Commodore 64 — They don’t make them like that anymore…
Remember the Apple II? Lots of people love Apple. What a comeback story…
Atari is so retro. The brand that just keeps hanging around. Through multiple owners, bankruptcies, you name it.
But Commodore? Now that was a moment! The top selling computer of all time! Just one time though…
Commodore was effectively a typewriter married to a gaming system. The former was what you sold your parents or grandparents to get one. The latter was what you really spent most of your time doing.
Now call me — Old Fashion. Or, like my staff, just call me — Old. But there was something transformational about the Commodore. It was a gaming platform that greeted you in a very odd way…
Atari had long been doing welcome screens on it’s products, but Commodore required that you at least program your way to the game load or directory.
LOAD”$”, 8, 1
or
LOAD”*”, 8, 1
RUN
For me, this was a gateway moment. It was too easy to try a PRINT or a GOTO. It was too inviting to look at game code or play with line numbers. And too tempting to hack the code or build your own.
Commodore made it too easy to learn programming and logic. And that would prove far more valuable in my life than the typewriter my parents thought they were replacing.
They don’t make them like that anymore. Or do they? Drop me a line if you know of anything out there today.
Originally published at www.linkedin.com.
