[vcf-midatlantic] Museum Report

[Gordon 'gsteemso' Steemson]

Hi folks,

> Some of us in the TRS-80 community
> refer to it as the “T” word. When said with
> an underlying affection and respect, it’s all good.
> It’s a way of “owning/“ the term. However,
> when said with derision or out of
> ignorance, its offensive.

I have almost always said it that way -- not with any value judgement
in mind, but simply because it is considerably faster than saying it
the "correct" way.

That said, I initially heard that form of the name when I was an
immature and easily-amused teenager. Obnoxious-Youth Me found it made
for a very vivid mnemonic association, in addition to being more
convenient to enunciate.

(For the record, I never actually _used_ a TRS-80 of any type, though
I have enjoyed brief interactions with a few specimens set up by our
fellow retrocomputing fans.)

It came as something as a shock when, after 25 years or so of using
"Trash-80" merely as a streamlined way of saying "TRS-80," I first
encountered someone to whom the term was strongly offensive. It took
even longer for me to grasp just _how_ strongly it offended, simply
because the Platform Holy Wars dispute had degenerated to "Mac vs.
IBM" with rare interjections of "Amiga!" by the time I encountered it.
The various 8-bit platforms remained in minor use by those
disinterested in forking over non-trivial sums of money to get
something more current, but had long since ceased to even be
referenced in that futile conflict, let alone be actual contenders
therein.

My two cents; quote or ignore as preferred.

Gordon "gsteemso" Steemson
Instigating Cat-Herder and Agitator-by-Default for the Seattle
Retro-Computing Society