Vintage Computer Festival, revisited
Hi all, I never seem to get much interest from SIGCIS people for the Vintage Computer Festival, but the upcoming edition (VCF East 7.0) might appeal more to this group than in years past. This year's speaker line-up includes Ruth Lewart, who worked on Bell Labs' TRADIC; Vincent Pogorzelski and Donald Caselli, who both worked at Monroe Calculator and specifically worked with the Monrobot XI; Joe LaViola and Al Rollin, both of UNIVAC/Unisys; and Michael Holley, who was a member of the Homebrew Computer Club and is an expert on Southwest Technical Products. Also this year, we're having a panel discussion about the New York City / New Jersey / Philadelphia region in the mid-1970s, including Roger Amidon (of Xitan / Technical Design Labs, which were S-100 companies), Dick Moberg (founder of the Philadelphia Area Computer Society and the 1978 Philadelphia Computer Music Festival), and Larry Stein (owner of Computer Mart of Iselin, N.J., which was one of the first computer stores in the state.) For this panel we also invited (but have not yet received confirmations from) John Dilks, who produced the Atlantic City PC'76 show; Sol Libes, who produced and still runs the Trenton Computer Festival and the Amateur Computer Group of New Jersey (possibly the longest-running user group); and David Ahl, who published Creative Computing magazine. And that's just in the morning sessions. Afternoons at our event feature the exhibit hall, a build-your-own transistor-logic circuit workshop, book sale, consignment, and museum tours. Our venue is the InfoAge Science Center, located in Wall, New Jersey. Our event is a wonderful opportunity to hear from people who worked in the field and (most important of all) to see vintage computers boot up and run again! Our event site is http://www.vintage.org/2011/east/ and we're on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/vcfeast7 . - Evan
All, I've been to the Vintage Computer Festival (west) and have had a great time. They were had the documentary of FIDONET playing and had film principles there. There were Mechano (British Erector) versions of the Babbage difference engine and the Bush Differential Analyzer running. I got to play Star Trek on one of the two working Altair computers demo'd. There were many people there who were the originators of the now mostly forgotten microcomputers that utilized the Altair bus. Plenty of characters worth talking to. I even picked up a used and working Osborne 1 for $15 (which security at the airport was a bit hesitant about). I recommend it. David On Wed, Mar 2, 2011 at 1:13 AM, Evan Koblentz <evan@snarc.net> wrote:
Hi all,
I never seem to get much interest from SIGCIS people for the Vintage Computer Festival, but the upcoming edition (VCF East 7.0) might appeal more to this group than in years past.
This year's speaker line-up includes Ruth Lewart, who worked on Bell Labs' TRADIC; Vincent Pogorzelski and Donald Caselli, who both worked at Monroe Calculator and specifically worked with the Monrobot XI; Joe LaViola and Al Rollin, both of UNIVAC/Unisys; and Michael Holley, who was a member of the Homebrew Computer Club and is an expert on Southwest Technical Products.
Also this year, we're having a panel discussion about the New York City / New Jersey / Philadelphia region in the mid-1970s, including Roger Amidon (of Xitan / Technical Design Labs, which were S-100 companies), Dick Moberg (founder of the Philadelphia Area Computer Society and the 1978 Philadelphia Computer Music Festival), and Larry Stein (owner of Computer Mart of Iselin, N.J., which was one of the first computer stores in the state.) For this panel we also invited (but have not yet received confirmations from) John Dilks, who produced the Atlantic City PC'76 show; Sol Libes, who produced and still runs the Trenton Computer Festival and the Amateur Computer Group of New Jersey (possibly the longest-running user group); and David Ahl, who published Creative Computing magazine.
And that's just in the morning sessions. Afternoons at our event feature the exhibit hall, a build-your-own transistor-logic circuit workshop, book sale, consignment, and museum tours.
Our venue is the InfoAge Science Center, located in Wall, New Jersey.
Our event is a wonderful opportunity to hear from people who worked in the field and (most important of all) to see vintage computers boot up and run again!
Our event site is http://www.vintage.org/2011/east/ and we're on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/vcfeast7 .
- Evan
_______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members@sigcis.org, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://sigcis.org/pipermail/members/ and you can change your subscription options at http://sigcis.org/mailman/listinfo/members
-- David Ferro, Associate Professor in Computer Science, Weber State University, Ogden, Utah
Update -- the event flier can be downloaded from my personal site at http://www.snarc.net/vcfe7flier.pdf On 03/02/2011 03:13 AM, Evan Koblentz wrote:
Hi all,
I never seem to get much interest from SIGCIS people for the Vintage Computer Festival, but the upcoming edition (VCF East 7.0) might appeal more to this group than in years past.
