pouët.net

Yeah, intros to what?(clue for bitfat: the cracked games) Thats why nobody called them crack intros, just the same way nobody called it "live music" until recorded music became a thing.

Here come G-Fellow and Dubmood with groundbreaking insight: Nobody called intros cracktros back then - that's right, and if you had bothered to watch demos and read scrollers you would know that the term "demo" existed and was in use in today's sense. Your misconception is that every production made at that time was to introduce a cracked game. Check again.
The key year to watch is 1986 - when demoscene in today's sense sprung into existence with the emergence of people that had all things (code, gfx, music) under their control, skipped doing cracks, and concentrated on making their stuff.

The earliest release with text scroller I could find from csdb is this Danish Crackers Intro from 1984. It was used at least in 24 games. Could this be a release that set the concept for later cracktros and early demos?

https://csdb.dk/release/?id=53624

So what we have is that demoscene emerged from the wider scene where cracking was the initial activity (1983-1985) but demos (mostly made by crackers) started to develop along cracktros and this development happened more or less simultaneously, though cracktros probably had much wider audience and thus much bigger influence. I think it's a highly important detail that the text scrolling concept which was so important for early demos seems to have been picked from cracktros.

Also in the context of Amiga it's clear that the earliest products in 1986 were cracktros, exceptions being Multiscanner by Spreadpoint and the Juggler by Eric Graham if that counts.

Currently I wouldn't say that there has been a myth there though it's probably true that many people would have thought demos showing up a bit later on when compared to cracktros.

...and those earliest demos were also mostly (if not almost exclusively) made by people also involved in cracking (or release by cracking groups).

la_mettrie: Certainly important, but it doesn't have sound. I think this production has had a huge impact for the emergence of the demoscene on the C64: https://csdb.dk/release/?id=46605.
Then again, we have this: https://www.pouet.net/prod.php?which=27291 - more artistic, more complete, more advanced than everything on the C64 for many years to come.

on the flipside though, lots of really early cracks (like, from before c64 was even a thing) just didn't come with intros, or even any kind of mention of who was responsible for breaking the protection (if there was any). and who's to say that the creators of (for example (ba-dum-tss)) that demo by HEC wouldn't have been involved in such matters... think about it, how likely is it that a thing like that would have been anyone's first venture in software development?

It's almost that the most natural thing humans would do with computers is make some little funny demonstrations BEFORE even thinking about "a scene" or even "cracking".

My opinion is that all this nitpicking (bifat, Krill) is completely irrelevant. I thought “demos evolved from intros” was a firm understanding, but was told here that I’m wrong. OK. I’m not so sure. But. It’s irrelevant anyway. These are the facts (or IDK perhaps someone disagrees on this too):

1) The same groups that released cracks also started releasing their demos. Mostly.
2) The only channel for the dissemination of demos was through snailmail swappers network which was put in place EARLIER to distribute cracks.
3) Demos increasingly began getting released on copyparties, which at a point became called “demoparties”

This can be verified. Nitpicking and guessing what were the actual motives of some teenagers back in 1985 is futile, and it disproves nothing. So, believe me, every future serious research paper on the demoscene and its roots will come to the same conclusion that all the past ones came to. The one you keep calling “myth” and “wrong”.


Not only was “unprotecting games” peak computer creativity back then, but it certainly can’t be described as “wasting time”. Because there was you know the actual use for this activity. On the other hand, drooling crap in basic could be called “wasting time”. If you don’t understand the punky appeal of “liberating software” for those kids back then, the agency it got them, I think you’re misunderstanding the early demoscene (which itself had roots in the hackerscene and their ethos, you know Mitch, ESI and all that). This is the setting that gave birth to the demoscene. One can only like it or not like it. I fail to see the disconnect between this setting and some imagined “creative people that didn’t want to waste time on cracking” supposedly going on simultaneously.

Of course. It’s called “computer art” and it goes way back. And what is “hello world” if not a demonstration. Or the “10PRINT” maze generator. The question is where would 13 year old kids in the mid 80s see that little funny demonstrations? Then, more complex ones? I think more often than not in front of games. Write down some telephone numbers. Ask around. Otherwise, how would those lone kids know what to do, what kind of demonstration? And where would they show them off? In school? In art galleries? On TV? On the internet? On Facebook? It was mid 80s and I think the crackerscene was the only available vessel, plus crackerscene bragging was a strong motive. I’m guessing cracker groups would be quick to snatch independent talent.

