vga256

https://mastodon.tomodori.net/@vga256

indigenous canadian, recovering academic → writer, gamedev & interactive toolsmith, the 4o3 bbs scene, 1-bit art, classic macs, and 80s/90s gaming. curator of internet, canadian & gaming historical obscura.

→ mages & modems: memoir of growing up with computers in the 80s & 90s https://tomotama.com/books
→ exigy: love2d shareware creation kit https://exigy.org
→ cd-rom safari podcast: https://cd-rom.ca/podcast

I do not read or reply to Private Messages.

(profile: a 6¢ canada red fox stamp)

tomotama: playful software for curious people: https://tomotama.com
kiki: a tiny homepage construction kit: https://tomotama.com/kiki
cd-rom safari podcast: 90s multimedia & edutainment software: https://cd-rom.ca/podcast
my personal home page: http://www.dialup.party/~vga256

Public Key

npub1hj02llxmd56ugs7x24e0mzewq3re4m8lv7adwyhwmptl2gr3styq6caev9

NIP-05 Address

vga256_at_mastodon.tomodori.net@momostr.pink

Profile Code

nprofile1qqste840lndk6dwyg0r92uha3vhqg3u6anlk0wkhzthds4l4ypcc9jqpz3mhxue69uhhyetvv9ujuerpd46hxtnfduqs6amnwvaz7tmwdaejumr0dsjmhtjk

Publishing to

relay.damus.io

nos.lol

Author Public Key

npub1hj02llxmd56ugs7x24e0mzewq3re4m8lv7adwyhwmptl2gr3styq6caev9

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Last Notes

2026-05-08 21:14:54 UTC

okay so i found something pretty awesome
the 3d scenes in Myst were all built using a mac modeller/renderer called Strata Vision 3D. i bought a boxed copy of this program with the intention of trying to recreate a model or two in the game, using the original renderer.
the box came with an extra disc - a library of shapes and textures. i noticed on the inside flap of the cd that it apparently included textures from Myst!
unfortunately, it turns out the disc was a demo. you browsed through the library until you found something you wanted, and then called a 1-800# to buy a serial number. you could enter the serial number and instantly have access to that texture.
unfortunately, no one has ever figured out how to crack Strata Clip 3D, and i couldn't figure it out today either.
fortunately, some creative digging turned up the Myst textures. they've been hiding on a Warez cd from 1996 for the past 30 years.
i just managed to load the program into system 7 and it's all there. these are the original textures used to render some areas of Myst. i still need to install Strata Vision to test them out, but afaik this is the first time these original textures have been seen since.
#macintosh #vintageApple #myst #retroGaming #win31
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2026-05-08 16:34:42 UTC

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it was absolutely not that at my university, because I was there when the change was made. the only impetus for getting rid of web space and all other kinds of self hosting was to decommission internal IT departments as a cost saving device. “we’ll save millions every year not having to run our own servers - Google can do that job for us”
hundreds of support staff lost their jobs permanently, the university made itself look like it was making fiscally wise decisions, and no one cared about the long term implications of it.

2026-05-08 16:22:45 UTC

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exactly. every single student and faculty member used to have web space. even if it was only 5mb.
it’s mind boggling to me that no university has something like cPanel for every department. let departments decide which software they want to support and use, and handle all the installation for individual professors/lecturers.
we used to do that with Moodle in the mid-2000s. moodle sucked, but it was ours to suck with.

2026-05-08 16:13:41 UTC

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remember when we used to have IT departments on campus because self hosting was a university support job

2026-05-08 01:55:06 UTC

@npub14wk…508e i belatedly just read your post on Death on the Orient Star and i would absolutely love to see this get made. long, long overdue for a game like Last Express

2026-05-06 15:09:41 UTC

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awesome news. were you able to find a local printer?

2026-05-05 01:52:26 UTC

really happy to have discovered something hiding in plain sight for several years: robyn & rand miller's original Myst pitch document from 1991.
it's a succinct work of art in itself. i'm surprised at how much of the world design was already on paper.
as all of the copies found elsewhere online are heavily compressed webp/jpeg, i've uploaded the robyn's original PNGs to IA here:
https://archive.org/details/myst_proposal
originally from robyn's site:
http://www.robynmiller.net/video-games-films
#digiPres #softwarePreservation #archival #gamedev #myst #cyan
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2026-05-04 22:29:25 UTC

til the english term 'scuttlebutt' (as in: 'So, what's the scuttlebutt today?') originated from the Age of Sail. it has literally the same expressive meaning as water-cooler gossip.
thank you Stephen Biesty's Incredible Cross-Sections: Stowaway!
compare this to the wikipedia entry for scuttlebutt - a dry factual kernel: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scuttlebutt
#multimedia #cdrom #edutainment
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2026-05-04 18:50:16 UTC

https://minidisc.pics
#minidisc
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2026-05-04 16:03:41 UTC

