ASCII by Jason Scott

Jason Scott's Weblog

Infocom Advertising —

While I’m at it, here’s a collection of Infocom Advertisements from the 1980s.  It was scanned in by Infocom Alumni to recall the many appearances that Infocom made in periodicals and other print locations. Each one had its charm, and some of them have stuck with myself and others for decades beyond seeing them.

As Fast As We Can

This is my favorite one; I remember reading it when I was 13, in either Compute! magazine or another such title, and being drawn in by this magical way of standing on the quality of your product.

For the people who don’t remember these ads, now you know why the GET LAMP site looks like it does.

Here’s some more that I like:

Some Things Never ChangeOur Stories Lack ImaginationPut the Gnome and the Pickling Solution in the Mason JarIt Is What It EatsOops, make that a Gondar Spell

Now there’s some quality advertising!


Categorised as: computer history | documentary

Comments are disabled on this post


9 Comments

  1. nimbus says:

    Dude. Can’t just put the thumbnails and nothing under them to click to and actually see something. That’s just a tease. Do more like this: http://oldcomputers.net/oldads/old-computer-ads.html

    And yes I know this was just done quickly for the blog, and will eventually (soon) be all available in full size (right??) Ah, but you are busy…..

  2. nimbus says:

    Yes it’s true! I am a moron. I see the link at the top now with the flickr set.

    http://www.flickr.com/photos/textfiles/sets/72157622111007949/

    I thought it seemed weird not to be able to see the full size! I know your attention to detail…

  3. […] Tags: Apple II, Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Infocom, Jason Scott, Zork trackback Jason Scott posted a set of scanned Infocom ads from the 1980 on his blog, ASCII, […]

  4. wilhelm2451 says:

    A great collection there! Thank you for posting it!

  5. Brian Kelly says:

    I remember first seeing a Hitchhiker’s Guide ad in an issue of Family Computing. It was a hand holding a beer. Oddly it wasn’t the beer that made me curious about the game but the snippet of gameplay.

    One day I ended up at a book fair and they had all the Hitchhiker’s books. I begged my mom to buy them all for me but she did the right thing and just bought me the first. It was the start of a long love affair with H2G2 and its various incantations.

    I also remember eventually buying the Infocom adventure and bringing it back to the store, claiming it was broke, because I couldn’t get out of the house without being hit by a brick!

  6. Drew Wallner says:

    I totally remember these ads, and “got it” the first time I saw the GET LAMP site design. Love it!

    Also, this morning I came across a site that I imagine you’re already aware of but I thought I would share it here just in case…

    http://www.accardi-by-the-sea.org/Infocom/Online/

    …it made me wonder, might it be neat to work out some deal with the Infocom guys to have a few of the most classic games playable on the DVD of the documentary somehow, as a DVD-ROM extra or something?

    Don’t know how feasible that is, just thinking out loud.

  7. Lester T Hobbs says:

    Would it be possible to have a list of exactly which magazines these incredible ads appeared in?

    • Jason Scott says:

      Infocom ads appeared in literally dozens of different magazines over the years. Any reason you need such a list? I can check through the scans I have.

  8. Lester T Hobbs says:

    That would really be great if you could…! I’m an Infocom collector and a few tips on specific issues would be of great help. With such information I would probably be able to track down some of those mags on eBay.

    Thank you for the incredible work you do!