This year's speaker line-up includes Ruth Lewart, who worked on Bell Labs' TRADIC; Vincent Pogorzelski and Donald Caselli, who both worked at Monroe Calculator and specifically worked with the Monrobot XI; Joe LaViola and Al Rollin, both of UNIVAC/Unisys; and Michael Holley, who was a member of the Homebrew Computer Club and is an expert on Southwest Technical Products.
Also this year, we're having a panel discussion about the New York City / New Jersey / Philadelphia region in the mid-1970s, including Roger Amidon (of Xitan / Technical Design Labs, which were S-100 companies), Dick Moberg (founder of the Philadelphia Area Computer Society and the 1978 Philadelphia Computer Music Festival), and Larry Stein (owner of Computer Mart of Iselin, N.J., which was one of the first computer stores in the state.) For this panel we also invited (but have not yet received confirmations from) John Dilks, who produced the Atlantic City PC'76 show; Sol Libes, who produced and still runs the Trenton Computer Festival and the Amateur Computer Group of New Jersey (possibly the longest-running user group); and David Ahl, who published Creative Computing magazine.
And that's just in the morning sessions. Afternoons at our event feature the exhibit hall, a build-your-own transistor-logic circuit workshop, book sale, consignment, and museum tours.
Our venue is the InfoAge Science Center, located in Wall, New Jersey.
Our event is a wonderful opportunity to hear from people who worked in the field and (most important of all) to see vintage computers boot up and run again!
Our event site is http://www.vintage.org/2011/east/ and we're on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/vcfeast7 .
- Evan
_______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members@sigcis.org, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://sigcis.org/pipermail/members/ and you can change your subscription options at http://sigcis.org/mailman/listinfo/members
I did go to this festival last week and it was great! We heard speakers who had worked inside of UNIVAC (physically) and programmed it. We heard from early computer society and store founders of the 1970s, and what the scene looked like to them at the time. (Bill Gates was too young ; the Apple I was no better than the other platforms but the Apple II was remarkable ; etc.) The stories of the old-timers are really interesting. I talked at length with an early Homebrew Computer Club member who is researching some of the early companies. Exhibitors included many people who knew the guts of early Apples, Ataris, Osbornes, and many other early computers. It's neat to see what they can do. The whole thing was quite electric, memorable, and worthwhile. I'm glad to know also of the InfoAge Science Center. Thanks, Evan! I'll be back! -----Original Message----- From: members-bounces@sigcis.org [mailto:members-bounces@sigcis.org] On Behalf Of Evan Koblentz Sent: Wednesday, March 02, 2011 3:13 AM To: members@sigcis.org Subject: [SIGCIS-Members] Vintage Computer Festival, revisited Hi all, I never seem to get much interest from SIGCIS people for the Vintage Computer Festival, but the upcoming edition (VCF East 7.0) might appeal more to this group than in years past. This year's speaker line-up includes Ruth Lewart, who worked on Bell Labs' TRADIC; Vincent Pogorzelski and Donald Caselli, who both worked at Monroe Calculator and specifically worked with the Monrobot XI; Joe LaViola and Al Rollin, both of UNIVAC/Unisys; and Michael Holley, who was a member of the Homebrew Computer Club and is an expert on Southwest Technical Products. Also this year, we're having a panel discussion about the New York City / New Jersey / Philadelphia region in the mid-1970s, including Roger Amidon (of Xitan / Technical Design Labs, which were S-100 companies), Dick Moberg (founder of the Philadelphia Area Computer Society and the 1978 Philadelphia Computer Music Festival), and Larry Stein (owner of Computer Mart of Iselin, N.J., which was one of the first computer stores in the state.) For this panel we also invited (but have not yet received confirmations from) John Dilks, who produced the Atlantic City PC'76 show; Sol Libes, who produced and still runs the Trenton Computer Festival and the Amateur Computer Group of New Jersey (possibly the longest-running user group); and David Ahl, who published Creative Computing magazine. And that's just in the morning sessions. Afternoons at our event feature the exhibit hall, a build-your-own transistor-logic circuit workshop, book sale, consignment, and museum tours. Our venue is the InfoAge Science Center, located in Wall, New Jersey. Our event is a wonderful opportunity to hear from people who worked in the field and (most important of all) to see vintage computers boot up and run again! Our event site is http://www.vintage.org/2011/east/ and we're on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/vcfeast7 . - Evan _______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members@sigcis.org, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://sigcis.org/pipermail/members/ and you can change your subscription options at http://sigcis.org/mailman/listinfo/members
participants (3)
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David Ferro -
Evan Koblentz -
Meyer, Peter - BLS