when i was a kid with my first 2x cd-rom drive, buying a cd-rom in a retail box was a $100+ CAD affair. so at my house that never happened.
all of my software on CD were either pack-ins that came with the computer, or from cheap multi-disc compilation packs like Sirius Software's 5ft10 pak.
one of those pack-ins was a copy of Encarta '94. it had a nondescript jewel case without cover art - just a green MS certificate of authenticity. i never knew what the retail box looked like, until today.
holy cow is it beautiful. the box is a hardcover flip-open activity book, designed for kidhands to pull open and rifle through. visually, it models the Dorling Kindersley UK educational books - I assume they did the graphic design.
the user manual is a thick kid friendly comic book. there's even a separate manual that teaches kids how to write a book report and *then* an entire section of proper citations and giving research credit.
MS was a big, big place in those days. its educational division was more or less walled off from the rest of the murderous beast, and it shows. this program is thoughtful, beautiful, and suffused with craftsmanship.
i'm right in the middle of retooling the Multimedia HyperGuide podcast, and now i have to do an episode on Encarta. it's so damned well made. in the mean time, feel free to listen to previous episodes here:
https://podcast.vga256.com
#multimedia #cdrom #win31 #win95 #retrocomputing #podcast
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2026-05-03 21:12:34 UTC

oooo this plex bug made me nuts. this post is for anyone running the plex htpc client on an intel-based mac.
a week ago i swapped in an old mac mini 2012 as a plex media player. it did a perfect job with 1080p.
after five days of flawless operation, it started stuttering, turning the screen magenta on playback, and then inevitably crashing with a meaningless gpu-related crash report.
okay, i thought: nothing has changed with the machine in the past week. it must be some kind of hardware or OS issue that suddenly cropped up.
first stop: check the fan and heatsink to make sure the gpu heatsink hadn't detached. everything good.
okay, so maybe a Catalina compatibility issue magically appeared? i *had* recently upgraded it to the latest macOS security patch, which may have introduced some undisclosed gpu issues. okay, so i upgraded it (via OpenCore Legacy Patcher) to Monterey.
same behaviour. stuttering, 1-3 fps on playback in plex. everything else works great. so... an issue with plex?
i noticed after a few days of playback, Plex had quietly selfupdated. pieces starting to fall together....
... one search later: every person with an older Intel-based mac experiencing the same crashes with 1.71.1 🤬 https://forums.plex.tv/t/htpc-1-71-1-crashes-fails-video-playback/927580
the only solution: downgrade to 1.71.0. (which plex made almost impossible, because it buried its client downloads behind a web API.)
/user/adsyuk1991 did the hard work to scrape their API to pull down the right version. i've uploaded a copy of the binary to IA here: https://archive.org/details/plex-htpc-1.71.0.334-aaf-6bcca-universal
finally - critical last step: stop plex from selfupdating:
- Exit HTPC
- Open
macOS: ~/Library/Application Support/Plex HTPC/plex.ini
Find the [debug] section - add one if one does not exist
Add disableUpdater=true directly under the [debug] header
Save your changes
look, i get it plex. no one likes maintaining backwards compatible code forever. but a showstopper of this magnitude *has* to be patched even if it's tiresome.
#plex #macintosh

2026-04-26 17:07:09 UTC

look i very much realize this comes an hour after i write a long post about my alcoholism but i can quit thrifting floppies whenever i want mind your own business
#retrocomputing
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2026-04-24 22:35:54 UTC

hurk
if, like me, you're the admin of a Google Workspace, you probably get randomonthly emails about useless new features they're adding that you instadelete
this week's gspam titled "New Workspace Intelligence admin controls" proudly announces that all of your Calendar, Drive, Docs, Gmail and Chat data has been auto-opted-in for mass ingestion by gemini
yes, you have to manually disable it in the Admin panel:
Admin -> Generative AI -> Gemini for Workspace -> Workspace Intelligence Sources -> Off
#google
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2026-04-22 15:46:06 UTC

i’m not sure what i expected when i received a copy of @npub1h9d…ya9n’s 50 Years of Text Games. i was mostly afraid that it would be an encyclopedic mishmash of wikipedia facts on IF.
to my complete surprise it is extremely well-written, has original interviews with developers, and a demonstrates a strong understanding of textual game engines and scripting languages.
the fact that Aaron took the time to write entire chapters for Tradewars and LambdaMOO blows me away - I did not expect MUDs and BBS games to earn their way into IF history. hell, there’s even a chapter on Achaea!
if you’re into IF, game history, or how the sausage is made with game development, this book is an exceptional read.
https://if50.textories.com
#bbs #gamePreservation #history #mud #interactivefiction #bookstodon
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2026-04-21 16:20:51 UTC

just for @npub1hzy…wwp4 whose weekly experiments with the worst pops and colas of the world allow the rest of us live longer lives 🙏
a selection of canada's finest generic pop brand at the Real Canadian Superstore grocery chain: President's Choice. the kind of pop the really cheap bastard on your team brings to a staff picnic because they secretly hate you.
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2026-04-20 15:56:39 UTC

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Drivers are routinely given more parcels than are deliverable in any one shift. I’ve watched a driver cruise past my house and tap the “not home” button as they drove. The parcel is moved back into the sort for “someone else’s problem” tomorrow.

2026-04-19 12:36:04 UTC

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i hadn't realized that the cyanotype printing process really did produce a blue print! i've never seen an actual blue one until today.

