Micro Men

[MarkyM3]

Saw this on BBC4 this week, it's a drama/comedy about the battle between Sir Clive Sinclair and Chris Curry for the burgeoning UK home computer market in the early eighties. Real nostalgia for anyone who got their first taste of computing with a ZX81, Spectrum or BBC computer.

Not sure how impartial the character portrayal is having been made by the BBC themselves (Sir Clive may have a thing or two to say) but very entertaining nevertheless.

Currently on BBC iplayer.

Edited October 12, 2009 by MarkyM3

[Crossy]

Cheers for the heads up, looks like fun.

It's also on the various UK oriented torrent sites

[garyh]

BBC says not available to viewers outside the UK!

[MarkyM3]

Try this link: removed

Download speed is quick.

[garyh]

Thanks Marky, have downloaded it, very good program, I remember seeing the Acorn at a trade show in Australia it was absolutly brilliant for the time, another little tit bit, I went to buy a modem in 1995 to connect to the internet, one computer store owner asked me did I want it for the internet and went on to tell me not to waste my money as the internet was a waste of time and useless!

[nikster]

Thanks Marky, have downloaded it, very good program, I remember seeing the Acorn at a trade show in Australia it was absolutly brilliant for the time, another little tit bit, I went to buy a modem in 1995 to connect to the internet, one computer store owner asked me did I want it for the internet and went on to tell me not to waste my money as the internet was a waste of time and useless!

He was absolutely right about the first part!

[Crossy]

Yes, it looks like an excellent programme, however, please remember the forum rules:-

17) Not to post links to pages that contain objectionable material. This includes, warez, cracks, file-sharing, pornography, pyramid schemes, referral ID's, eBay listings and requests for donations.

Links have been removed.

[MarkyM3]

Apologies for posting the link! If anyone wants to download this program it it's available on loads of torrent sites by doing a search.

The program struck a chord with me as I remember getting a 16k ZX Spectrum for Christmas in 1982 and being totally amazed, especially only being 11 at the time! The whole thing went through the roof over the next few years and I guess it stuck with me as I earn my living in IT nowadays (IBM mainframes).

I remember using the BBC computers at school and as the program highlights, they were far better suited for education than the Spectrum, not least because they couldn't be nicked so easily or hammered to an early grave by kids playing Daley Thompson's Decathlon! Thing was, the Spectrum was the machine that brought computing to the masses in the UK, being less than half the cost of the BBC micro and it gained a big software base very quickly with the machine being pushed right to its limits. If anyone remembers the game "Manic Miner", it had constant background music going at all times which was previously thought impossible on such a limited platform.

Crossy, love the anecdote about the internet. I didn't get started until 1998 so it had matured slightly by then and the modems were slightly quicker! I read an interview with Sir Clive and he admitted he had never forseen the rise of something like the internet and the program does indeed allude to that. In a similar vein of poor vision, Amstrad "barrow boy" Alan Sugar (who bought the remnants of Sinclair Research when it crashed) said in 2005 the Apple ipod would be dead by next Christmas!

Cheers.

Edited October 14, 2009 by MarkyM3