pouët.net

Don't listen to Tomcat, he's an anti-
gay skinhead!

Dominei: Hehe, this pics of Tomcat were quite cool. :)
But he is right. Maybe this books would be cool as pdf today but what about them in 10 or 20 or even more years? Are you able to read them? Are you able to read the storage devices where they are stored? Are you able to find the storage devices where they are stored?

everything is converted

yeah, into budishm og hinduishm! NO MORE CHRISTIANITY!

hey some sceners should wake up... PDF is now quite a standard for "digital paper", and Adobe has given the specifications so that one can code one's own PDF reader on one's favourite system.

moreover if you are totally allergic to Adobe you can use other standards like CHM, HTML or even TXT ;)

btw some sceners would be against digital representation or distribution ? that would be quite paradoxal for so-called computer lovers...

and the traditional distribution networks of the scene are perfect to widely spread such historical and educational knowlegde ;)

zest: newsflash - people are entitled to have different opinions about different aspects of a subject. it is, for example, perfectly acceptable to hate album number two from whatever musical group even though you loved the first one.

even suggesting that "computer lovers" should automatically approve anything remotely connected with computers is absurd.

..and my take on the pdf-thing? no, i do not think a book such as this should be distributed electronically - it's something to sit in the couch and read/take in while drinking coffee and listening to good music.

indeed Gloom but there can be both the real paper version and the e-paper one in order to fasten and facilitate the distribution, and please everyone :)

I think in a few years, the book can be put out on all archives as a PDF for free. PDFs are uncomfortable to view (because they are layed out for paper), so i'd say it's more for historical reasons. I don't know - low resolution PDF could also be considered. But such stuff as encryption is probably very bad for it. It would lead to what Tomcat said.

It being an art book and not just a stream of information, i think it has a place as a printed book on the shelve, even if people would have seen it as PDF.

I don't think PDF would become obsolete... It was originally an easy-to-view subset of PostScript, now it has evolved to more. Free viewers are available for all OSes. One only has to pick up a sufficently mild subset of a standard.

when it does become out of print it would be a good idea to make it available digitally, even if only for historical purposes.

besides the obvious fact that everything nowdays ends up on digital form. imo it's better that the version circulating is created by the makers and not the "rippers".

either way, if you need space to store these kind of scene related publications online, scene.org would be happy to comply :)

it's like mindcandy - you can get the demos, but to be l33t, you have to have the DVD :D

got the books to sell at inercia in the mail yesterday.

read one this morning, they're pretty nice :)
highly recommended for mothers, girlfriends and co-works :D

Just a quick update:

The "Buy Now" buttons are now active in every place :). We will soon add more resellers to the list. Go and get your copy now, since half of the books we printed are already gone (in a couple of weeks). Be sure to get a copy of the first edition. The feedback has been very positive. Thank you everyone. We're still looking for media contacts to get more mag/radio/tv reviews etc. Contact us if you know people who could spread the word. Thanks.

Time for some feedback then? The history/basics article was quite well written in my opinion. Not too dumbed down and not too "academic" either. I especially enjoyed the theatre/cinema analogy, I've been trying to come up with something simple like that to use on the "mundanes" for a long time. :) I also found myself surprisingly un-offended by the dividing of scene history in 3 parts at the end of the book, as it was at least done with some degree of humour. All in all, the material was quite entertaining.

As for critique, there were several instances of bäd englisch that caught my eye. You might want to have someone go over the text once more for the 2nd edition. Also, it was too bad that the only visual examples of demos were by katastro.fi allstars (even the Skid Row cracktro, although it wasn't mentioned :)). Sure, I understand that getting rights etc to use others' work - hell, probably just LOCATING the authors - would be difficult and time consuming, but I'd still like a broader perspective. All in all there could've been more visual examples of specific effects and styles to enlighten the uninitiated.

But all in all the book was an enjoyable read. I'm looking forward to testing my copy on non-sceners and see if they'll get the "big picture"..

Thanks 4 feedback. It is very nice to hear what people have to say about the timeline and the three eras that I divided it into (old-, middle-, nuskool). That was the whole idea to start discussion about it. It is meant to be half serious, half funny. I hope people understand that in a three page presentation you have to use generalization and don't flame too much about missing computers like Atari etc. Timeline is all about trying to find the most common "signs of time" that the most of the people agree to and remember from those years.

About the translation:

All the texts we're translated by a person who does english-finnish-english by profession (I don't trust my self :), except the one about the parties which was submitted in English by the author (proofread later tho). The ICQ interview wasn't "proofread" 'coz we wanted to have the ICQ feeling in it, only typos we're fixed. The long history article was also proofread by Trixter (native US), so it definately shouldn't have 'bäd english'.

Anyway, some typos, missing words, wrong dots, copy paste errors, Adobe Indesing addons etc. always stick around, until you have a 'release' (or a beta test :). Please send me an email feedback to info@evenlakestudios.fi when you spot errors or something else you'd like to see fixed in the second edition.

First edition always comes with these special features, that's what makes it a special thing to own. :)

the book is (imho) nice

The demoscene book is now on amazon.com:

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/952917022X/

But can probably be picked up cheaper from smaller vendors listed here:

http://www.evenlakestudios.com/books/buy.htm

I like MAZ's bundle prices!

i heard they'll also be sold at bcnparty to visitors. check the [url=http://www.bcnparty.org]website[/ur].

darned. website.

skrebbel: that's not totally true.

I'm selling demoscene books at bcnparty but only with a previous reservation. So, if you are planning to come and want a book you MUST reserve it before.

btw, reservation ends on October 7th.
see you at bcnparty!

i like the book. Got it yesterday :-)

Any new news on Tomcat's supplemental book?

He presented a preview (in .hu) at Evoke, we have to wait for the translation.

Our lil' "70-page pamphlet" (quoting Tomcat :)) is doin' great: 1000 copies sold & the 2nd edition will b printed in '05. The site is updated with a link guide 4 non-scene readers + reviews. We recently visited art festivals in Trondheim & Hamburg. The next presentation is at a symposium in honor of Will 'Sim City' Wright, on the Future of Interactive Entertainment to be held on March 16 in Atlanta, USA. Happy Holidayz & a warm thnx 2 every1 who bought/sold/supported the book this year! CU in 05!

Good job.