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Veronica Explains

You open up a Commodore 64, and the box says "welcome to the world of friendly computing."

You turn on a modern PC, and it immediately threatens your data unless you agree to save your data to *their* cloud service.

That right there is why we talk about vintage computers. Folks need to be reminded of what's possible.

#Commodore64 #VintageComputing

18 comments
Random Geek

@vkc I do miss the days when computers felt like "anything can happen! :blobwhee:​" instead of well I guess "anything can happen :blobsadeyes:​"

Martin Vermeer FCD

@vkc It wasn't *so* friendly... the peripherals were horrendously slow. And 'computing' was really an euphemism for games playing.

aZa

@martinvermeer @vkc but imagine the openness of a computer from back then with the Speer and convenience of computers nowadays.

It would be the dream

Mike, First of His Name

@vkc and every single computer in the 80s was covered in rainbows. It's all been downhill since that trend ended.

Jiří Fiala Total Landscaping

@vkc I don't know, I remember
?SYNTAX ERROR
READY.

on absolutely any input 😂 and then, after learning

LOAD"*",8

from god knows where you waited for three minutes to load a loading screen for further loading.

And even the most basic possible piece of software costing $20. Let's not idealize the past.

Davide Bucci

@vkc I somewhat miss the classic Macintosh system logo, where the computer smile to me each time I turn it on.

Nina Kalinina

@davbucci vintage computers were not necessarily user friendly, but they were made by humans for humans. This is rare nowadays.

So rare I was really touched when I first heard a gentle voice from the Japanese toy computer telling me "良く頑張ったね" ("You really worked hard!") after I saved a text document. 🥹

Davide Bucci

@nina_kali_nina by the way, about the human side of computing, I’m restoring a Macintosh Plus right now. I loved to see the famous signatures inside the case.

The signatures inside the  Macintosh Plus plastic case.
Juankprada

@vkc it’s kind of nostalgic, computers used to be made so they would serve us!

Now they look like a tool made to squeeze the last drop of information from us, if they have to “perform” some tasks for us to do it, that’s the price they pay…

Stefan Gast

@vkc This. Exactly this. We're no longer in control of many machines we own. Instead of solving genuine technical challenges, we have to work around anti-features – artificial problems that should not exist in the first place. Many systems today are outright user-hostile.

JocelynAyodele

@vkc Friendly computing also revolves around Linux as well.
Windows and macOS aren't the only options THANK GOD!

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