pouët.net

No, but a registration is required, and if you are a first-time visitor, you have to make plausible you really are able to handle the kind of freedom UC has. This usually means that some of our organizers knows and trusts you. We don't check tickets etc, and with the complete organizing team being stoned and drunk, we need to be sure people will stay fair and make sure to survive themselves.

See, at Breakpoint we have to accept to care about Bronix falling into the fire, about Aenima-Members acting violent etc. At UC, we orgas don't want to take care about our visitors, we want to have fun ourselves.

(And well, we UC/BP orgas know next to all german sceners personally, so large chunks of that will get invited by default, this is where the 'german' focus comes from)

I like it when you post like that. You make me feel less obsessed, for starters.

No, we don't really see eye to eye. Let's celebrate diversity :)

It's been said: checking ojuice != research, and demoparty.net is pretty hard to miss. You're also missing the fine points on how a lot of people actually got into the demoscene: school/university typically had no part in it -getting initiated by that weird friend of a friend who handed you a bunch of floppies however, did.

Don't dismiss these outreaches because these people initially aren't the stereotype of creativity. I did that last year, and I was very much stupid for doing so. Talking with people there, it's painfully obvious that a lot of people simply lack that magic middle man. People were going apeshit when they learned just exactly what people were pulling off on what they'd typically expect to be gaming gear only. Hell, last year's runner-up in the democompo at demozone was a convertee from the year before that. There's quite a bunch of diamonds in the rough out there, not just on the academic level.

..but anyway, about that sleeping bag? :)

Let's face it...

German sceners just won't travel abroad. Even if a party is organised only minutes across the border, with free pickups from German airports and railway stations, the amount of Germans that will show up is going to be minimal.

There are some exceptions to the rule. But with a German party in the same weekend, the only German sceners who are likely to prefer Demozone will be those who have been traditionally ignored by the mainstream German scene anyway (in other words: the Atari scene).

And so another weekend of two camps is coming up. On one side the Dutch, the Atari folk, and some handfulls of random foreigners, on the other the German in-crowd. Woohaa, back to 90's all the way...

The sad thing is, it's exactly the opposite situation than what we had hoped for. We've consciously concerted our partyplanning with the schedules of all other major events. Outline moved away from Easter, Demozone goes multiplatform and was the first to claim this weekend, next year the number of Atari sceners @ Breakpoint will most likely increase by the bucketload.

So it should be obvious to anyone that we are kicking the bucket here... Anyone home? Apparently not- since we forgot to register our party @ Orange Juice...

naturally i fully agree with the other dutchos, however i think we've all whined enough now. scamp will not move uc, we will not move demozone, and the 5 german sceners that do actually know that there is life outside germany are out of luck (and so am i, for i kick butt at 180bpm topfschlagen).

shifter: research regarding the sleeping bag is in progress, somebody has to go the storehouse to check. Regarding the hoodie: There are several, gimme more info (at least the color etc).

shifter: Yeah, so I missed cross-checking demoparty.net. And demozone missed adding their party to ojuice.net. So their anti-collision-work was at least as crappy as mine :)

havoc: That's bullshit. There are heaps of german sceners who travel to partys outside germany. But then again, we germans have 3 major scene events inside our country already, plus several small ones. Not everyone wants to visit more than 4-5 parties per year.
[...]

[...]
And having a look at the end of July/beginning of August: Every german scener wants to visit Evoke. Many want to attend Assembly and Buenzli. This already makes 3 parties within 4 weeks. Chances to see germans visit a 4th party in that time already are small. Especially if it means traveling outside germany, paying 70 Euros, and being part of a huge LAN-party.

With or without UC, the interest for demozone at that time obviously is rather small.

havoc: And regarding that atari-scene comment... wtf. The atari scene never got "ignored". The german atari scene always completely refused to get in contact with the rest of the scene.

Back in the M&S times, the Atari scene refused to take part and instead insisted on having an atari-only event on Easter. When M&S dies, the atari scene was cheering and stating things like "let's hope those lame PC sceners now don't show up at our party".

Atari sceners (with very few exceptions) don't show up at ANY german cross-platform party.

