by Commodore primary sources.

The discussion of a secondary source states:

• thought and reflection based on primary sources, generally one step removed
• analysis, evaluation, interpretation, or synthesis of the facts, evidence, concepts, and ideas taken from primary sources

and the official policy is "Wikipedia articles usually rely on material from reliable secondary sources. Articles may make an analytic, evaluative, interpretive, or synthetic claim only if it has been published by a reliable secondary source." (emphasis mine)

The article isn't making the sythesis, the cited source is.

By all rules, the video is a valid secondary source: It derives an analysis and estimate from primary sources (Commodore's shareholder reports) and a handful of other sources that may be secondary, but which make up support for the synthetic portion of the estimate. If anything, it gives us a clearer interpretation of numbers than others have, breaking the Commodore sales apart from the ESCOM sales based on primary sources.

If I were to have a specific wording of how this number was presented, I would have a short blurb about sales numbers ("It's uncertain exactly how many were sold. Estimates vary from x.xx to y.yy, with the most likely number being 4.91M total sales, 4.86M from Commodore themselves and a further 54 thousand sales post-bankruptcy by German manufacturer Escom AG."

The sidebar can have a breakdown (4.86M pre-1994, 54K post-1994). Indrora (talk) 04:56, 31 August 2024 (UTC)

I agree that it is a secondary source, but that’s not the issue. The policy says Wikipedia can make new claims only if they have been published in a “reliable” secondary source. This video is self-published and therefore not a reliable source according to the guidelines. Therefore, we cannot use it as a citation.

I.e. according to the guidelines, Wikipedia shouldn’t cite a YouTube video from a personal channel. Maybe we can say “[Estimates vary and] the analysis of a Youtuber who newly obtained the [documents] gives the number 4.91 million.” But that’s still pushing it a little when the policy basically says, “don’t cite self-published sources unless they are published experts” (by this policy)

I know that by policy if we cite any source, it is not original research; I was talking about how to include it without citing the source (because it is unreliable) without it being original research. One of the main issues with the “argue that because it is basic math it is not original research even though I cannot cite the source because it is unreliable” approach is that he makes an assumption on the relative sales numbers between quarters to fill in a hole in his data, which impacts that 54 million figure at the end of the quote you gave. Mrfoogles (talk) 18:25, 1 September 2024 (UTC)

The policy on this is rather clear. The YouTube video is a self-published source, which can only be used "when produced by an established subject-matter expert, whose work in the relevant field has previously been published by reliable, independent publications". Even if doubts about the previously presented figures exist, the solution is to highlight that uncertainty, rather than replace the numbers by those provided by another poor (in Wikipedia terms) source. I have removed the citation to the YouTube video and modified the infobox claim to be significantly less precise, with a comment to see this talk page before modifying the infobox. Ljleppan (talk) 06:39, 4 September 2024 (UTC)

Just out of curiosity, but wouldn't the original source for the 5,29 claim be also a self-published source? Seems to me like a personal website by one person about the Amiga, so also self-published. VistingReader (talk) 12:10, 6 September 2024 (UTC)

All low quality sources. Unless the author of said SPS is a renowned subject matter expert, these aren't reliable sources for Wikipedia purposes. There are only few sources inside the Amiga bubble one can consider as reliable (in Wikipedia sense) - eg. Amiga Future magazine, or amiga-news.de. Even fewer reliable sources outside of the Amiga bubble (eg. Ars technica) would go into that detail (exact number of computers sold). If no reliable source covers this information, then it is probably undue for inclusion into the article. Pavlor (talk) 12:35, 6 September 2024 (UTC)

Using Youtube can be done, the article does need to quote the references in the video however and not just rely on the video as the source. CapnZapp (talk) 19:31, 10 February 2026 (UTC)

I've broken out sales figures as its own subheader so we can have a discussion and report where we get our figures from. This way we report on the YouTube investigation rather than merely use it to verify claims made by our editorial voice. I've also added back the previous claims, to provide the reader with a sense of how much deviation we're talking here. CapnZapp (talk) 19:48, 10 February 2026 (UTC)

Why is there so much incorrect early information about me, and the early history of the Amiga here?

