Retro. The old brightblack

{::comment} Posted by: graham · 25 May 2000 · 23:25:00 {:/comment} In Hindsight ‘Densha De Go!’ in December 2020. I don’t remember much about writing this one, though the title is a play on the name of an arcade game which came out around the same time, and made it onto consoles. You played a train driver and had to get simulations of real trains to real stations on a real timetable. Yup, it was a big thing. There were sit down versions also, where you could even put a driver’s faux uniform on. There were fans indeed. All I remember from the few times I played it was that I was horrific at braking, cueing small animations of passengers being thrown around in the carriages. ...

{::comment} Posted by: graham - 01 May 2000 - 22:28:00 then on 01 December 2020 {:/comment} With Hindsight ‘PC Upgrade - May 2000’ in December 2020 We can always have a good laugh at PC specs and prices from decades past, but this was fairly balanced I suspect for the time. Ah, VersionTracker, I used to check that thing every day in the 90’s until RSS and in-application updaters were a thing. I have fond memories of that first GeForce too, if only because it was indeed my first gaming card. I want to say there was a DDR version, but mine wasn’t that, mine was the cheaper version. I’m pretty sure I was mostly playing Counter-Strike and Myth II around this time. That obsession with BIOS updates would take a long time to abate, and wow, 2 CD/DVD drives. Some of these companies are still going, some aren’t and some are shadows of their former selves. This also reminded me of that ATi Rage Turbo too. I’d completely forgotten about that. I cannot explain the sheet number of commas though. ...

{::comment} Written by: graham · 1998-02-12 20:57, Last modified by: graham · 06 May 2007 · 22:49:24 {:/comment} In Hindsight ‘Digital Life Update - February 1998’ in December 2020 Over 20 years on, and the idea of explaining a move to Mac might seem odd. In context, at the time, Apple was a basket case, Jobs barely back, the iMac wouldn’t be out for another six months and the company was almost bankrupt, so the idea of move to the Mac platform was a bit weird. Rhapsody? Wow, I’d forgotten about that. For those who don’t know, that was what would become OS X Server 1, when Apple bought NeXT with Steve Jobs, and a move to Intel would take another 8 years. Rhapsody would then further evolve into OS X. ...

{::comment} First Published: October 14th 1997 Last Updated: July 22nd 1999 {:/comment} In Hindsight - December 2020 I was a huge fan of free online texts, and I wrote this page against that backdrop in late 1997 when I was still teaching English on JET, Amazon was just getting somewhere and when buying an English language book meant a small selection in a larger city like Yokohama and paying a lot of money. Still, they were quaint and fun days perhaps. I still believe in open source e-texts, and still support Gutenberg, and they continue to upload more and more content each day. Interesting I mentioned the extension of copyright, something which rages on even to this day, but against a backdrop of more authors opening up some of their works to the marketplace to see how that model works. Surprisingly then, I think this page holds up, even in 2020. ...