2026-04-19 12:14:07 UTC

til what i thought were blueprints all of my life, were in fact, whiteprints
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whiteprint

2026-04-17 02:38:51 UTC

after 15 years of waiting for a copy i could afford, i finally have an original copy of an underrated graphical adventure: Inherit The Earth - Quest for the Orb.
this is one of those strange games that gets dismissed by adventure gamers because it never cleanly fits into established genres. the mix of traditional 2d side-view art and isometric tile-based adventuring is in itself unique to this game. it pays off with a strong world/setting, and a surprisingly interesting final chapter.
you really get the feeling that the team *cared* about this project, and wanted you to enjoy what they made. because of this, the originality and authenticity more than make up for the (at times) uneven craftsmanship.
April Lee's ink illustrations in the manual were a welcome surprise. you might recognize her work from card games like Warhammer and MTG. less well known is that she was a staff artist at New World Computing, on several Might & Magic games, including HoMM. and then also did contract work for the Dreamers Guild.
best of all, one of the Dreamers Guild founders - Joe - continues to support the game with patches and new versions for Mac/Windows/Linux every year:
https://wyrmkeep.com/download.php#ite
#bigboxgames #dosGaming #furry_art #furry #adventureGames
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2026-04-16 17:19:33 UTC

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i love them. they scream "family-owned computer shop in town sold me a pentium 133 tower and they came with these free speakers"

2026-04-14 15:33:22 UTC

that’s uh, quite the typo 😅
#macintosh #win31
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2026-04-06 03:57:45 UTC

does anyone else remember 1970s Federal hot coffee and/or hot chocolate vending machines in north america?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9zfTxd7gZzo
for some reason these were ubiquitous at airports and bus stations for decades here, and then quietly disappeared
i cannot explain why, but i so badly miss hitting a button and watching that paper cup drop, and then fill with boiling hot water and substandard hot chocolate 😋
#canada

2026-04-05 21:00:28 UTC

a decade ago i went through a long period where i had no friends, no money, no memory card for my ps1, and too much free time every night
one month, i sat down and played Final Fantasy VIII every night. because i had no memory card, the game was effectively in insta-permadeath mode: one bad decision in battle could kill the entire party.
that forced me to play very conservatively. i grinded every random encounter until my characters were overpowered for the area. this ensured that i'd never get accidentally ganked in battle. every night, i'd turn off the tv and leave the PSX on overnight.
after several weeks, i had made it about 40 hours into the game, and hit a nice cinematic reward cutscene. i sat back to enjoy the fmv: the party ran across a bridge, fleeing as the bridge disintegrated behind them. except it was weird: the party just stood there as the bridge collapsed.
......................
it was an *interactive* cutscene, and i was supposed to run the party the rest of the way myself.
the bridge collapsed, and they all died. the game over screen rolled.
i stood up, shut off the PSX for the first time in a month, and screamed
that was the last time i played FF8.
10 years later, i still don't have any friends or money, but i DO have a memory card.
is it time ff8? 🤔
#psx #retroGaming #finalFantasy #ff8
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2026-03-29 18:40:06 UTC

#silentSunday
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2026-03-23 19:48:00 UTC

i put a reading chair in the library corner of the living room. it took henry 10 whole minutes to permaclaim it.
#cats #CatsOfMastodon
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2026-03-06 21:33:59 UTC

TIL: over two dozen Philip K. Dick stories are in the public domain because their copyright was not renewed
https://philipdick.com/2012/04/03/public-domain-philip-k-dick-stories/
#books

2026-03-04 02:17:31 UTC

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i knew there was a reason i instantly liked the design of the canon BJC-70. the charcoal grey case shares a lot with the Powerbooks of its time. but the part that grabbed my attention was the ribbing at the back.
i pulled out my NeXT Laser printer for a comparison. Canon manufactured NeXT's laser printers, and then (iirc) later acquired NeXT's manufacturing tech when the company shut down in the late 90s.
no coincidence that Canon borrowed some of that styling for some of their mid-90s bubblejets.
#retroComputing #next #vintageApple
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2026-03-03 21:44:38 UTC

look, we all need another inkjet in the house like we need e.coli in our jello
but who could resist this tiny portable canon colour bubblejet 70.
i am finally realizing a dream that began when i saw it in Future Shop's printer aisle in 1995 for some outrageous price that my mother said "Absolutely not" to in a close and shut case.
update: just checked a catalogue - it was $700 CAD ($499 USD) at the time 😆
$7 later, i now have my first perfectly cromulent colour printer. it even came with six 30 year old ink carts. the ink cart holder is a nice touch.
i had to do it. this was absolutely headed to e-waste if i hadn't rescued it. didn't this have a battery expansion unit you could buy separately? (update: yup - the Canon NK-300)
#retrocomputing
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2026-03-03 16:27:44 UTC

for anyone new to globaltalk, the official globaltalk kiki is loaded with really helpful information written by your fellow users. you can learn how to get your own gt instance up and running on various hardware, or add yourself to the zone list.
if you'd like to add your own pages or edit an existing page, please send me a pm for the password. (it's still the same password as last year)
http://globaltalk.dialup.party
#globaltalk
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2026-03-02 17:29:22 UTC

ahahah til that not only does Pangea Software still exist, but that @jorio source ported Nanosaur to modern MacOS and it works *great*
https://www.pangeasoft.net/nano/files.html
#macos #retrogaming #dinosaurs
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2026-02-26 21:23:40 UTC

