saying this again....there was a real thing about the IBM PC and not allowing it to be included in "vintage computing" as well as a lot of the home computers, when this hobby first started. This view is still held by the original guard of vintage computerians. That's why classic cmp does not dwell long on the C-64, Amiga, Ataris, Apple, etc. Classic CMP is not the place to ask "hey can someone here help me fix my 1541 drive..." The original vintage computer festivals did not allow IBM PCs to be exhibited. Bill On Mon, Aug 16, 2021 at 1:26 PM Ethan O'Toole via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:

I saw that, I assumed he meant the users of the forum itself.

PC hater. Can't deny that most of the computers in the world descended from the IBM PC up until ARM grabbed a lot of the embedded space.

- Ethan

On Mon, 16 Aug 2021, Christian Liendo via vcf-midatlantic wrote:

...

From ClassicCMP

From: Al Kossow via cctalk <cctalk@classiccmp.org> Date: Fri, Aug 13, 2021 at 9:24 PM Subject: Re: 30 yrs. ago To: <cctalk@classiccmp.org>

On 8/13/21 6:14 PM, Murray McCullough via cctalk wrote:

...

this began the era of mass-computing and it is now what classiccmp.org is all about

wrong

go play with the children on vogons or the VCF forum if you feel that way

Well in my mind, if it ain't a Babbage computer it is not vintage. Everything else is modern by that benchmark __. Sarcasm aside, for me there are two ways to look at this passion we all have, technical/academic and nostalgia/pop culture. I like both aspect and I am sure people's age has a big part to play in how they see these things!

From a technical perspective, it is fascinating to see the origins of mass storage with giant tape reels and washing machine sized fixed storage, but from a nostalgia perspective it means nothing to me.

I don't know anything about CMP but it sounds a bit like the scientific societies of the 1800s. On 8/16/21, 2:41 PM, "vcf-midatlantic on behalf of Christian Liendo via vcf-midatlantic" <vcf-midatlantic-bounces@lists.vcfed.org on behalf of vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote: While that explains why he has an issue with the IBM, it doesn't seem to explain the issue with VCF On Mon, Aug 16, 2021 at 1:50 PM Bill Degnan via vcf-midatlantic <vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote: > > saying this again....there was a real thing about the IBM PC and not > allowing it to be included in "vintage computing" as well as a lot of the > home computers, when this hobby first started. This view is still held by > the original guard of vintage computerians. That's why classic cmp does > not dwell long on the C-64, Amiga, Ataris, Apple, etc. Classic CMP is not > the place to ask "hey can someone here help me fix my 1541 drive..." > > The original vintage computer festivals did not allow IBM PCs to be > exhibited. > > Bill

Considering all that Al has done (and is doing) for our community, I'd say cut him some slack. Many of us would not be in the position we're in if not for Bitsavers.

I will second this.  Even so, his frustration with the forum crowd does not necessarily carry over to the other aspects of the organization.  I've never seen the VCFed, the forums, the event organizers/exhibitors, nor the listserv posters as being concentric/overlapping circles of our greater community.  How many of you post on the forums on a regular basis?  If not, why not? Me, I do not.  I've found my questions usually go ignored over there, or I feel that I have little to contribute to other people's discussions.  I post occasionally, but I've never felt like I really fit into that forum community.  I've since found my circles elsewhere. -Alexander 'Z' Pierson _

On Aug 16, 2021, at 6:25 PM, Christian Liendo via vcf-midatlantic <vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:

I agree that Al Kossow has contributed immensely to the community and continues to do so. I respect what he does. Given his contributions and position in the community it was one of the reasons I asked the question in the first place. I just didn't know what warrented that response about VCF.

In fairness, the response ("go play with the children on vogons or the VCF forum if you feel that way") is specifically directed at the forum, not VCF as a whole. I'm not going to wade into whether *that* was justified (the forum isn't for me, but that's just a matter of preference, and I'm not gonna trash it), but it didn't seem like he was aiming directly at the organization overall. That said, cctalk became such a zoo that when I was accidentally auto-bounced from it a number of years ago because of mail server issues, I never signed back up and don't feel particularly bad about it. Every forum (in the more generic sense of the word) has people who like it and who don't (and plenty who are just "meh"). Might be nice if he weren't so dismissive, but here we are. - Dave