Fuck the atari scene, I couldn't care less about them. :)

nobody said anything got ignored, and it's a known fact that the atari sceners never really bothered much about the other platforms until recently. the point is that we try to fix situations like those by moving a big atari party away and picking a free and decent weekend for demozone. you, on the other hand, just dont seem to give a damn, waltz over the cool thing that we're doing here and defend yourself instead by deciding that "interest is obviously rather small" for a party that you haven't ever even smelled from a distance. that, sir, is not the attitude i had expected from you.

Oh crap, this is getting sour pretty fast. Nice perspective on the atari scene you go there Scamp, it's pretty much the polar opposite of what I've experienced. Then again, catering to the armchair elitists in the Amiga scene and the judgemental technophobes from the C64 scene might be more fun than understanding Atari sceners.

The atari scene has so far been friendly, far from dismissive and rather communicative. They just don't reach out to grab you by the arm to gush about how great their fucking platform is and how mine fucking sucks because megahertz isn't what fucking matters :)


Perhaps some people in the organzing team know something about ojuice that prompted them to not submit it there... And again, demoparty.net pretty much took over the party announcements months ago.

Anyway, I guess you missed the very first time I whined about my hoodie. It is black, void of any print (no amiga bouncy balls for the likes of me, k thx) and probably from some default clothes store like H&M or WE.

Since this thread is going to shitsville, here's something to lighten the load a bit:

adding to that, i'd like to apologise for my mean and attacking attitude in that last post.

and fuckings to scamp for *once again* organising uc in a weekend in which i can't come! :-)

I second shifter's pouetization attempt and in general scamp's points without the arrogance and the DZ bashing.

Oh, and the atari scene is a bunch of arrogant, elitist and first of all isolationist bastards. I've experienced them for more than 15 years now (back in the original C64 vs AtariXL days), and it all hasn't changed a bit. Details when requested.

PS: Lego rocks.

shifter: I sure would be happy if my experience with the Atari scene would change to the better in future. Here in germany, most Atari scener still try not to mix with other sceners. At the major cross-platform parties in germany, you can spot sceners from Amiga, C64, PC, Console platforms and many more - but next to no Atari guys. And what I said regarding the bad atitude towards M&S (and Breakpoint 2003) - well, read the articles in Alive and on various Atari sites, I'm not making this up.

kb, detail request filed!

be warned, i have an atari cap and i'm not afraid to wear it!

Sorry if my posts felt like I'm bashing demozone - this wasn't my intention.

Let's clarify:

1.) I don't think that UC is competiton for demozone or any other serious demoparty, because UC is a satire, suitable only for a small fraction of the scene. The date collide won't do noticable harm to DZ.

2.) If I had known about DZ's date (my research was limited due to 1.) and also had known that a bunch of people I personally highly respect are behind it, I would have communicated regarding 1.) with them in private earlier.

3.) *Personally* I'm a known anti-gamer-nazi, and I probably would not pay 75 Euro entrance fee when I know that part of this money does not go to sceners, but to support a large gamer event. For lots of other people, this very well will be OK. I'm also aware *why* this is the only option for DZ etc.

Oh yeah, and

and i guess i'll now go to neither of the two parties and enjoy a quiet weekend instead.

Skrebbel: as you wish.

- 1988 (or 89), small "computer club" meeting in my hometown, about 40 ppl. Big room full of C64s, Spectrums, Amigas, even a few 286s, lots of weird selfmade hardware, basically everyone was showing off and running around to see what fucked up stuff the others had to offer. Except that one corner in the room where the 10 Atari ppl gathered and not only showed demos to... each other, but also a genuine disinterest in all the other things going on. At least they were friendly when you joined them.

- Easter 1996: Symposium. Fried Bits organizing had dissolved, and so the Atari and Acorn scenes had become homeless and were looking for a shelter. Sym'96 was meant as a cross-platform party, perhaps the only several-100-ppl party EVER with Archimedes compos, and the result was the following: The Acorn scene blended in with the C64/Amiga/PC guys, the Atari people on the other hand found a remote section of the hall without any contact to the rest and were never to be seen again. Oh, of course except in a few Atari diskmags afterwards where it was claimed how much Sym'96 sucked a donkey's bollocks. Well, at least they remembered the fucking NAME of the party they attended.

- 1997: The Atari scene was so fed up by the hostility brought against them by the Sym'96 organizers (well... WTF!?!?!?!?!) that they mobilized some remains of the Fried Bits and organized the Siliconvention. M&S 97 was surprisingly cozy.