so after the open discussion of how to deal with the canadian content problem on the fediverse, i've decided to start small: i'm going to post little stories about canadian life once every day or two (we'll figure out a bigger strategy later.)
today's find: The Whole Lost Moose Catalogue.
whenever i'm out used book shopping, i keep my eyes open for the most obscure stuff i can find. the more hyperlocal and weird the better.
this book that began its life as a local zine from whitehorse (in the yukon) is easily in my top 10 bizarre and wonderful canadian retro obscura.
equal parts parody of stewart brand's "whole earth catalogue" and part real tips for living in the far north, it is absolutely replete with every kind of diy tool building, cabin building, farming, cooking, trapping, and living off the land information you can imagine.
and of course, being from the north, there is no shortage of weather, animal and gallows humour.
if you ever see a copy on the shelf, grab it. besides, who could resist a Lord of the Rings typeface on the front cover like that?
#canada #yukon #canadaverse
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2026-02-25 21:14:49 UTC

i've been reading a late-90s book about virtual worlds - some of them VRML-based, many custom 2d and 3d clients, and some MUSHes/MOOs/MUDs
i came across a scientific MUD i had never heard before, and i'm absolutely blown away by its goals and implementation: NAU Solar System Simulation/SolSys by prof Reed Riner at northern arizona university. it was online from 1990 until at least 2017 (and maybe longer?).
there is a little information out there on what SolSys was:
"The Solar System Simulation, originated at CONTACT VI in 1987, was developed into an intercollegiate curriculum at Northern Arizona University by Reed Riner, as an honors course in Anthropology and Engineering. Since 1990, it has included student teams from many colleges and universities around the globe.
The teams represent colonies in a simulated future human community in space. For example, Mars Colony is normally manned by NAU and the Cabrillo College team traditionally inhabits the L-5 Colony near Earth. (See L-5 artwork left by Joel Hagen.) Teams communicate via websites, Internet e-mail and a Multiple User Domain (MUD), a text-based, virtual reality program. Students are directed and encouraged by their local faculty advisors and by a board of professional consultants in the social and space sciences."
https://www.contact-conference.org/c03.html
seriously - a hardcore scientific MUD built around real-life anthropology and space exploration. and entire mud devoted to teaching players how to cooperate in order to accomplish goals together, instead of killing a bunch of shit. how fucking cool is that?
did anyone here play/use SolSys when it was still alive?
the urls went dead when prof reed passed away last year, and the university wiped his webspace
SolSys ran on a modified version of tinyMUD, focused largely on building and communicating. this is its last known homepage:
https://web.archive.org/web/20250328124317/https://www2.nau.edu/rdr/SolSys/
dr. riner's obit:
https://www.legacy.com/us/obituaries/azdailysun/name/reed-riner-obituary?id=58181563
#mud #moo #virtualWorld #mush
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2026-02-24 18:40:02 UTC

my mom's morning off to a rough start
remember how every piece of tall ikea furniture comes with a little wall safety anchor/tether so you can screw it into the wall to prevent tip-overs?
this is why. 😬
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2026-02-23 13:10:04 UTC

inexplicably, peak Tom Selleck at the apple newton product launch at macworld boston on aug 3, 1993.
photographer: doug menuez
source: https://exhibits.stanford.edu/menuez
#vintageApple #newton
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2026-02-23 02:46:00 UTC

not sure how well known this already was, but i just stumbled upon an archive of super high-res 35mm photos of Newton and NeXT photos from the 90s, by photographer doug menuez. the vast majority are candid b+w snapshots of the newton and next teams as they grind through workdays and product launches
https://ftp.buriedbits.org/#/General_Scrapes/Apple/Apple%20and%20NeXT%20Photos%20-%20Photographer%20Menuez%2C%20Doug/
#vintageApple #next #newton
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2026-02-18 17:05:24 UTC

henry cheering on team canada this morning
#canada #hnom #olympics #CatsOfMastodon #hockey
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2026-02-16 20:42:58 UTC

the world is divided between those who would turn up their noses at a $5 USR Sportster at a thrift shop, and mastodon
#1990s #dialup #retrocomputing
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2026-02-15 03:53:18 UTC

in the absence of a new 65scribe video so far in this new year, i'd love to hear your thoughts on the most *beautiful* macintosh computer. it doesn't have to be fast, functional or useful. just what your pure aesthetic taste deems pleasing.
#vintageApple #macintosh
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2026-02-04 19:09:06 UTC

all of mastodon encapsulated in one Wilson comic by daniel clowes
https://mastodon.tomodori.net/system/media_attachments/files/116/013/918/096/180/490/original/9d41ceaab189f0a9.jpeg

2026-01-31 06:19:54 UTC

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am overcome with gratitude. after hours of searching usenet, ftp indexers, ftp sites, archive.org, discmaster and every archival tool i know of and coming up with zilch, i jusssst found the MacMOOSE software buried in a professor's apache open dir! he worked in the same research group as MacMOOSE (Epistemology & Learning Group @ MIT) and had the foresight to make a tarball of the lab's FTP server before it died years ago
this is the kind of archival once in a million thing - that someone self-archived an incredibly important and obscure piece of software by accident, and left a copy on the web. thank you prof fred g. martin 🙏
this archive of the MIT ELG ftp server is going straight to archive.org.
update: WinMOOSE has also been found thanks to https://mas.to/@justinto/115990209538195283
#archival #digiPres #worldWideWeb
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2026-01-31 05:50:30 UTC

