Date   : Wed, 07 Oct 2009 14:52:04 -0500
From   : mfirth@... (Michael Firth)
Subject: Electric Dreams last night.

On Wed, 7 Oct 2009 10:02:38 +0100, "Tim Matthews" <tim.matthews@...>
wrote:
> ps. and the Beeb came ready equipped with Elite! Surely still 2 years
> down the line!?
> 
They did take 3 days (= 3 years) to manage to get any games to run on it
once they had it at home, so by the time they were actually playing Elite,
it would have been released.

It was interesting that after showing so much interest in programming the
BBC at the "Computer Fair", everyone apart from the teenage boy seemed to
lose all interest in doing things with it once they got it home.

It was also a little dodgy to demonstrate all the computers on seperate TVs
/ Monitors (the BBC even seemed to be connected to a Cub), and then to tell
them they could only connect it to the home's main TV once they got it
home.

Alright, as they said, most people didn't have proper monitors, but I think
a lot of people had their computers connected to portable second TVs,
rather than the main lounge one.

It was also interesting that the organisers interest in keeping things "in
time" didn't apply to the VHS tapes - they were happy for the Dad to go and
find 90s VHS tapes in a rental shop.

Its sad that I looked forward to the 80s programme more than the 70s one,
but actually enjoyed the 70s one more, because I think it was more
sympathetically handled - they seemed to spend a lot of time in yesterday's
programme basically saying "there was a lot of technology available, but it
was all crap", which seemed very unfair.

I think their claims that modern technology can just be plugged in and work
was also very dubious - I think many people still have a lot of
difficulties setting up a new TV, connecting up a new DVD player (or games
console, or set-top box), or setting up a computer. I think the 80s stuff
just seemed harder to the family because they were having to get to grips
with so much stuff in such a short time, and some of the connectivity
wasn't what they were used to.

Regards

Michael