- 1998, Easter, Sunday: Two high-ranked Siliconvention organizers suddenly showed up at M&S because they couldn't stand their own scene anymore.

- 2000 or 2001: M&S together with some open-minded Atarians (TM) made serious attempts to re-integrate the Atari scene. We had one full set of compos for Atari, Atari-related sponsors and even reserved two rows of tables for the Atari sceners if they all wanted to sit together. That's about all you can do as party organizer. Result: Only a handful of Atari sceners showed up, naturally lots of the compos got canceled due to lack of entries, and of course a few weeks later every Atari mag or site was ranting about how much the party sucked and how arrogantly they were treated (because they had to endure, like, contact with actual humans). Yeah, RIGHT.

- 2003: Scamp offered the Atari scene a place on BP with the promise that the party would really be unlike M&S (which was true). Result: Now the bashing started even BEFORE the party had begun. And continued afterwards though nobody even _attended_.

- about 2004: The Atari scene found Nectarine. Until then, the music played there was a healthy mix of SIDs, MODs, XM/IT music, sequenced stuff, game tune remixes, etc, with everyone uploading and requesting mostly their favourite tunes and caring for diversity. Guess what then happened: Suddenly HEAPS of YM music (read: shittiest sound chip ever) were getting uploaded and mass-requested until many of the other ppl quitted listening because the one or other SID in between is ok, but most normal persons (including myself) just can't stand constant square wave beeps for HOURS. Luckily the situation has relaxed again, but this was one of the reasons the rules for uploading and requesting have become a lot more restrictive in the last year.

That were my fucking subjective (TM) experiences with the Atari scene so far. Enough for a start? ;)

More! More! There simply is no way in hell that you might be able to outweigh the ten odd years of the german commodore fetishists being cockmongers :(

thanks :)

i heard quite different versions from atari sceners...
and having visited outline i must say that the atari scene is definetely the most serious and mature part of the demoscene nowadays. and probably already were before.

instead of fiddling on this 'who started it'-thing...

Is it? Then why don't we ever see more than a handful non-Atari Germans at recent parties in Holland? It cannot be that our German friends don't feel invited- or maybe we should've made even more than 5 invite intros?

Anyhow, don't get me wrong... I'm not blaming you for this phenomenon, but it is a fact of (scene-)life, whether we like it or not. You are right in saying that there are more than enough cool parties within German borders to fulfill the average scener's wishes, and that is an unique situation indeed. But still, it is strange to see that our parties get a lot more attention from (for example) the United Kingdom than from our nearest neighbours in Germany. AFAIK, there are no other foreign parties closer to major population areas in Germany than ours... and as stated before, our visitors can be picked up in Germany if they let us know when they arrive in Emmerich or Duesseldorf. What more can we do to drag you guys across the border? If your main aim for the weekend is to get stoned and drunk... as you say... well... that's a guarantee here in Holland... :-)


I can only comment from my own perspective ofcourse...

It all started with the Fried Bits parties in Bremen/Delmenhorst. Those were great fun for some years, the last event even had a sizeable non-Atari contingent (including Acorns, so KB is allowed a moment to rejoice here ;)). Then the Fried Bits organisers merged with some Amiga and PC people and launched Symposium. When I arrived at the party in 1996, I was instructed (not asked, literally instructed) to go sit in the side room with the other Atari sceners. During the party however, I spent like half my time there, and the other half in the PC/Amiga area with some Dutch pc and Amiga friends. Already during the party, it became clear that there were certain tensions in the organising team. In retrospect, I'd have to say the "mistreatment" (as many Atari people experienced it) was probably caused equally much by the remaining few Atari organisers as it was caused by the general organising team. So fingerpointing makes no sense... And the tiny release I participated in resulted in one of the first times a crowd cheered for my stuff, and thus probably one of the reasons why I'm still here. So, in my view, so far so good.

Then 1997 comes... I started studying in Venlo, so here my Easter party memory is blank for almost 2 years. In 1997 I didn't visit any party at all, in 1998 I was planning to go to InterCon but couldn't due to a family member falling ill on the other side of the planet. Shit happens... But to get back to topic, I don't know what happened in those years in the party organising department. I do know that when I get back in 1999, virtually everyone who was part of "The Independent" (-->the original Fried Bits orgos) has quit the scene or switched platform, and some young guys from the former DDR just announced their "Error In Line" Easter party.