just stumbled upon an incredible piece of MUD/MOO history from the mid-90s web that disappeared in the 2000s and is now all but forgotten. it is a testament to the interactive and creative possibilities real people imagined in the 90s, before greed and pessimism spread through the world wide web.
MOOSE Crossing: A MUD for Kids was a mud/moo designed by Amy Bruckman at MIT as her doctoral dissertation project in 1996
"MOOSE Crossing is a MUD designed to get kids 9-13 excited about reading,
writing, and computer programming. It includes a new programming language
(MOOSE) and client interface (MacMOOSE) designed to make it easier for kids to
learn to program.
Kids have made things like pigs you can hug, light bulbs that tell light
bulb jokes, and pots of gold at the end of the rainbow that ask you a
riddle! They're doing creative writing and computer programming in their
spare time for fun, and meeting other kids from around the world."
(from a rec.games.tiny.mud announcement https://groups.google.com/u/1/g/rec.games.mud.tiny/c/MhnTf0G3C_0/m/BKWIngCp440J)
while a moo wasn't anything new at all in 96, what i find incredible is that her team also built a custom graphical mud programming WYSIWYG client, for Mac and Windows. the clients - MacMOOSE.sea.hqx and WinMoose.exe appear to be lost to time (edit: macmoose has been found! https://mastodon.tomodori.net/@vga256/115988260112466194), but i found this screenshot buried in the wbm. you can see how an object is broken down into verbs and properties.
i have about a million questions about how the client-server system worked because this is adorable and user friendly. but for now, i'm excited to just think out loud about what the world wide web could be made into today, if developers got more interested in user-driven interactivity
this is the original site for MOOSE Crossing:
https://web.archive.org/web/19981202051515/http://www.cc.gatech.edu/fac/Amy.Bruckman/moose-crossing/
Amy's dissertation in html:
https://ic.media.mit.edu/Publications/Thesis/asbPHD/HTML/
#mud #moo #retroComputing #macintosh #vintageApple #worldWideWeb #indieWeb #smallWeb #history #digipres
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2026-01-24 17:41:03 UTC

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haha i know the feeling! i went from 2400 to 14.4k (one of the important stories in Mages & Modems) on valentine's day in 94, and it was the most wonderful upgrade ever. suddenly i could download shareware(z) in under an hour 😆

2026-01-24 03:17:07 UTC

did you dial in to Calgary area BBSes in the 90s?
browse through this bbs list published in the nov 93 issue of (alberta’s) The Computer Paper.
who could resist dialing into Boonies Bar&Grill CDROM 😂
#yyc #bbs #alberta #canada
https://mastodon.tomodori.net/system/media_attachments/files/115/947/884/763/073/706/original/7cbbfdafd56d3511.jpeg

2026-01-23 17:56:28 UTC

during this week’s aliexpress replacement screen debacle (bad digitizer) i had noticed that the lcd seemed pixellated up close, with visible jaggies on fonts. i chalked this up to my eyes getting used to a new screen.
last night i put my original apple display back into my iPhone SE. i had replaced it years ago after it got a minor scratch. it sat in my backup parts pile for exactly a situation like this.
the original screen is absolutely pixel perfect. no jaggies at any distance.
i am utterly baffled. what on earth kind of lcd display did aliexpress sell me? it claimed to have the same resolution as oem. did it lack subpixel antialiasing of some kind?
i wish i had thought of taking pics with the aliexpress screen. it is night and day with the original apple display. anyone would notice the difference.
#permaComputing #diyrepair

2026-01-22 17:03:07 UTC

happy to report that after unexpectedly selling out on day one, I was able to resupply Audrey's Books with another ten copies of Mages & Modems this morning.
for those looking for overseas shipping (and who don't want to use Amazon) - Audrey's *does* ship internationally. edmontonians can pick it up in-store.
https://audreys.ca/item/OjYAgNdL7Pm6QhxTxxkhLQ
for amazon and the ebook edition, or to read a chapter sample, visit:
https://tomotama.com/books
#books #bookstodon #yeg
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2026-01-20 22:58:21 UTC

back in the early pandemic, with way more time spent in my apartment than was healthy, i decided to run a solo podcast about 90s gaming on the Macintosh, Windows 3.1, and MS-DOS. my aim was introducing a level of technical and historical detail not often found on general audience video game podcasts.
each episode took 10-20 hours of research and writing to explore in depth. i tried to pick less popular games that hadn't been talked about much, were underrated, or fascinating from a programming perspective.
in 2022 we moved, i began new programming projects, and the podcast went on the shelf. i always meant to get back to it, and received many e-mails about future episodes.
today i'm relaunching the podcast.
website link:
https://podcast.vga256.com
rss link:
http://podcast.vga256.com/rss.xml
apple podcasts link:
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/multimedia-hyperguide-windows-3-1-macintosh-and-ms/id1393890581
feedburner link:
http://feeds.feedburner.com/MultimediaHyperguide
while i write the next episode, please enjoy some of the earlier episodes, including everyone's beloved SimAnt (episodes 14 and 15).
here are some box and browsies shots of SimAnt: The Electronic Ant Colony (Maxis, 1991) for 16-bit windows. i use the physical boxes and their documentation during research and writing. this has a 150+ page manual, which is 50% ant science!
#dosGaming #msdos #ants #vintageApple #macintosh #shareware #podcast
https://mastodon.tomodori.net/system/media_attachments/files/115/929/831/710/092/362/original/17093d70cb39e3d1.jpeg
https://mastodon.tomodori.net/system/media_attachments/files/115/929/832/190/313/791/original/1fb4e68189d64cb8.jpeg
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2026-01-18 21:56:47 UTC

