Repost from 1998 #history

From my first website, all those years ago.

I was five when I first saw one: it was a beautiful piece of technology. (No, really…) One of the first families to own a “Home Computer”, we had to build our own extras and we were constantly being told that the limitations of the Z80A chip meant that we couldn’t do many of the things “grown up” machines could. Most of the software and much of the hardware that even Clive Sinclair said was impossible to build, amateurs would create overnight, because they hadn’t yet seen the letter from Sinclair Research . Usegroups were set up, consisting of real people who actually met face to face, in halls. “Modems? What are modems?”
But this, too, passed. The market became broader, the Wozniaks and Gates’ flooded the markets with “fully supported” machines, compatible with everything(except the ZX81), and before we knew what hit us, the hobby programmer had become a myth…The one honour remained when Commodore wizkidz dedicated “hacked programs” to DANCAT orTANSTAAFL, but we had become hazbeans, sad and lonely people with only our fading memories.” to rely on… that is, until today…

• D.W.Crompton(1976-now)

Source: WayBack Machine

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