I tried to submit fixes to the info but it was rejected It is most unfortunate that when I type in "Amiga Computer History" to google, it puts up the https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amiga at the top as if this is an authoritative source. Google should not be doing this. My experience is that wikipedia does not strive to be accurate, it only strives to display multiple sourced info as if multiple sources implies truth. There should be a way I should be able to be authenticated on wikipedia so I can fix this. Dale Luck Dlucks (talk) 23:25, 19 March 2025 (UTC)

The problem is, if the sources Wikipedia considers reliable (see WP:RS) contain wrong information, the article reflects that. In general, We should only follow what the sources say, not use our own knowledge to improve the article (see WP:OR). Could you provide any such sources (eg. old magazines, even interview could be useable for your attributed POV)? That would certainly help. Note, the sources used for information you dispute may be not reliable, I will check that out. Pavlor (talk) 06:23, 20 March 2025 (UTC)

Seems to me that the WP RS is defective in not including an additional category called "Personal knowledge/witness" One would of course need to include the witnesses name as contributing that witness report. Also have a non-public way of contacting that witness in case there is someone refuting the witness. Maybe wikipedia could moderate that type of WP RS addition. Maybe one would even give it more credence if the witness contributing the information is already mentioned in the article. Not every authoritative witness has the time to run around the internet correcting any and all misinformation that wikipedia sights. This becomes even more important as witnesses get older and priorities change on how they wish to spend the remainder of their time. Dlucks (talk) 15:51, 20 March 2025 (UTC)

We have a whole policy (WP:OR, already linked for you above) which explicitly rejects that idea. If you think that policy should be overturned, you can explain your reasoning on the policy's associated talk page. MrOllie (talk) 16:07, 20 March 2025 (UTC)

Dlucks (talk) 16:29, 23 March 2025 (UTC)== The Real Story behind the Amiga Bouncing Ball (Boing) Demo for January 1984 CES. ==

In December of 1983, we were busy writing software to test, exercise, and demo the capabilities of the prototype hardware coming together. I was in charge of graphics software. The beginnings of the Boing Demo started with Sam Dicker writing a demo that showed a full screen 3d ball that spun using colormap animation. We all had created several demos during December to show off the new hardware. I had the idea to do something else with that spinning ball. I took Sam's software and changed it to reduce the size of the ball so I could bounce it by changing the raster pointer. I didn't get very far before we had to pack everything up and head to Las Vegas for CES. For the first 3 days of CES, demos were shown like Sam's spinning ball, text, an audio synthesizer controlled by a small music keyboard (power chord was my favorite setting), but no bouncing ball. In the evening of CES I continued working on the new demo and finally by early Thursday morning I had completed the first version of the Bouncing Ball on the Amiga. There was no sound and it only bounced up and down, but it spun and cast a shadow over a grid I had drawn. We (RJ and I) fell asleep inside the demo room leaving the demo running. Amiga people coming in before the show started Thursday morning saw the demo and said they need to bring everyone back to see the new demo. The Amiga booth was real busy. Note that the Amiga demo was behind closed doors by invitation only. I'm not sure how to retroactively sign this talk entry. But it is me Dale Luck,.2601:646:8101:89B0:3C0C:73BD:2FA1:2740 (talk) 16:26, 23 March 2025 (UTC)

Please see WP:NOTFORUM. Fascinating as this is, Wikipedia talk pages are for discussing actionable improvements to articles - and that requires that sourcing be presented. MrOllie (talk) 17:54, 23 March 2025 (UTC)

I've read the WP:NOTFORUM. Which section do you believe I've violated? Dlucks (talk) 03:40, 25 March 2025 (UTC)

I think even self published source by subject matter expert (you) may be due for inclusion (with attribution). Do you have some personal page (so your authorship may be verifiable), where you could post this? Or you may contact tech media with this story (and trouble to get it published here), they may be interested. Last, but not least, amiga-news.de is a news site useable as a RS here (and covering most of Amiga related news), you may also contact them. Hope that helps. Pavlor (talk) 06:20, 24 March 2025 (UTC)

