The End of Sierra as We Knew It, Part 1: The Acquisition

Re:The End of Sierra as We Knew It, Part 1: The Acquisition by JKCalhoun on Friday April 04, 2025 @03:47PM (#43586930)

> Forbes first became associated with Sierra in 1991, when he agreed to join the company’s board. Ken Williams, Sierra’s co-founder and CEO, considered this a major coup...

And then:

> “Have you and Ken ever thought about selling Sierra?” <Forbes> asked her out of the blue one day in the lobby of the Paris hotel.

> “No,” Roberta answered shortly. “We’re not interested.”

> “But if you ever were, what sort of price would you be looking at?”

> “A lot,” Roberta replied, then walked away as quickly as decorum allowed.

Pretty clear which of the two was the better business person.

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Re:The End of Sierra as We Knew It, Part 1: The Acquisition by influx on Saturday April 05, 2025 @12:22AM (#43590723)

She also built most of the intellectual property.

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Re:The End of Sierra as We Knew It, Part 1: The Acquisition by canucker2016 on Saturday April 05, 2025 @01:10AM (#43590939)

And from Steven Levy's Hackers, she was one of the women in the hot tub for the cover and ad for the game Softporn Adventure, published by the company that was soon renamed to Sierra On-line.

see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Softporn_Adventure

Interesting to read the link to the Leisure Suit Larry game.

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Re:The End of Sierra as We Knew It, Part 1: The Acquisition by alexey-salmin on Saturday April 05, 2025 @01:45AM (#43591128)

There are a couple more photos from that photoset https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2014/12/the-o...

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Re:The End of Sierra as We Knew It, Part 1: The Acquisition by wileydragonfly on Saturday April 05, 2025 @11:40AM (#43594295)

I always found those photos deeply unsettling. None of the women look particularly happy about being there. “If I don’t do this, Timmy doesn’t get that operation” vibes. The photo in the advertisement was bad enough, the outtakes are worse.

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Re:The End of Sierra as We Knew It, Part 1: The Acquisition by gopher_space on Saturday April 05, 2025 @01:27PM (#43595052)

These aren't slice-of-life photos you can deconstruct like this, it's a professional shoot with amateur models. Professional models are paid to look happy to be there after hour three under hot lights. Amateur models thought you were going to snap a few pictures.

It's entirely possible that everyone in the photo needs to pee.

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Re:The End of Sierra as We Knew It, Part 1: The Acquisition by wileydragonfly on Saturday April 05, 2025 @06:14PM (#43597246)

They’ve been thrown in my face for decades as “oh my god, look at this.” I think every single article about Sierra mentions it. Oh well.

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Re:The End of Sierra as We Knew It, Part 1: The Acquisition by gopher_space on Sunday April 06, 2025 @05:25AM (#43600110)

Oh I’m not saying you’re wrong, I’m just framing the situation around my experience.

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Re:The End of Sierra as We Knew It, Part 1: The Acquisition by BrtByte on Saturday April 05, 2025 @02:18AM (#43591293)

Yeah, that exchange says so much in just a few lines.

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Re:The End of Sierra as We Knew It, Part 1: The Acquisition by sc2862 on Saturday April 05, 2025 @02:02PM (#43595301)

Apologies for my lack of understanding of business, but who was better business person? Was it Roberta because she wasn't interested?

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Re:The End of Sierra as We Knew It, Part 1: The Acquisition by cyberlurker on Saturday April 05, 2025 @02:44PM (#43595735)

It’s generally a bad idea to ask someone to name their price. And the right answer to that question is “A lot”.

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