THE 16-BIT COMPUTER FAIR ------------------------ Royal Horticultural Gardens, London 12-13-14 1989 This show was the first of it's type by Westminster exhibitions and unlike previous shows that I've reported on, I was actually involved with one of the stands. (Prior to my 17Bit involvement) I was on the Argus Press stand on Friday and Saturday duly promoting FAST ACCESS which is another disk-magazine (with a different style/aim to Newsflash). I only actually ventured around the 2 halls a few times mainly because as soon as I went for a wander around I was dragged off to the pub against my will by a friend who I had not seen for a few months or else I dragged them to the pub - either way I still ended up at the watering hole. The show was reasonably well attended, I cannot tell just how well as yet but I don't think it is going to break any records although I must admit more people turned up than I had anticipated especially given the time of year (just after christmas i.e. everyone is broke). There were the usual array of stands that inhabit this type of event and some strange and boring ones concentrating on purely the ST or the Archimedes which brings up a talking point.. How come the Archimedes owners claim their machines are 32 bit yet they are very happy to attend the 16bit show?? Don't ask me, anyway there were only two and nobody seemed to be interested and it was only due to the fact that they were opposite one bar that they were noticed at all. On the Friday I had arrived to the show and the stand via British Snail and followed the rather misleading map on the back of the ticket I had meaning I wasn't exactly on-time. Things were reasonably quiet and I managed to sneak off and talk to a few friends of mine in the bar and felt a bit guilty when I turned up back at the stand with everyone saying they wanted to leave 30minutes earlier... oops After searching around the show for some good friends and to see if they were 'Out on the town' that night I gave in and conceeded to kipping on Stuart Cooke's settee (Group editor of 'Your Amiga' and other journals) and a few 'Nukie Browns' at a local pub in Stevanage. Staying at Stuarts was fine, his family are all from the Yorkshire area and with me being a patriotic devil I felt at ease all the time and it was nice to meet and stay with similar-minded people. Funnily enough I made friends with a lovely mini-yorkshire terrier called Kim, who wouldn't leave me alone for the entire weekend - this goes to prove that I always seem to get off with the dogs. During friday I had been wearing my Leeds Utd tie much to the amusement it seemed of a proportion of the southern community and I had to hide it on several occaisions for fear of being stabbed! Big hello to Paul Kavangh of Argus who's a big Arsenal fan.. the first four letters say it all don't they... Can someone do me a favour and write to him at Argus's address and just put "WIMBLEDON HAHAHA" I'm sure he would appreciate that. :-) Saturday came and my feet were aching after the first day and after having a good kip on the floor/settee I was ready for more punishment. When I got to London I headed straight for Tottenham Court Rd because I needed a small adaptor so we could fix a sound problem we had with the Amiga/Amplifier set-up we had on Friday. I had tried to remedy this on Friday but ended up miles away and empty-handed so I had to catch the tube back much to the amusement of the Argus staff. Anyway my luck changed on saturday and I bought the part in the first shop I ventured into and headed off back to the show. At the show it was much more busy than it had been the previous day and I can only put this down to one thing. Maria Wade. Maria works at Argus and has eyes you could die for, they must have been something special as they kept me from wandering off for what seemed like an eternity. No wonder people were waiting to take leaflets and things from her.. I couldn't blame them. Sigh. The inevitable happened though, midway through the afternoon, I nipped off to see some more friends and ended up bumping into a guy I have talked to over the phone and written to for AGES but never met - Phil South of journo fame, his name has appeared in just about every publication I can think of, well, except for Bella. It was nice to speak to Phil, suitably daft and well worthy of the 'Journalist' tag.. here's hoping for a plug Phil!!! (Was that ok?) Later on we sneaked off from the show being suitably tired and fed up, there was nothing of any excitement there and I put this down to the time of year and people such as 'Encyclopaedia Brittanica' being there who moaned each time we blasted 200watts of sound at them. There were two halls at the show, one of them was the place where not- enough stands were sold and the planners spaced the stands out making it look very empty - even if it wasn't really. There were a few notable stands including a 'Spot-the-worst-Workbench-Set-up' on the ICPUG stand, a sight for sore-eyes indeed, Ken will know what I mean. The show was much as I expected, a dull affair only lifted by reasonable if not amazing beer in the bar downstairs and a barman with a good sense of humour. Attendance was bigger than expected and my own thought is that they only turned up when they knew Maria would be there.. It certainly didn't help me concentrate that day.. It was a buyers-show, not an exhibitors show and was perhaps let down by the fact that there wasn't any terrific items to buy although there were bargains and opportunities for the new Amiga User. Saturday night was spent at a Stevenage restaurant playing silly- devils as I had to wear a plastic bib when eating my spare-ribs, this was most embarassing and much to the amusement of Stuart Cooke. I ripped the 'bib' off and shrank into a corner. Sunday was arguably the best day of the weekend as I slept till 10am then had a great lunch followed by looking at the sports results (Leeds had won again and were still top of the league) then it was onto the train back north accompanied by 7 cans of beer and Pink Floyd on my walkman. I found a tape in my bag with the Beach boys on and listened to this when I got near home, feeling rather jolly and rather drunk it was certainly a strange feeling leaning against a urinal in Wakefield station listening to 'Surfin USA' !! Martyn.