ASCII by Jason Scott

Archivists don’t always talk about it, but you have to do refreshes occasionally if you really want your stuff to survive. Pawing through piles, blowing off dust, scrubbing down computers. It doesn’t matter how nice your facility is but you have to do these things. And my facility (my house) ain’t so nice. I’ve been going through my collections/projects in my office and found a bunch of stuff that I have to get moving on.

Among this is cd.textfiles.com, that erstwhile collection of shareware CD-ROMs and CD-ROM-based archive stuff that has ballooned well past every other site on textfiles.com. Weighing in around 205gb, it’s just a monster to deal with. But that’s not the problem.

The problem is I’m about to triple its size.

Some time ago, I was asked to provide ISO images of these CD-ROMs where possible, providing pristine digital captures of the data. I agreed, along with label scans and the rest. These will be added to cd.textfiles.com over time. Additionally, I’ll be adding Apple Macintosh disks, in some way that makes sense. (It’s a little weird to add them.) I have over 100 of those to add. And their ISOs.

So really, there’s this cascading flood of data I’m about to blow out onto the net. It’s going to make a lot more stuff available. It’s going to be quite exciting. It’s also meant I bought another hard drive I’m installing into the server, a 750gb, to handle all this incoming data.

This, and all the similar issues I’m encountering, are delightful crises; the problem of too much stuff, the problem of too much interesting things to do, the problem of so many things to accomplish. My days are not filled with aimless wandering; they’re filled with excitement of wondering which amazing thing to work on, and how much more of stuff to add to the piles.

It’s a busy bunch of months ahead, indeed.

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I doubt this has seen the light of day for 13 years.

While doing compilation and collection of media for GET LAMP I found a 1994 CD-ROM insert for a magazine that contained audio/graphical reviews of various contemporary computer games, as well as a preview for a number of other games, including the never-finished “Planetfall II: The Search for Floyd” (or Planetfall III, as it was sometimes called).

Also contained on this CD was an interview with Steve Meretzky, in the middle of doing work with Boffo, Legend of Entertainment, and potentially working with Activision on the Planetfall project. He’s 37 years old, and in good spirits.

The interview was actually 40 320×240 VFW 1.1 (Video for Windows) clips, which connected to a DOS program that would summon them in a window as you pressed different buttons. Separately was a data file with the questions they asked (or, more accurately, grafted onto the clips afterwards, because some only tangentially connect to what Steve is saying).

I’ve gone ahead and yanked these clips into my video editor, added the questions as title cards between them, and rendered it, giving you a 16-minute video interview with Steve Meretzky that likely, as I said, hasn’t been seen for over a decade.

Grab the MPEG-2 video file here. (94mb, 0:16:26).

But wait, there’s more.

The disc also contained a (again, only workable through the DOS program) preview of this version of Planetfall, including initial graphics and screenshots. I’ve gone ahead and edited that into something usable.

So go ahead and grab that here. (21mb, 0:02:17). Or, if you prefer, this one was small enough to fit as a youtube video.

So what happened?

As I understand it, creative differences between Meretzky and the producer over the direction and approach to the finished product was a major reason for the project ultimately being shut down; other reasons might have gone into it that are lost to time. Either way, the world lost out on what likely would have been a great little game.

Steve Meretzky gives great interviews (I have a couple with him of my own). This is no exception.

What else is in my collection that I haven’t found yet?

Update: I have been told that this interview was conducted by John Voorhees, who also authored the original software for the question and answer setup, and that these days he’s a folksinger at johnvoorhees.com.

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I have a friend.

He’s not a close friend; we don’t talk on the phone, and we don’t live in the same area, but in a room of people I don’t know well I’d be very likely to walk over to him and start talking. Online life breeds a lot of friendships like this, and perhaps they’re not as great as the buddy you hang out with in person all the time, but I don’t mind.

My friend and his other friends bought a toy.

It’s a very nice toy, somewhat expensive, but really cool in that way that toys built to be fashionable are. It looks nice, and the toymaker told a lot of people about it all over the world so a lot of people heard about the toy and many thought they wanted one.

The toy was broken.