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guffaw. it's even better than i could have hoped for
that huge scar across his forehead only adds to his street cred
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k1mjTZQkKH0
#2000s #toys #vintageComputing

2026-01-18 21:48:01 UTC

yano talk
yano tell story
yano steal dreams
my gods
i want this bad
#vintageComputing #toys #2000s
https://mastodon.tomodori.net/system/media_attachments/files/115/918/289/476/388/826/original/74a3eaf48549dac5.jpg
https://mastodon.tomodori.net/system/media_attachments/files/115/918/293/007/036/832/original/5bb5e9b3a74ac952.jpg
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2026-01-18 04:17:11 UTC

psa for globaltalk users: i've moved the globaltalk kiki to https://globaltalk.dialup.party
update: i am grateful to @npub1pfp…x9j0 whom i transferred the globaltalk.network domain ownership to.
#globaltalk #vintageApple #macintosh

2026-01-17 05:39:04 UTC

@npub1ppe…qv2g i'm not sure that any game had a more profound influence on me as a 12 year old than SimAnt. sometimes i think about how it's almost criminal how completely ignored in the Maxis catalogue (like SimLife) it is.
#dosGaming #msdos #retroGaming
https://mastodon.tomodori.net/system/media_attachments/files/115/908/812/278/517/684/original/b377a0e57b7bbef8.png

2026-01-17 02:22:30 UTC

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wow nice! my uncle swears by these kinds of removable cleats (he's got a dangerous outdoor job). had no idea kunitz carried them too

2026-01-16 17:44:25 UTC

i can’t believe how quick and pleasant Audrey’s Books was when it came to carrying Mages & Modems in-store.
huge thank you to their bookwizard Levi who walked me through the local author consignment program.
also: couldn’t have asked for a better spot beside alan siegel’s (far better) simpsons book 😆
if you’d like to support Audrey’s: https://audreys.ca
there is no bookstore more relaxing to visit in alberta.
#books #bookstodon #yeg #yegdt
https://mastodon.tomodori.net/system/media_attachments/files/115/905/986/860/137/809/original/c10d9a16f3c04323.jpeg

2026-01-16 14:30:10 UTC

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now imagine trying to explain to them how the original version was a Flash SWF

2026-01-14 03:26:07 UTC

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it’s a big mess of everything imagineable and bruce is incredibly nice. great guy to nerd out with - he used to code assembly on an apple ii!

2026-01-14 01:55:48 UTC

high literature discovered at the Double Read Book Nook used bookstore in edson, canada
it’s easy to miss this book dungeon along the transcanada highway. inside you’ll find its incredibly warm owner Bruce, who was gifted the bookstore by the previous owner after he worked there for years - often for no pay. his chubbo orange tabby Max waddles around in his harness asking visitors for treats and pets.
the second i saw the grey striped book spine i instantly knew i had found an Infocom novel. can’t wait to read this novelized treatment of Enchanter
#alberta #bookstodon #books #infocom
https://mastodon.tomodori.net/system/media_attachments/files/115/890/935/002/562/938/original/d65dbecba29e436d.jpeg

2026-01-12 18:46:45 UTC

whenever my wife shelves returns at the library, she checks them for bookmarks/junk readers have accidentally left inside
she arranged a month's worth of them into a collage and put the work up on the wall in the library. i love it.
#libraries #epl #yeg #art
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2026-01-11 21:50:35 UTC

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welcome to the exciting world of post-phd telemarketing sales!

2026-01-08 17:36:07 UTC

a few years ago i mentioned that i wrote a book about the exciting, awkward and embarrassing experiences of growing up with computers and video games in the 80s and 90s.
i wanted to remember what it felt like being the only dorky computer kid at school. or what it was like to hear my first modem handshake sound. or starting the first flamewar on the school's national FirstClass BBS in the macintosh lab over the lunch-hour
it was originally something i wrote only for my family and friends who were there at the time.
and then i met all of you folks when i started my first masto instance 4 years ago. i had no idea there were so many hardcore retrocomputing and gaming nerds out there; unix and mac and ms-dos folks alike.
so i mentioned it casually. i was surprised by the interest in the book.
so i spent the better part of the past 3 years rewriting the book for *you* fellow mastodon dorkus malorkuses. the book is a celebration of all of the best (and worst) parts of a kid growing up in the digital age.
we're all busy old tired stressed folks now. so every memory and cringetacular story is short enough to read on a 5 minute bus/metro/toilet ride. they're weaved together into an arc that starts at my family's first Tandy TRS-80 and ends at my school's Mac LC II and building my first Pentium 133.
it's finally published, and i'm super proud of what it became thanks to everyone here nerding out for years.
enjoy the book. i wrote it just for you. ❤️
paperback edition: https://mybook.to/EDuUf
DRM-free ebook (EPUB format) and chapter samples here:
https://tomotama.itch.io/mages-modems
#books #indiePublisher #bookstodon #author #macintosh #vintageApple #vintageComputing #msdos #dosGaming #yeg #canada #alberta
https://mastodon.tomodori.net/system/media_attachments/files/115/860/655/613/490/105/original/6a0cdb26abee5db9.png
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2026-01-02 03:50:38 UTC

it warms my heart to hear a 15-year-old say that he's tired of renting his media and wants a physical copy that he owns.
https://www.ctvnews.ca/edmonton/video/2025/12/31/vhs-making-a-comeback-in-edmonton/
#yeg #vhs

