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I continue to no longer attend vintage computer festivals

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Re: I continue to no longer attend vintage computer festivals

#11

I was in Google Patent Litigation, and we actively collected old stuff, for possible use as prior art. I even went to Beryl Nelson's house before she died to collect her old Bell System Technical Journals. A lot of old stuff has no value to anyone. That can be hard to accept, but it's true. Even old wood furniture -- no one wants it. Old PC or Byte Magazines? Forget it; they're all over.

So why did they take the material? If you don’t want it, then don’t take it.

[flagged]

Re: I continue to no longer attend vintage computer festivals

#12

I was in Google Patent Litigation, and we actively collected old stuff, for possible use as prior art. I even went to Beryl Nelson's house before she died to collect her old Bell System Technical Journals. A lot of old stuff has no value to anyone. That can be hard to accept, but it's true. Even old wood furniture -- no one wants it. Old PC or Byte Magazines? Forget it; they're all over.

So why did they take the material? If you don’t want it, then don’t take it.

Donation sometimes helps to write off some budget. Speaking generally, not accusing anyone in this case, of course.

Re: I continue to no longer attend vintage computer festivals

#13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So why did they take the material? If you don’t want it, then don’t take it.

[flagged]

> What is this obsession with the past and the early days of computing?

Sure, no need to study history. Just pull to refresh every second and don't remember anything. And also, defund the national archives too, they are apparently useless.

/s

Re: I continue to no longer attend vintage computer festivals

#14

I was in Google Patent Litigation, and we actively collected old stuff, for possible use as prior art. I even went to Beryl Nelson's house before she died to collect her old Bell System Technical Journals. A lot of old stuff has no value to anyone. That can be hard to accept, but it's true. Even old wood furniture -- no one wants it. Old PC or Byte Magazines? Forget it; they're all over.

It would've been courteous to offer it back to the donor, if they weren't equipped or willing to archive or distribute it. I'm guessing that's probably not standard practice, but surely it's common for people donate things to be archived because they're in some way important to the donor.

Re: I continue to no longer attend vintage computer festivals

#16
> I also want to take this moment to clearly state that Evan Koblentz, the director of the Vintage Computer Federation for many years, who took the original donation, had absolutely no say or part in this pulping of historical magazines, having been driven out of the organization years before.

Sounds like new staff came in and they decided to clean things up, but decided to keep the plastic boxes.

Re: I continue to no longer attend vintage computer festivals

#17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So why did they take the material? If you don’t want it, then don’t take it.

[flagged]

In the original post he mentions that he purchased the containers specifically for the purpose of the donation, so it's likely that the containers sat full for years after being donated and were only incidentally re-used.

He also mentions that the person who originally accepted the donation was pushed out of the VCF organization, and did not have a say in the material being disposed of.

There is a possibility here that the containers sat for years after they were accepted, no one was left who knew why they contained a bunch of papers, and so they thought it wouldn't be a big problem if they disposed of the papers. Being a supposedly archival organization, however, if this was the case it would have been very poor judgememt.

I'm the kind of person who keeps random marketing materials from obscure gadgets from 40 years ago, so I can feel the pain of these documents having been lost.

That being said, once a donation is made, in general, is there an obligation to uphold any wishes of the donator? I guess there is, in many circumstances.

Re: I continue to no longer attend vintage computer festivals

#18
post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

> What is this obsession with the past and the early days of computing? Sure, no need to study history. Just pull to refresh every second and don't remember anything. And also, defund the national archives too, they are apparently useless. /s

No this group wastes so much time trying to relive the 70's and 80's they're missing an even greater paradigm shift unfolding right here and now. Someone has to say enough with the tinkering already. It's a waste of time. Yesterday's people are dead. Not relevant - dead and gone. That party's over, move on. This is not healthy

Re: I continue to no longer attend vintage computer festivals

#19
Other than folks generally lamenting the situation there are quite a few who seem to have their knickers in a twist.

There are a number of people who seem to need PR training, or basic human decency training in relation to this topic. The original post, and this one were very civl and dry (here's my story with plain delivery). The responses being so... charged is not not a good look. It makes the groups and people responding look, well, like assholes, to be blunt about it.

If your running a "vintage computer festival" you might want to change your name based on the behavior of other people speaking on behalf of their VCF...

Re: I continue to no longer attend vintage computer festivals

#20
post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What is this obsession with the past and the early days of computing? Sure, no need to study history. Just pull to refresh every second and don't remember anything. And also, defund the national archives too, they are apparently useless. /s

No this group wastes so much time trying to relive the 70's and 80's they're missing an even greater paradigm shift unfolding right here and now. Someone has to say enough with the tinkering already. It's a waste of time. Yesterday's people are dead. Not relevant - dead and gone. That party's over, move on. This is not healthy

I'm infinitely thankful most people don't think like this. History is a treasure.
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