4gentE: it was a waste of time for creative people once they had honed their skills. everybody was using monitors and took stuff out of games. in 1984 to 1986 a big portion of scene releases were ripped musics and gfx from games, or unprotected games with no intro, or just a slightly altered title pic. they do fall in neither category.
the branching occurred when some people kept unprotecting and ripping, while others were starting to do gfx and music themselves and produced code to put their stuff on the screen.
that's not a difference here, really?
cracking was certainly a fertile ground for groups which had people of both interests, but stand-alone productions were interesting as well. the notion of a "demo" existed, and they inspired each other. the notion that demoscene came from cracking is wrong, but only in that there were no such differences in scenes and terms coined. they were people of the same kind, but interests started to diverge early, which lead to outspoken "demo groups". this process was complete already in 1986.

I still don't quite understand what bifat is trying to prove by repeating the same argument without proof over and over again. One thing is for certain: the non-scener must be terribly confused by now! =)

Defiance, let me help you: "what is constantly being summoned is the myth that (crack) intros predated demos. this is clearly wrong. so the idea might remain that today's demoscene is a cultural successor or offspring of the cracking scene. that's also wrong - there was no such distinction when early demos were already being made."

Q.E.D. :)

The non-scener must be terribly confused by now! (Defiance, I cracked your comment!)

For sure there were demos made before cracks, but there was no demo scene before the cracking scene (as in people connecting to compete and spread their work just for the sake of making demos).

Again, I’ll speak for myself because I can see that mileage varies. I’m no coder, I’m no artist, I’m a tinkerer and a “crafts hobby-ist”. Back in mid 80s “school computer clubs” and one more version of “towers of hanoi” were not cutting it for me. Then I saw intros. I dropped noodling in BASIC and began poking in ML monitor because of intros. Because I loved them, because I wanted to modify them to my own liking, because I wanted to know what makes them tick, because I instantly knew (scrolls) they were made by kids like me and not corporations. Because what that fascist boy from Malmo was writing annoyed me. ;-) There was coolness and mystique to all of this. Dad got me the final cartridge. I never had interest nor required knowledge for cracking. But I always considered cracks and demos to be parts of the same scene. Perhaps I was wrong. But a lot of recounts seem to support my personal experience. That’s all.

Indeed, and specialised demo-only and warez-only scenes gradually emerged from it, possibly inspired by the police cracking down on copy parties. It seems like much of the contention is caused by putting a "cracking scene" label on the less structured early scene, and reusing that label to argue that demos came from cracking.

@bifat: This demo you linked:

https://www.pouet.net/prod.php?which=27291

actually seems like a nice example of non-demoscene real time computer art from the period. Like Jaron Lanier’s Moon Dust. Non-demoscene. Therefore kinda proving the opposite of what you are trying to say.

No softscrolls, no logos, no reused music, no borrowed aesthetics, no graffiti style, no sinustables, no world records, no 4 letter fx abbreviations. Because it was not part of the big cultural circle jerk called “The (demo)scene”.

Demoscene took another 5 or 10 years to come to appreciate that sort of aesthetic.

4gentE: I see what you're getting at, but consider Havoc's comment and let's ask ourselves: Is a demo only a demo if it comes from the "right" cultural background? Uh-oh!

Of course an artifact doesn’t have to be in a particular circle to be called a demo. A lot of artifacts are demos. But, you can’t deny and rewrite the whole crack/demoscene history because demos outside of demoscene exist.

For example Amiga Boing ball IS surely a demo, but AFAIK it’s NOT considered a product of the demoscene.

that (as well as most of the other topics you're discussing here) depends on how exactly you define "demoscene". me personally, "demoscene" came into being when sceners started writing demos to show their skills. but others will insist it started at the first demoparty, or when the first greetings in scrolltexts between individuals with pseudonyms were exchanged, and so on and so forth. fact of the matter is, none of those definitions are particularly more wrong OR right than others. so logically, no-one participating in this debate is very right or very wrong, it's just that some are letting their autism get the overhand more than others.. :P

Haha I agree. I’m certainly one of the more autistic ones. I seem to bite baits easily.
However, if someone wants to “debunk” or “mythbust” something that is considered a widely accepted “fact” (because it says so on Wikipedia ;) ) he/she should invest a lot of grunt, perform a lot of investigation, and not just dismiss conventional knowledge with a small wave of the hand in a besserwisser style.

I cant help but seeing similarities in bitfats argumentation, and that of a flat earther or climate change denier. he just ignores all the overwhelming evidence and start hacking on some small detail. all while completely ignoring the difference between a demo and the demoscene.