Not completely broken, of course, because if the toy was completely broken my friend and his friends would have asked for their money back and gotten a different toy. But the toy was just working enough that most people would think it was working completely, or overlook any broken parts because it might be fun.

My friend fixed the toy.

Now, as it turned out, the toy was pretty broken but easily fixed. If you swapped some parts out of it, snapped off some wires and whirlygigs inside the toy, it would work properly. My friend and his friends figured out how to do this, and let a lot of people know about it. People who would buy the toy would find out they could make the toy even better.

The toymaker didn’t like this.

But the toymaker broke the toy in the first place so obviously he wanted it to stay broken, so his opinion wasn’t all that relevant to how broken it was. And anyway, it wasn’t his toy anymore. He sold it to my friend and his friends, and they paid full price for it, and so it was theirs. It wasn’t rented, borrowed, or stolen.

So some guys with machine guns showed up at my friend’s house a little while ago. At 7am.

Again… Machine guns. 7am. Because he fixed a broken toy.

Oh, sure, the toymaker makes a lot of noise and throws out a lot of numbers and can, definitely point to a law the toymaker got passed that makes fixing broken toys illegal, and I can totally understand that we’re now in a situation where fixing broken toys breaks the law and therefore my friend broke the law and so he should have guys with machine guns show up at 7am to arrest him. I don’t have to like it. I don’t have to like it at all.

What did we give away, 9 years ago?

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…because it’s no good for the projects I’m working on if I die!

Simply put, my muscle mass has increased significantly this year, and so my weight, that is, the basic number, has risen. If I went by the number alone, I’d look pretty bad, but my body mass index is going more towards the muscle and away from being a big marshmallow, which is where it was. Even looking at the Defcon video I linked to, I can see the difference in my shoulders and gait. I’ve moved, as of last week, to a much more intense schedule, where I’m going to the gym on any night I’m at home. (Obviously I don’t go while traveling in other states, where I can’t get to the gym and am running around for the sake of the production).

For my trip to Seattle/Oregon and PAX, I drove over 800 miles in the weekend to be able to interview people, and that took a toll on my legs, making them beyond sore and contributing to more kidney stones (or maybe just aggravating already extant stones, which is more likely). So there are times I just can’t run for an hour, and I have to concentrate on upper body stuff. So be it.

The point is, I’m not stopping. I’ve passed the gate, I’m over the hump, I’m doing this thing. Workouts are now a part of my life and I don’t know if it’ll make me look like a sculpture or if it’ll just be something in the background that explains why I pick stuff up easier. Either way things go, I know I’m doing myself some big favors that will help me down the line.

Now, check out these guns! Hurrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!

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Oh, how very lucky you are, my friends.

A mere three years ago I posted a review of the musical version of The Last Starfighter, an unexpectedly touching and well-arranged stage production of the 1984 film about an arcade game turning out to be an alien recruitment tool. I gushed in buckets about how I walked into the theater expecting a campy and dashed production and instead got a deep and emotional experience, and a realization that geekdom can reach new levels.

The musical’s success ramped up the more people heard of it until by the end of its too-short run it played to a packed house. (Granted, it was a small house, but still, a packed house night after night!) And then it was gone, leaving behind an excellent cast album and some very special memories.

Well, like I said, your lucky day has arrived: The Last Starfighter Musical is returning.

It’ll be playing in New York City from September 28th through to October 7th, with a handful of performances available for you to enjoy this pinnacle of geekdom. I’ve already written, to great length, in my previous weblog entry about how the musical was for me personally and how the scenes flowed in a musical format; trust me, it’s everything you could imagine it’d be like.

I could spend paragraphs convincing you why you should go, but really, the phrase “Last Starfighter Musical” will either light a switch within you like a Manchurian Candidate or it will not. If it does, then I must merely have notified you of the fact this event is happening to look forward to seeing you there.

Why are you still reading this?

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So, I had the opportunity to go to PAX, the Penny Arcade Expo, in Seattle. I had a great time, enjoyed the combination old-E3 room and the levels of pure gaming going on, and so on. The concerts were good, I met Wil Wheaton, and got to play a bunch of upcoming games. All in all, I’d do it again, and intend to.

