1/ *sigh* What happened with the personal computer at Xerox:
The Dallas group knew that if they were forced to add an entirely new product to their customary line of office machines, any hope of meeting their near-term sales & financial quotas for the year would be demolished...
The Dallas group knew that if they were forced to add an entirely new product to their customary line of office machines, any hope of meeting their near-term sales & financial quotas for the year would be demolished...
2/ “They had to sandbag the Alto III, because with it they wouldn’t make their numbers and therefore wouldn’t get their bonuses,” Ellenby concluded.
“As a Xerox product, the Alto III was dead.“
“As a Xerox product, the Alto III was dead.“
3/ Xerox’s top executives were for the most part salesmen of copy machines. From these leased behemoths the revenue stream was as tangible as the “click” of the meters counting off copies, for which the customer paid Xerox so many cents per page...
4/ Noticing their eyes narrow, Ellenby could almost hear them thinking: “If there is no paper to be copied, where’s the ‘click’?” In other words: “How will I get paid?”
5/ For Geschke, the most discomfiting revelation was the contrast between the executives’ reactions and those of their wives. “The typical posture and demeanor of the Xerox executives, and all of them were men, was this”—arms folded sternly across the chest.
6/ “But their wives would immediately walk up to the machines and say, ‘Could I try that mouse thing?’ That’s because many of them had been secretaries—users of the equipment. These guys, maybe they punched a button on a copier one time in their lives.