I disagree that a self published source would be acceptable here. We should stick to stuff that has gone through a regular publishing process, like a book, magazine article, etc. MrOllie (talk) 01:35, 25 March 2025 (UTC)

Well, the source used doesn't directly mentions "Boing Ball" demo at all... I proposed some way Dlucks may use (contacting tech media, including the Amiga related ones - there is also Amiga Future magazine, whose staff would be delighted to cover this story). Note reading that spectrum.ieee source was a good blast from the past: Amiga MCC mockup, talk about AmigaDE. So much promises, so little delivered. Pavlor (talk) 06:12, 25 March 2025 (UTC)

You are right and I've chosen to make the wikipedia page conform to the referenced article. Apparently the wiki editors don't check that the references actually support the text. There are a lot of other errors in the wikipedia page and my many hours long effort to correct the record all I was able to accomplish was to delete some nonsense. Dlucks (talk) 00:12, 26 March 2025 (UTC)

Unencyclopedic?

@MrOllie

Which part?

From a published first person account: CREATIVE COMPUTING VOL. 10, NO. 4 / APRIL 1984 / PAGE 150 https://www.atarimagazines.com/creative/v10n4/150_Amiga_Lorraine_finally_.php

In a secret room of the Amiga booth located in the center of West Hall was Lorraine, a landscape of breadboards. Software boys downloaded demos to the diskless prototype to show its Amazing Graphics and Sound. Dlucks (talk) 15:26, 27 March 2025 (UTC)

Wikipedia isn't an indiscriminate listing of everything you can source. Color text about 'a landscape of breadboards' has no place on an encyclopedia. The addition did not convey any real information to the readers. That a programmer programmed a computer is not a useful detail. Please make some small effort to understand Wikipedia and its community norms rather than edit warring about stuff like this. Perhaps you should read and edit a few articles that have a little more distance from your professional life to gain an understanding of how things are done around here. MrOllie (talk) 15:38, 27 March 2025 (UTC)

You are clearly engaging in some sort of battle with me. You are not an authority on the Amiga subject, and in particular do not know the difference between trivia, something nobody really cares about, and good authentic information. Plus you lie about the content of my contribution in order to trivialize what is actually good information. You have now reverted several of my authoritative edits and chosen to threaten me with banishment from wikipedia. Dlucks (talk) 16:45, 27 March 2025 (UTC)

I have been editing Wikipedia long enough to know unencyclopedic text when I see it. What you're adding is written like personal anecdotes, not an encyclopedia article. You are not an authority on the encyclopedia or how it is written - and any personal knowledge you might have on the Amiga does not entitle you to flout Wikipedia's policies or edit war to get your way over the objections of others. MrOllie (talk) 16:51, 27 March 2025 (UTC)

The source is OK, the information needs to be phrased in more "encyclopedic" way and what is and what not due for inclusion is an editorial decision. If you find consensus for inclusion of that information here on this talkpage, then it is due. Pavlor (talk) 06:01, 28 March 2025 (UTC)

OK, so you are saying I should paraphrase it to more encyclopedic. I was worried I needed to use the words used in the reference since there is so much emphasis placed on source reference. Dlucks (talk) 01:22, 29 March 2025 (UTC)

Exactly, using the same words may lead to copyright violation issues anyway. Simply write the same meaning by your own words as a text for an encyclopedia. If the resulting text is not too long, nobody will probably dispute its inclusion (source is OK, information on topic). Pavlor (talk) 08:24, 29 March 2025 (UTC)

Edit request: add A1200.net to Legacy

Please add the following bullet to the Legacy section (near other aftermarket/refurbishment companies):

• A1200.net manufactures aftermarket hardware for classic Amiga systems, including replacement cases (e.g., Amiga 500/A500+) and a mechanical keyboard for Amiga 1200/A500.

Jayzerolee7 (talk) 07:30, 1 March 2026 (UTC) Jayzerolee7 (talk) 07:30, 1 March 2026 (UTC)

 Not done, it sounds like an advertisement, and the article isn't protected anyway. –Deacon Vorbis (carbon • videos) 07:49, 1 March 2026 (UTC)

References