MC Frontalot was in attendance, and so we hung out a bit, and he let me know that one of the panels would show the “It is Pitch Dark” video we shot as a “World Premiere”. Naturally, I went along for the ride and was in the room. It was the first thing they played, and audience reaction seemed good for suddenly being subjected to a 5 minute video out of the blue.

So, someone bootlegged it! Held up what was either a cell-phone camera or a regular camera (I can’t tell) and just flat-out recorded the thing in shaky-cam auto-focus majesty, then put it on YouTube.

Am I annoyed? Nah. Imagine that I have something I made people consider worthwhile to sneak out to the world. That’s pretty cool. I won’t link to their site, though. Frontalot indicated he will probably put the video out for general download soon, and so will I, at that point. There’s a lot of detail missed in this shaky-cam wonder, so you might want to get the point and then watch the “real” thing later.

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Roy of SAC posted a copy of the video recording of my talk at DEFCON, “The Edge of Forever: Saving Computer History”.

This was kind of a Hail Mary pass to get into DEFCON; a general nebulous subject, a short explanation of what I was going to do, and graciously, DEFCON’s organizers accepted the speech. I was planning for a one hour (50 minute) speech and then saw that they’d blocked off 2 hours of talk for me. So, I added a couple stories in and blew it out to an hour and a half, plus another 20 minutes of question and answer. I’ve had worse days.

I’ll avoid giving too much context to this speech; I figure it stands on its own, pro or con.

You can watch it here.

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The leaves turn color

The forums await your skill

To prevail is all

As we wind down our time together, Internet Warrior, I will show you one last technique. It is insidious, a rampant virus that can pull down not just a thread but all further discussion on that sub-board. It is to be handled carefully, as one carries a multi-faceted knife. This technique is to mirror the past.

In any discussion, one must merely bring up the past; wistfully, happily, as one recalls all good things in one’s history. Then, standing back, your victims will too recount their own pasts, sharing a smile at the times that have passed between them.

Boy, we’ve come a long way, haven’t we? I remember when it was just a couple people who know about this… now the entire scene is filled with people who don’t know where we came from….

So insidious is this technique, warrior, that you should only consider it a last result, when all other attempts to dominate have failed. Your enemies will fall upon each other with vigor, each working to outdo each other in nostalgia and memory, of details and ideas they’d thought no-one would have cared to hear, until you designated it the coin of the realm.

I wish you well, Internet Warrior, in all your studies and in all forums you will dominate and destruct in the pursuit of victory.

What is that, you ask?

No, it is merely some dust that has caught itself in your teacher’s eye.

Now go.

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We have come so far in so short a time, Internet Warrior. Your deft appraisal of our lessons and the skill which you have shown in using them brings to mind the memory of xxMartin56xx, who could drag a conversation regarding beekeeping into a forum-destroying political meltdown. Perhaps you too will be spoken of in these halls after your passage.

As our teachings progress, Internet Warrior, so too do the subtleness of our discipline and our techniques. The best Warrior appears to be a contributing member, willing to share his information and attention with his opponents, until it is too late to have known otherwise. A mis-step will lead to your discovery, but a sure-footed stance and deftness of touch will ensure victory.

To Blur in Clear Sight is to become the ultimate double-agent; appearing to be the most productive of a forum while quietly ruining it. Beyond the destruction of a thread, beyond the lifting of heads away from the matter at hand, to Blur in Clear Sight is to render the entire idea of conversation moot and mortally wounded.

I see you shift uneasily where you stand, unsure where to begin. This is normal, for it is a mode of thinking so insidious that you are lying nearly to yourself in your efforts to control and fling the conversation into blessed and enveloping darkness. Watch carefully.

Hey there, first time poster to this movie board. Some quick thoughts.