Looking back at it, 1999 was strange. Before going to Error In Line, I visited Ambience with my Atari gear in a crate on the back of my bicycle (-->the only advantage of studying in Venlo, ever ;)). I heard about MekkaSymposium from (again) my Dutch pc/Amiga friends, but there was nothing about Atari in the invitations. Some people on IRC had mailed the organisers , and had gotten a rather negative responses (sadly I don't remember from who exactly, I'll try to dig that up). In those circumstances, so clearly under the impression that we were not quite welcome at the "big" parties anymore, the Dresden guys started the Error In Line tradition. And what a tradition it became...

Seriously, noone can properly understand the reason for the Atari scene's apparent "choice" for isolation without having visited at least one EIL edition. First of all because it wasn't really a choice, but rather a solution that, despite being intended to replace another party, worked so well that nobody ever bothered looking back once it started. That party rocked so hard... It is simply impossible to create a better atmosphere. If another edition would be announced today, and starts tomorrow, I'd quit my job just to be there, that's an easy choice. Hell, even KB would have bought an Atari, had he visited the event.... :-)

In 2000, EIL was briefly replaced by SillyVenture in Gdansk. In 2001, there's another EIL. In 2002, some weeks before Easter, it becomes clear that noone in the Atari scene is planning to organise an Easter party. Panic. What to do now? Luckily Lotek manages to cut some kind of deal with the MS organisers, and in the end about 15 of us show up at MS2k2. Far too few, ofcourse, and those who do make the trip (and by now are quite used to the EIL "service level") are disappointed at the facilities offered at the MS2k2 location. Later on, we find out that well informed visitors booked a nearby hotel, and that this has become common practice for pc and Amiga sceners. Call it ignorance, call it what you like, but the fact remains that that MS2k2 tent was goddamn cold and it wasn't easy at all to sleep under our tables (thank you Polish dude with the helmet, the axe, and the FAR TOO LOUD VOICE ;)).

2003 comes, and the last of the EIL parties is organised. Again, the memories of previous editions are so good that noone in the Atari scene seriously considers going to another event. But sadly it turns out to be the last edition of this legendary party, the main organisers cannot get access to University of Dresden properties as easily as they did when they were still students, and so an end comes to an era.

The rest of the story should be known to most people on this site: In 2004, Outline competes directly with Breakpoint. In Atari terms the score is at least 10-0 for Holland, in any other respect Germany is the clear victor. In 2005, exactly the same happens again, with the possible exception of a 3 hour hi'n'bye by Sparcus, Skrebbel and Plek, on their way to BP...

This year, we (Outline) moved the date of our party. Please pay close attention nay-sayers, it is a fact: we moved a tradition that is equally strong and valid as your own, in an attempt to break the aforementioned apparent "isolationism". Sure, we could point at the facts endlessly, and claim our tradition is as valid as any other, like BP for example. But that makes no sense, any child can see that despite any trivia, it will be much easier to guide the relatively small Atari "fragment" back into the general scene herd, and if that's what it takes, that's what I'll be working on...

Because I'm not here to piss around randomly. OK, that's what I do most of the time on Pouet... But behind all the drama and the bravoure, I hide only 1 desire: for the entire scene to coexist, as it did back in my days at the atheneum. Because back there, it didn't matter shit what computer you had, as long as you didn't copy games but made demos instead. So that's what we all did, me on my Atari, Bjorn and Matko on their Amiga, Okkie, Kork, Jace, Lenz, Sjaak, Bassie et al on their pc's, Erik on his C64... I really don't know who, why and how all the platform-related warfare started. Sure, a joke here and there, but for fuck's sake, if that is still a reason in 2006 to feel offended, then it's really time for me to quit the scene..

So there you have it. My rant. Was it boring? I guess so. If you just skipped the entire story, and your name happens to be Scamp: don't bother reading the above, I just had to get it off my chest. ;) Seriously, we should have a beer and a good conversation some time soon. I don't know whom you have offered to organise an Atari section for Breakpoint, but if you would appreciate that, I'd be happy to offer my "fame, knowledge and expertise" (cough) to assist in such a venture. As I've tried to explain above, the whole aim of our planning is to achieve this. So tell me, what is the next party where we can talk business? Evoke I presume- shall I put a Grolsch in the crate for Cologne then?