2025-12-30 18:46:58 UTC

someone local selling their porsche-branded zamboni 😎
only $25k to make your back yard rink glassy. guaranteed this is some remorseful parent with frustrated nhl dreams for their 7 year old. 😆
for anyone who didn't grow up around an arena: the zamboni attachment scrapes the top layer from the ice, heats it and mixes it with hot water, and then returns it as a thin layer of hot water behind the machine, behind the rubber flap.
this little lawn tractor version is nearly identical to the full-sized nhl version in operation (without all of the nice panel toggles sadly)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zamboni_Company
#hockey #canada #yeg
https://mastodon.tomodori.net/system/media_attachments/files/115/809/984/730/806/247/original/6748f090d41094f0.jpg

2025-12-21 01:48:34 UTC

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looks like you got the in-store demo model!

2025-12-12 23:19:05 UTC

our neighbourhood hare at sundown. she found the pile of spillover birdseed in the snow
if you saw my photos of her weeks ago, her patchy brown summer coat has almost been completely replaced with her thick winter coat
#winter #canada #yeg #rabbitsofmastodon #urbanWildlife
https://mastodon.tomodori.net/system/media_attachments/files/115/709/145/907/092/445/original/580ce4016ac64633.mp4

2025-12-03 23:00:09 UTC

after 25 hours of repair, cleaning and lubrication, this pfaff select 1546 sewing machine has been rescued from oblivion. here's a quick worklog
how i found it at a thrift store for $30. it looked grubby but OK on the outside, and didn't make any broken-pieces sounds when i shook it around
i plugged it in and it turned on. i tried to turn the handwheel, and it immediately seized up. it made a terrible metal-on-metal grinding sound that was a dagger in my heart.
#sewing #repair #permaculture #sewingmachines
https://mastodon.tomodori.net/system/media_attachments/files/115/658/098/596/132/860/original/87ebb12bd0584694.jpeg

2025-12-01 22:51:33 UTC

jobs demoing a codeless UI using NeXT/OpenStep's Interface Builder at macworld expo in 1997
making games in Adventure Game Studio taught me how fast games can be built when designers spend their time working on scenes and gameplay instead of coding scrollbar and button behaviour
i admire and get inspiration from hypercard for the same reasons.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dl0CbKYUFTY
i'm trying to implement something similar for my little game construction kit, called Exigy. if you've got UI suggestions on how to do this well, i'm all ears!
https://exigy.org
#exigy #shareware #indiegamedev #macintosh #hypercard

2025-11-30 20:09:38 UTC

really, really impressed with posty: a mastodon archive -> html static site generator
it ingests your mastodon archive (post history) as a zip, and barfs out an entire static html site with indices and tags. all servable with any standard web server.
this is super helpful because when i shut down the dialup.cafe instance, there was no easy way to get access to my old posts and images.
it can either be run online here:
https://posty.1sland.social
or instructions here for running it locally:
https://codeberg.org/oliphant/posty
#mastoAdmin #mastodon
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2025-11-26 22:49:16 UTC

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my wife is less excited 🤣

2025-11-26 22:21:13 UTC

the whole reason i rescued these NeXT machines from a garage an hour away was because of the asset tags still glued to them.
i know exactly where and when the machines came from: the university of alberta's General Services Building (GSB), 8th floor, computer lab, in 1995.
when i was a teenager, my mom would take me to the university and let me wander around campus with a pocket full of quarters for the arcade
her grad student office was on the 8th floor. across from it was the department computer lab, which consisted of three rows of boring beige 386 SX-20's and a massive line printer. i used to goof around playing Jezzball and Pipe Dream on those machines.
but tucked off in the corner were four jet black machines. they all had huge monochrome monitors, and a gorgeous GUI with Wile E. Coyote on the login prompt. there was a big sign that read "you must have permission from CNS to use these computers". i'd sneak over and try every login/pass i could dream of, and never figured out how to login.
ffwd to the 2000s:
i've hunted every week for the past 25 years to find those machines. i suspected they might turn up on some local ad eventually, and today they did.
they were bought by a gentleman (now in his 80s) from a provincial government surplus equipment auction sale 20+ years ago. they were decommissioned by the department, boxed up and auctioned as e-waste. he thought they'd be valuable, so he bought them all for a pittance. they sat in his garage for 25 years collecting dust, until his wife asked him to start clearing out his computing junk. (i'll post a pic of his garage soon)
so here they are - the department's most expensive asset at $10-20K CAD (after upgrades and accessories), ready to be put back to work again soon
#UofA #retroComputing #vintageApple #yeg
https://mastodon.tomodori.net/system/media_attachments/files/115/618/281/223/847/089/original/559d703bee711b03.jpg

2025-11-22 04:47:48 UTC

i had no idea Inherit the Earth has had its own webcomic for over 20 years, and is still publishing new issues at https://inherittheearth.net
i'm amazed that joe pearce (and the many artists who have drawn the comic over the years) have continued to put so much work into this MS-DOS classic which came out over 30 years ago. *this* is the best way of preserving software: by continuing to make it relevant to new generations of players/fans.
#dosGaming #msdos #retroGaming #furry_art #furry #webcomic
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2025-11-21 03:19:56 UTC

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done! https://archive.org/details/zero-waste-life-the-toy-doctor

2025-11-21 02:28:56 UTC

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i watched a minute of one of the fix-it shop episodes and it was amazing how familiar it all was 40 years later