Hitchcock is one of my favorite directors. I’ve seen everything of his I could find, from the Lodger up through to Family Plot. I am having a lot of trouble finding some of the other early works on DVD and perhaps someone can tell me some of the more reputable DVD firms to purchase copies of them (I’ve gotten burned on some of the resellers at conventions and would prefer to “buy honest”, as it were). I’ve also read a bunch of biographies of the man and he just gets more fascinating the further and further I look into him; I’m especially tickled pink by his escapades under the studio system and his television appearances. I wouldn’t mind discussing some of the more controversial statements he made, either. There’s a sense of wonder in the way he planned his movies and the approach he took to the composition of the frame. I’ve made the occasional home movie to try and replicate this approach (mail me if you’re interested in having a copy of some of them; VHS quality only, sorry). I don’t know of many other movie directories who’ve planned their works this extensively any other time in the mid-20th century, but wouldn’t mind hearing of them, should there be some films I should watch. Properly addressed, I should get to everyone, thanks so much for having this forum!

Your eyes unfocus reading this paragraph, Warrior, and that is how it should be. It is tiring, sapping of energy in every turn. It provides a number of opinions but then requires facts, endless seas of facts that would require research and effort on the part of the community to fulfill. In a deluge of queries and statements, the reader must divest themselves of points uninteresting to them while struggling to find points worth pursuing. All indications are that answering your queries, time-consuming they may be, will result in yet more cascades of topics and investigation. In this way, you drown your opponents, not in a deep and avoidable lake, but in a consistent six inches of wet, slippery mud.

Left alone, your messages will signal a poison, carefully hidden within a gleaming fruit of energy and enthusiasm. The forum’s topics will blur, lost in a haze of your messages, until no enemy who knows his territory will venture there further.

You smile, Internet Warrior… you see the masterstroke in this. Take a walk with me; we will ponder the endless and shifting forms of nature and compose these quicksand paragraphs together. None shall stand against you once you have mastered them.

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We rise again with the passage of the sun and toil upon our lessons until the moon shines brightly. We are Internet Warriors and no fight shall be too great to triumph and prevail. Through Words, Dominance.

Your lesson today concerns an easily misunderstood technique, Internet Warrior. When you wish to guide the conversation away from subjects you do not already master and enemies you do not wish to strengthen with attention, you must provide the topic new direction without appearing to do so. This gentle wind, blowing the topic adrift and off course, is called The Tangential Sweep.

Lesser schools teach of the Thread Hijack, a dull and blunt stance that attempts to shift gears by a direct stab at the heart of the topic and a twist in a new direction. It is obvious, easily discerned and quickly vanquished. We will not stain the day with further regard of it.

The Tangential Sweep exerts its influence as one who sprinkles thumbtacks across a hallway; the message is peppered with considerations, phrases that will cause your enemies to fall into the trap of changing the topic and either succeeding or bringing the weight of criticism upon themselves. You are rendered innocent of any suspicion, ready to seize upon the topic change as you see fit but safe and protected should the tide turn.

Let us practice.

The newest model of video card is definitely a top choice; between the default amount of RAM and the driver support, it should work well for any new applications coming up. I recently moved my computer from my NY apartment to the Cape Cod estate so that I could edit my films during lobster season; and with the new monitor I got, I was looking for a card capable of driving a 30″ behemoth. This card does the trick.

Ah, you have gotten the general idea, Internet Warrior; a video card posting becomes a reference to New York City, Cape Code, Lobsters, and that you own an unusually large video monitor. Any of these may trip up your enemies into moving the conversation outside of the thread. Let’s see a more intense approach.

There’s nothing wrong with the main argument being presented here, but I’m worried, as someone who struggles through the day with pressures I don’t want to talk about, how this might be perceived outside this forum. I think this begs the question, though – is this the best way to go about this? I’ll see if I can come up with a better example of what I’m talking about after physical therapy.

Even better. Now you have wrapped the discussion into a flowing, majestic stream of references to yourself. Curious posters need merely inquire to your pressures, your physical therapy, and your “discussion of the discussion”. Any of these carefully laid traps will ensnare an unsuspecting combatant into a tangential discussion, and as the sweet smell of success, this discussion will be about you. We recall: There is no finer conversation than the conversation others shall have about you. Very well done, Warrior.

This is a most difficult technique; many of our brethren have been spotted in the open attempting it. But the rewards are great, and should you master The Tangential Sweep, you will know a pleasure of victory few are lucky enough to know.

I hear the bell for dinner; run as fast as you can, to get the best portions.

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