Showing posts with label Craig Haynal. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Craig Haynal. Show all posts

Saturday, September 25, 2010

The SACS Report, Episode 4

The SACS Report was a public-access cable television show produced by the Southern Alleghenies Computer Society of Johnstown, PA, in the early 1990s.  For more background, please see the entry for Episode 2.

In this episode, we see the debut of my awesome sweater collection, featuring a button-up V-neck sweater over a turtleneck.  My patterned socks also figure prominently in this episode.  Unfortunately, the age of the VHS tape results in extremely poor video quality—the worst of the series—and my stunning wardrobe is mostly obscured.  The good news is that you’ll be able to devote your attention instead to my panel of guests, Craig Haynal, Mike MacInnis, and Ben Hauger.

Wednesday, September 15, 2010

The SACS Report, Episode 2

In the early 1990s, when I was in high school, I was a member of a community computer club.  In those days the ‘tubes were short, and your online community mostly consisted of nearby people who could make local calls to the same BBSes.  We met monthly for demonstrations of the latest hardware and software.  As a form of community outreach and education, we put together a show on the latest computing news.  This was before “podcasts” and “live streaming,” so we used the 20th-century equivalent: public access cable television.  Think Leo Laporte meets Wayne and Garth.

I was selected as the moderator of the show, presumably on the basis of my outstanding sweater collection.  Just as Star Trek’s pilot episode was missing Captain Kirk, Episode 1 of the SACS Report did not feature yours truly as the moderator.  I’d rather poke fun at myself, so I’m starting this series with Episode 2.

The video quality of the footage varies from poor to adequate.  The episodes, being an irreplaceable relic of my youth, were lovingly archived at SLP speed on a VHS tape previously used to record baseball games.  The audio quality of this episode improves after a couple of minutes.  My archive consists of 6 episodes.  I assume it is complete, but I’m not certain.  I’ve simply assigned the numbers 1-6 to the episodes on my tape.

Episode 2 features two guests, Craig Haynal and Mike Dom, presenting the hottest computer games of the era, including The Sims, Wolfenstein 3D, and Los Dados Afortunados.  Revisiting this episode is appropriate, as Intel recently demonstrated a raytraced, cloud-computed remake of Wolfenstein 3D.  A massively multiplayer, raytraced, 3D update of Los Dados Afortunados is expected in Q2 2011, and should give Portal 2 una carrera por su dinero.