just thinkin' about late 1970s, early 1980s computing... sigh...
microsoft really did destroy all that, the hobbyist scene. it is back now, despite its relatively puny size and position as a 'subculture'.
i wonder what it would take to liberate the human from the computer today. something suggests to me that it lies in simple, expressive command prompts--staying clear of modern GUIs, while not necessarily rejecting WSIWYG
if i have enough money after i pay my bills tomorrow i will try and print out some magazines and do some deep research into the era of 8 bit computing. to try and answer the question: what would a powerful but minimal computer need for the average user today?
i'd love to make lil 8 bit games again
the stock market with their souped up graphics cards can take a hike
8 bit assembly is also so easy! race the beam ~
i wonder what 6502 assembler is the community standard for atari 2600 dev now
i always used this piece of vaporware everyone swore by on the atariage forums called dasm
Laid out a little tutorial dungeon for the milestone and recorded a walking tour. The tile memory works different now and I think it looks nice.
Time to pack this baby so full of skeletons š
When was the last time you heard the #warez word? 
If you've never read Worse is Better or the history behind it, it's worth reading https://www.dreamsongs.com/WorseIsBetter.html
tl;dr: Yeah you think your tech is better designed and it may be but the Zerg Rush strategy works for tech (but with long-running consequences)
When you eat a lot of fruit
"Ladies and gentlemen
This is mango no. 5"
Anil Dash on why you should quit Substack while you still can: every new feature they add increases lock-in, making it harder to leave while they court some of the worst people online https://www.anildash.com/2024/11/19/dont-call-it-a-substack/
people are so far removed from the systems that keep them alive - the internet comes out of a socket in the wall and that's basically it.
A new (old) song for the playlist: https://youtu.be/J6AiZaGBal0
#GiantIsopods #Isopods #music #doritos
if i was gonna make a VM
i think it would be either:
- something like CHIP-8, for making amazing games for the TV
- something like smalltalk, where you have very high levels of abstraction
i will meditate on this. i like DMA video RAM so CHIP-8 would be fun
I'm trying to #crowdfund ā¹20k (~ā¬224 or ~$237) by the 20th of December, to add
~350 POIs (shop, restaurants, healthcare, etc)
~150 building levels,
shop phone numbers,
shop addresses,
named commercial and apartment areas,
and much more to #OpenStreetMap in the city of #Mumbai, #India.
To learn more and to contribute, visit -
https://contrapunctus.codeberg.page/projects/osm-mumbai-2024.html
(I've been an OSM contributor since 2016, and this is my latest attempt at trying to contribute to it full-time.)
#LambdaMOO update available at https://lambdamoo.blogspot.com/
Power outage. In case you were unaware of this blog, now you know.
i think the entire australian welfare system must now be entering crisis because it changed its app name from mygovid to myid
THANKS š
have a lovely little BASIC listing (:
This version of Chase was written for SWTP 4K BASIC. The idea for this game came from Creative Computing. There are a high voltage fence, 15 high voltage posts, and 5 robots all out to get you. As you move, the robots will always take the shortest path toward you. Your only chance is to run them into a post or each other. If you can destroy all 5 robots, you win! I found that many times more than one move could be made without the map, so the printing or not printing a map was written as an option in the program. This program should run on most 4K or 8K BASIC with minor changes. (For in- stance, to run this on Altair 8K, the random number statements must be changed.) Good luck with your Chase.
source: https://archive.org/details/Kilobaud197702/page/n49/mode/1up
Interesting, this works, ran about 45% faster in my quickie test in emulator. What's it like on real hardware?
On Atari there's a "fast mode", but it turns off the screen. Used to use that in long processing like fractals, hours generating one screenful.
#retrocomputing #coco
