age distribution and home computers

[analoq]

I often observe the birthday reminders that crop up and can't help but notice I'm a bit younger than most here, which is to be expected, but I got curious to know where exactly I fit in. In hopes that the data from this page serve as a representative sample and failing to mitigate my inexplicable fondness for charts, I created this:



This 30-year span shows a sudden rise in the late 60s, peaking at 1970-71 and a slow fall ever since.


My story: I was born in 1980. We had a C64 when I was a child and I have fond memories of playing games on it but I didn't really get into computers until we got our first PC when I was ~10. Eventually getting a modem and thru BBSs I discovered the demoscene which was influential to me, it was an inspiration for me to learn programming and electronic music -- my two main interests to this very day.


Reminiscing on that made me curious as to which computer played the significant role in people's lives here. I'd speculate for the early to mid-70s people it was the C64, for the early 80s people it was the PC and somewhere in the middle are the Amiga folks. Am I getting close? If you'd like to share your experiences along these lines I will be a very attentive listener.

cheers.

[LMan]

Wow this is interesting.

I think you're right with your assessment.

[merman]

One thing I found interesting back in the early 1990s was that there were a lot of older people into the C64 back then - and they were pretty die-hard C64 fans too, not wanting to upgrade to the PC.

[C64GLeN]

Indeed, this is very interesting. The peak at 70-71 would tie in with my personal experince of mixing with c64 users.

[fnordpojk]

I was born in 1981 and when I was growing up (ie the mid-to-late 80s when I got into computers for the first time) the C64 was ubiquitous amongst my friends, mostly as a gaming machine, and the Amiga was the #1 cool computer to have, but as we transitioned into the 90s the PC took over more and more and the focus shifted to BBSes and the demoscene. It was only a couple of years later that I returned to the C64 for nostalgic reasons.

So - I'm not entirely sure that the "early 1970s" demographic theory holds up; although most of the people I meet in this scene tend to be in that age group, I think it's because the combination of C64 + the love of SID + interest in remixing trims down the dataset so much that it's hard to draw any well founded conclusions from the statistics. I think you'd come to an entirely different conclusion if you went out and sampled 1000 people born between 1960 and 1990 and asked if they remembered the C64.

[analoq]

I was born in 1981 and when I was growing up (ie the mid-to-late 80s when I got into computers for the first time) the C64 was ubiquitous amongst my friends, mostly as a gaming machine, and the Amiga was the #1 cool computer to have, but as we transitioned into the 90s the PC took over more and more and the focus shifted to BBSes and the demoscene.

I think this illustrates my point. Our age group was too young to really get into the C64 the way we did the PC; for us the C64 was mostly a gaming machine. But for the early-70s folk they were old enough to get into the C64 in a way more significant than just games. Hopefully someone from that group won't mind chiming in on that point...

... it's hard to draw any well founded conclusions from the statistics. I think you'd come to an entirely different conclusion if you went out and sampled 1000 people born between 1960 and 1990 and asked if they remembered the C64.

You are probably right. But I think you can appreciate I'm merely curious about the community so I did some simple research and shared the results along with my take and am glad to hear your take among others.

[Steve B]

i am a 69'er and am now thirty ten (ahem)
i guess the C64 was a major influence in my life .. but so were the Speccy and the VCS 2600 and the Grandstand before it. (if not for them i dont think i would have owned a C64)
so too were the ST and Amiga and the Megadrive etc etc etc after it. (i am still here, playing games and doodling on a computer)
i have over 25 different 'games systems' at the moment (i dont sell computer stuff .. i just dont) and, yes, the C64 i guess has had the biggest impact on me.
i think the reason for this is due to the way humans mature.
we are most receptive to influences during puberty i think, (big changes in not only our physical bodies, but in how our brains are changing the way they work) so whatever is big in our lives at that time will be a big part of us in the future.
if you are hitting 'the change' when the Amiga is The Big Thing then chances are the Amiga will be your special machine.
if it was the Playstation at that time, then the PS one will be what you will be remixing when you're older.


just my 2p

[analoq]

we are most receptive to influences during puberty i think, (big changes in not only our physical bodies, but in how our brains are changing the way they work) so whatever is big in our lives at that time will be a big part of us in the future.
if you are hitting 'the change' when the Amiga is The Big Thing then chances are the Amiga will be your special machine.

I agree, in fact that may more closely resemble what I'm getting at than what I've been saying. Well said.

[Andersson]

I'm from '93 and I've never even seen a C64 in real life

[Steve B]

How did you get into the c64 remix scene ?
It's not the sort of thing you just stumble into.

[Andersson]

Since I've got the memory of a goldfish I can't really remember, but i think it had something to do with Mastering Swedish ^^

[Mordi]

I'm from '93 and I've never even seen a C64 in real life

Same here, although I am a '90. Played plenty of Amiga, though.

I got into the 'scene' in 2006 when I stumbled across a news-item on bizarrecreations.co.uk (developer of Combat Crazy) in which they had a link to Ollas' and Ziphoid's excellent remix of the CC theme. Then I found a bunch of remixes that were really great, and I started listening to all of them. Then, in december 2007, I decided to try remixing a song myself. Been doing so ever since.

[Makke]

Born 1980. The C64 was my first computer, and as such it will always be special to me, but it was on the Amiga I learned to get creative with computers. I reluctantly switched to PC in '97, simply because there was no convenient future for the Amiga anymore.

As a music machine, the test of time has been harder on the Amiga than the C64, but I still love the special Amiga sound.

If I had to choose one computer to use for the rest of my life, I'd pick the A1200*.

* Yes, yes I know, I shoud've picked a modern computer where I could emulate the Amiga, but this is completely hypothetical to begin with!

[Vosla]

Short version:
- Born 1968
- C64 in 1984
- A500 in 1988
- PC in 1992 (somebody sees a pattern here?)

I still use the old equipment though lack of space to have the old gear up all the time makes me use emulators a lot. Now I am even using Virtual PC for DOS and old Windows versions, backing up my old systems as virtual clones.
Currently trying to slow down the decay of the old stuff and archiving whatever is left; you might say I fight a hopeless battle against entropy.

[Analog-X64]

Short version: Very Similar to Vosla.
- Born 1970
- C64 in 1984
- A1000 in 1986
- A2000HD in 1988
- PC in 1992

I ran a BBS from 1984-1992 using hardware listed in the same order as the above list.
I supported C64 even on my Amiga2000HD with a 20MB Rodime Hard drive it was plenty of space.

The PC BBS Lasted one year, the Internet was finally main stream and it killed the BBS overnight, thats
when I shut it down.