2025-11-21 02:24:41 UTC

not sure if there are any journalism students here, but if you're interested in living in one of the most beautiful cities in northern canada for the summer, @npub1ctj…y8su is offering summer internships.
details here:
https://cabinradio.ca/internships/
#canada #journalism

2025-11-21 02:01:44 UTC

happy to report that i managed to recover this lost NHK mini-doc about a retired guy who runs a toy repair hospital for kids
will upload a high quality version to archive.org
#nhk #japan #permaculture
https://mastodon.tomodori.net/system/media_attachments/files/115/585/214/607/052/459/original/bfb29cbaf09b249a.mp4

2025-11-21 01:43:38 UTC

the best place on sesame street was luis & maria's Fix-It Shop
i've thought for years that i'd love to teach drop-in electronics/computer/console repair in my city
we have a tool library, but no diy repair place here.
#yeg #permacomputing #permaculture
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2025-11-07 17:47:30 UTC

published book authors who have used a print-on-demand service: what is the current landscape like for printing physical books via amazon kdp/lulu/ingram/etc?
i'm reading so many very conflicting reports, especially now that some of these services are now using ML crap instead of human beings in their printing processes.
book details:
- 400 pages b+w
- color front cover
#books #ebooks

2025-11-05 22:43:01 UTC

the world’s tiniest camcorder format: sony microMV
loading into an equally tiny sony DCR-IP5
the 60 min cassette stores 7GB of mpeg2 transport stream data on 3.8mm tape
https://mastodon.tomodori.net/system/media_attachments/files/115/499/496/245/491/815/original/102219baa6a3fd8d.mp4

2025-10-31 02:53:59 UTC

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that filename would be the perfect name for a band

2025-10-31 00:27:30 UTC

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yeah it took a whole 0.97ms to fall in love with this thing
i’m amazed by the build quality. 100% magnesium body, feels really nice in one hand.
i absolutely miss this style of pistolgrip shooting. it’s totally made for snapshots on vacations and road trips
https://mastodon.tomodori.net/system/media_attachments/files/115/465/926/992/088/213/original/f2f0bfc88d9aa3a3.jpeg

2025-10-30 21:48:55 UTC

today’s retro rescue from a hick town an hour away: a Sony DCR-IP5E MicroMV handycam - my wallet and the charger beside it for scale.
absolutely wild recording format - the tape is tiiiny
#digiPres
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2025-10-23 17:06:03 UTC

as the sun cruises lower in the autumn sky my morning americano begins to cast a footlong shadow. at the peak of summer months ago the shadow rode around the edge of the cup
the ethiopian beans that made the espresso shot have this perfect buttery-creamy texture. it’s hard to imagine any better roast.
#coffee
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2025-10-20 14:07:33 UTC

my fantasy as a 9-year-old becomes real: buying that 1.8m/6-foot microwave long distance transmission repeater i've been dreaming about for 30+ years
these massive point-to-point antennas sat at the top of gigantic towers dotted all over the northwest territories where i grew up. they beamed all kinds of signals around the north, where permafrost made buried cable nigh impossible. when i worked at an arctic isp in the 90s, we used them to beam our dial-up analog telephone internet access between communities and our central office.
there are less of these in the north now that there is fibre and satellite, but i still occasionally see them at the tops of towers in the most remote areas.
#radio #canada
https://mastodon.tomodori.net/system/media_attachments/files/115/406/849/773/076/849/original/8f3c7192bfa1e8be.png
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2025-10-20 11:13:23 UTC

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haha. does your toshiba emit a piercing BEEP BEEP BEEP when it goes into battery panic mode?

2025-10-19 21:24:31 UTC

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sort of like how in the southern USA people ask for a "coke" when they mean a "pop" or "soda pop" 😬

2025-10-19 21:21:00 UTC

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i could be wrong, but if i'm remembering the context correctly, it is coffee made from spice/mélange - not coffee beans per se

2025-10-15 21:54:41 UTC

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ha so, i have a more complete answer after doing some research.
what a scam :( it turns out they just got pixar to render out IMAX quality clips from that exact episode. no new content - just a few minutes of homer and bart

2025-10-15 21:16:08 UTC

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i am so sad that i somehow missed this site back then. it's funny that homer3d was already 5 years old by the time this site launched

2025-10-14 19:58:25 UTC

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y'know, this makes me wonder if this is what became called "Interference Robustness" in OS X 10.4.x+ wifi options

2025-10-13 16:58:23 UTC

this is exactly the kind of restoration project that will one day appear on hackaday: a musicmaker kiosk that burns music to a cd and transfers it to your diamond rio, then prints out your playlist so you can carry it around all day
source: wired mag april 2000
#2000s #retroComputing
https://mastodon.tomodori.net/system/media_attachments/files/115/367/899/852/418/123/original/87edcc190367e5e1.jpeg

2025-10-13 16:44:03 UTC

buried in an april 2000 issue of wired mag: cyberworld.imax.com was a flash site that demo’d homer^3 and antz characters.
sadly lost to time as wbm did not properly archive the swf
#flash #macromedia #simpsons #2000s
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2025-10-06 19:50:26 UTC

memories that haunt us forever
that time i was teaching a 400 student intro course and wasn't getting any chuckles of recognition from my simpsons references
so i shoehorned in a family guy reference to appease the unwashed masses to great effect 😭