pouët.net

We haven’t featured C64 disk covers for a while, so here are some from the collection of Goat/Laxity, which was scanned already four years ago. This big batch features 50 disk covers from the early- to mid-1990s (with one early exception from 1986), including some really extraordinary ones.

CLICK:

Swiss Cracking Association, the legendary Zurich-based C64 group, whose archive we have covered in numerous updates, always loved to come up with something new – be it a spectacular game hack, the first Amiga virus, or a disk designing competition. In their “SCA Competition!” demo from March 1987, they made the following announcement:

SEND US YOUR MOST BEAUTIFUL 5.25” OR 3.5” DISKS. PAINT IT, SPRAY IT, DYE IT OR PUT SOME ORIGINAL STICKERS ON IT. THEN WRAP IT IN A PAPER WHICH CONTAINS YOUR ADDRESS. THE WHOLE BUNCH HAS TO BE PUT INTO AN ENVELOPE AND SENT TO THE FOLLOWING ADDRESS : PO-BOX 470 / 8037 ZUERICH / SWITZERLAND. AFTER HAVING DONE THIS, YOU LEAN BACK IN YOUR CHAIR AND WAIT FOR YOUR PRIZE… 1ST TO 3RD PRIZE: A DINNER WITH THE SCA-CREW (ALL TOGETHER, IN ZURICH) 4TH TO 10TH PRIZE: AN SCA T-SHIRT (100% COTTON, SIZE: S,M,L OR XL) 10TH TO 25TH: AN SCA-STICKER OR AN SCA SWAP-DISK.

Numerous swapping partners followed that call and sent in colourfully designed floppy disks. The SCA brothers don’t remember anymore how many disks the competition ended up with, who was the winner, or whether they really did go out for dinner with them. However, at least they preserved four entries: One by future SCA member Spot 3001; two by a Danish guy called TRP, and another one by an unknown competitor. We are happy to present the scans of these colourful disks to you – as well as the scan of an original “SCA swap-disk” which was announced as one of the minor prizes.

CLICK:

Famous Scottish Atari ST cracker Zippy a.k.a Absu, member of the groups Cynix and The Medway Boys, who was very recently interviewed on Codetapper.com, provided us with photographs from his letter archive. This time, we bring you a very special portion of these documents: The inbox, so to say, of the Cynix P.O. box in Merseyside from 1992-1994. Most of these letters stem from less-known sceners or even complete outsiders, non-scene fans and users of Cynix cracks, encouraging the group to continue cracking in a time where the Atari software industry was already in decline. They were answering to a poll of sorts, initiated by Cynix themselves, who, in the scrolltexts of several crack intros, urged users to write them if they did care for Cynix to continue cracking. And they did – from all over the world! In what is just a small surviving part of the letters Cynix received, we find letters and postcards not just from all over the UK, but also from Ireland, Germany, the Czech Republic, Finland, France, Iceland, Serbia, Australia, Greece, Sweden, the Netherlands, Poland, Spain, and Slovenia. These letters – some by people who would become prominent Atari sceners, some by unknown home computer users – testify not just to the transnational audience an active cracking group could reach, but also to the fact that the cracking scene and its protagonists mattered to a lot of people far outside the scene itself. These are literally fan letters, hailing whom the authors perceived as heroes for letting them enjoy software for free.

CLICK:

great site, makes sceners look like retards, fun.

???

i think elkmoose is referring to the fact that letters written by enthusiastic 15-year old nerds aren't generally high prose. I think that's the charm of it, but hey, to each their own.

that, or he's practicing his haiku skills

Codetapper's interview with Zippy is a long and interesting read, there’s quite a lot of technical discussion about cracking on the Atari ST, among other things (such as more about the Barras market.)

Great interview, thanks for sharing!

We start the New Year with a bang. The archive of C64 scener Rough had been sitting here for almost three years – until last month our heroic student assistant scanned over 400 pages in one go. With this update, we present you 269 letters by 127 individuals from 16 countries. They stem from the years between 1989 and 1998, while Rough’s most active phase was between 1989 and 1992. As a self-declared “legal swapper“, Rough had a lot of contacts within the early C64 demoscene. While they were spread over Europe and beyond (there are letters from Australia, Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, Germany, Hungary, Israel, Italy, Netherlands, Norway, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey and the United Kingdom), Rough’s focus laid, besides his native Germany, on Austria and Hungary. Almost all big names of the early Hungarian C64 scene are present in his papers.

CLICK FOR MORE:

Today, we present you with artefacts from 32 years of copy- and demoparties – from 1987 to 2019! Quite an astonishing time span, longer than the life span of some current demoscene members. The scans stem from the collections of Acidchild & Bugjam, AD aka Rough, Dipswitch, Goat, Ile, Mike, Moqui, Sir Garbagetruck, Swiss Cracking Association, The Movers, and X-Raffi. Some fascinating documents and objects are included – such as the paper invitation to the legendary Danish Gold 1987 party, where the first cracker standards were established; the flyer for the Beach Party 1992 which was cancelled at last minute; the invitation for the Bitnapping Party 1988 which was one of the very rare cooperations between German hackers and crackers; and many more.

CLICK:

The letter collection of legendary Dutch C64 cracker Honey of 1001 Crew has provided us with a stream of treasures over the past years. Now, after five instalments, this fountain has run dry: Today, we give you the final update. It includes some fascinating materials from 1986-1987, such as letters from fellow compression expert Matcham and some well-known crackers from the very early days of the C64 scene.

CLICK:

After a long pause, here we go with another update. We did not run out of materials, not at all – only out of time. Anyway, today we bring you the second batch (see first batch here) from the collection of Jugger/Panic, a well-known early 1990s Amiga pack editor and swapper from Germany. Here are 21 letters from between 1990 and 1992, sent to Jugger from all over Western Europe by various early 1990s Amiga sceners.

CLICK:

We’re back with materials donated by Unlock, main organiser of the Swiss demoparty called Buenzli until 2010 and Demodays between 2011 and 2014. Included are flyers, visitor brochures, and – a most rare thing – brochures/reports made for sponsors and supporters. Enjoy the high quality design!

CLICK:

Thank you Dipswitch <3
And here's a working link :) https://gotpapers.scene.org/?p=3997

Not only are we back, but we also have exciting news: HBH, a Norwegian C64 scener active in the late 1980s and early 1990s, sent us a full box of letters and flyers. The treasure trove is currently being scanned and will start appearing here very soon. Here’s a sneak peek: Brainstorm, a small C64/Amiga paper zine published in 1988 by the Dutch C64 group Fire-Eagle. Only an advert demo for it has survived, the mag itself was considered lost.

CLICK:

Enjoy the Sunday while browsing demoparty-related materials: flyers, wristbands, votekeys, posters etc. from over three decades! The oldest object is from 1992, the latest is just one day old (from Mountainbytes in Switzerland which took place this weekend). Contributions this time stem from Cthulhu, Dipswitch, JAL, and Moon. A particularly special document is the internal organiser info sheet from Takeover 1999 & 2000 (in Dutch).

CLICK: