AdamCon 28 live chat from the convention

[hardhat]

Hi,

 

If you want to chat with people at the convention, we are starting now at:

 

http://adamcon.org/chat/

 

or in IRC

 

join irc.freenode.net and look for the channel #retroemu

 

We will be on for the next two hour, approximately.

 

[+nanochess]

There are pictures of the convention or there is a FB group?

 

It feels so mysterious

[+5-11under]

  On 7/24/2016 at 3:23 PM, nanochess said:

There are pictures of the convention or there is a FB group?

 

It feels so mysterious

 

I'm still waiting to see the picture of me (visiting) with the three stooges musketeers.

[Kiwi]

One of these days, I gotta go to the convention and meet you guys.

[NIAD]

  On 7/24/2016 at 8:08 PM, Kiwi said:

One of these days, I gotta go to the convention and meet you guys.

Best chance for all the Midwesterners on here would be if it's held in Grand Rapids, MI again. Hopefully that will happen for next year's convention and then we could raid Bob's basement!!!!!

[Milli V]

How many people go? What goes on there (itinerary?)?

[Dr. D.]

  On 7/25/2016 at 7:04 AM, Milli V said:

How many people go?

In the last decade, 15-20. There is a core of about a dozen who have been to 20+ of them. The rest is made up of returning prodigals or (significantly) new ColecoVision homebrew people like NewColeco and Pixelboy. hardhat is the only person left who’s attended every one, and adamcon has been to all but #1. I myself have been to 20 ADAMcons — I didn’t know about 1–2, was trying to finish my Ph.D. during 3, first attended 4 (probably the largest in terms of attendance, over 100 delegates), missed 10 because it was during the school year and I had to teach classes, and missed 18, 19, 21, and 23 due to finances (multiple kids in college). There has been attrition as people’s lives change, they lose interest, they get old and die... it’s like family. The different ADAMcon “eras” in my new “ADAMite™” board game (Early, Middle, and Late) reflect some of these changes over time.

 

Where the ADAMcon is held also affects who can attend. It is hard for some of the Canadians (especially those from Quebec) to get to US ADAMcons. We had some West-Coast folks at one time, and even ADAMcons out that way (5 in Salt Lake City, 11 in Seattle, 15 on Vancouver Island), but those folks have gradually faded away. The last decade of ADAMcons is centered around the Great Lakes, with 3 excursions into Quebec.

 

  Quote

What goes on there (itinerary?)?

All kinds of stuff :-) It depends a lot on who is coming. Only a few of us are programmers anymore (me, hardhat, NewColeco, Pixelboy), only a few of us are hardware types (me, hardhat, adamcon and his son Doug), and there are a lot of spouses and family who are game players at best. After ADAMcon 26, it was decided collectively that it was too hard anymore to have 3 full days of sessions, so we cut it back to about 1.5 (Saturday and Sunday), making the traditional Thursday night and Friday optional, to make it cheaper for those who wanted just sessions and not “family” time. In the 2 subsequent ADAMcons, this has not changed who has come, or for how long (i.e., we did not pick up 2-day delegates or day-pass delegates). Pretty much I talk about whatever I have done with my ADAM (software or hardware), or meta-ADAM stuff like hacking the Time Pilot game cartridge for the 2013 Mighty Mitchell Award™. Pixelboy has demonstrated games, NewColeco has talked about music and graphics programming (including DAN1 compression this year), hardhat has run hands-on tutorials in SmartBASIC (where we build a game or project together as a group) and even assembler.

 

In the old days, ADAMcon was where you could see in person the people you read about in newsletters, or who wrote the newsletters, or who wrote the games/software that you used, or who ran the BBSes that you logged into. You could come and absorb and be a tourist and not really have to contribute anything, because you were just one person in a sea of activity. The first 5–6 ADAMcons were 3 solid days of one-hour sessions, 2–3 at a time in parallel, so you could never see them all. It was not all happy times either, because there were personalities and disagreements and turf wars and fights.

 

Those days and most of those people have now passed away, figuratively and in some cases literally. As noted above, the number of sessions has been greatly reduced over the last decade, as attendance has shrunk and delegate interests have changed. You can still meet new people, but if you are expecting to just come and be a sponge, getting what you want and disappearing back into the ether as if it were a glorified Google search, you may be disappointed. We still have some personalities, but I have not seen turf wars or fights for a very long time, so things are pretty pleasant nowadays. We don’t bark much and certainly don’t bite :-)

 

Just my thoughts from my own experience. Anyone else, feel free to chime in!

 

*Dr. D.*

[adamcon]

You have it pretty much covered Dr D. When we go into Canada from the States, or vice versa, we just tell the border people we are visiting friends - because that is actually what has happened as the group got smaller. Here is this year's schedule; although there are ALWAYS changes and switching things around or even changing topics. An ADAMcon would not be true if this didn't happen, along with Mr Murphy shoing himself quite often to mess things up.

 

ADAMCON 28 JULY 14-18, 2016

 

Thursday July 14th schedule

 

Arrival at hotel, dinner with friends, welcome to ADAMCON 28

 

Friday July 15th schedule

 

Breakfast at the hotel

Day outing - Wings of Paradise Butterfly Conservatory

 

Saturday July 16th schedule

 

Breakfast at the hotel

9:30 am Welcome to ADAMCON 28

9:45 am Luc Miron - games

10:30am Jeffery Wick- the Pokemon craze

11:00am Rich Drushel - Mighty Mitchell Award game

12:30pm Lunch from local restaurant

2:00 pm Daniel Bienvenue - music and color for CV games

2:45 pm Dale Wick - hardware my ADAM needs; programming

4:15 pm Luc Miron - games

9:00 pm Annual ADAMCON chat session

 

Sunday July 17th schedule

 

Breakfast at the hotel

9:00 am Dale Wick - game programming

10:30am Bob Slopsema - history of ADAM in Uraguay

11:00am ADAM News Network meeting

11:30am Doug Slopsema – ADAMnet "virtual" ADAM disk drive

12:30pm Lunch from local restaurant

1:30 pm Much Maligned But Highly Coveted Mighty Mitchell Award

finals game play of ADAMite (Monopoly type game produced

designed & implemented by last years winner, Dr D) THIS will

an annual event, it is a wonder to behold!!!

6:00 pm Banquet @ Mandarin restaurant

8:30 pm Passing of the ADAMCON 28 banner/t-shirt

 

Monday July 18th schedule

 

Leave for home - plan for ADAMCON 29 on July 20-23, 2017 somewhere

in time……………….or Albany, N.Y. or somewhere near there ???????

[adamcon]

Just to show you the people attending, here is a small snapshot of the group......some of us were a little thinner before the banquet at the Mandarin, but you get the picture. ANY and ALL are welcome to attend any or every year; we did have one visitor this year, 5-11under came for awhile and had dinner with the programmer "group" @ Kelsey's Sat night.

[Pixelboy]

I can't remember who took a picture of me with newcoleco and 5-11under...

[+5-11under]

  On 7/26/2016 at 10:14 PM, Pixelboy said:

I can't remember who took a picture of me with newcoleco and 5-11under...

 

Dale was in the picture too, and the picture was taken with Dale's phone.

[adamcon]

  On 7/27/2016 at 7:22 AM, 5-11under said:

 

Dale was in the picture too, and the picture was taken with Dale's phone.

Think it was possibly the waiter. When we left, Jeffery was chowing down on dessert and it looked like the waiter was monkeying with a phone

[+5-11under]

  On 7/27/2016 at 3:03 PM, adamcon said:

Think it was possibly the waiter. When we left, Jeffery was chowing down on dessert and it looked like the waiter was monkeying with a phone

 

Dale has a picture taken in the conference room. Taken by Rich or something like that.

[Milli V]

Albany NY would be awesome - it is only 20miles away - I could do a session or 2

[Pixelboy]

  On 7/28/2016 at 6:39 AM, Milli V said:

Albany NY would be awesome - it is only 20miles away - I could do a session or 2

I'm sure Dale and the rest of the gang will love to see you come and participate.

[Milli V]

We have been talking on FB of a potential "micro-con" this fall in the Northeast - sort of a get ball rolling and build enthusiasm for the Adam instead of waiting another year

[digress]

I know colecovision is included in adamcon but maybe with more emphasis if you want to make a nother event. So "COLECO-CON"

 

Could even involve more than just the colecovision/adam.

 

  On 7/29/2016 at 8:21 AM, Milli V said:

We have been talking on FB of a potential "micro-con" this fall in the Northeast - sort of a get ball rolling and build enthusiasm for the Adam instead of waiting another year