POPULARITY
6 episodes with paul thacker
3 episodes with paul thacker
3 episodes with paul thacker
5 episodes with paul thacker
2 episodes with paul thacker
2 episodes with paul thacker
2 episodes with paul thacker
3 episodes with paul thacker
2 episodes with paul thacker
Every bit of Covidian science is collapsing. Investigative journalist Paul Thacker unpacks the takedown of an accurate study that proved masks don't work against Covid and how it's just another example of the corruption of science by ideology. And Trish has a lovely note from someone inside the Coutts Two trial in Lethbridge. Follow Trish on X @woodreporting Website: www.trishwoodpodcast.com Shop: https://www.trishwoodpodcast.com/shop
GUEST 1 OVERVIEW: Paul Thacker is an Investigative Reporter; Former Investigator United States Senate; Former Fellow Safra Ethics Center, Harvard University. He runs The Disinformation Chronicle Substack https://disinformationchronicle.substack.com/ GUEST 2 OVERVIEW: Ben Habib is the Deputy Leader of the Reform Party@reformparty_uk, Parliamentary Candidate for Wellingborough, ex-MEP for London. He started his career in corporate finance at Shearson Lehman Brothers. and worked in reinsurance brokerage as a finance director and was educated at Cambridge University.
This conversation with esteemed journalist Paul Thacker explores the evidence hierarchy and the conflicting views on the effectiveness of masks. It discusses the Cochrane Collaborative's reviews on masks, which found insufficient high-quality evidence to support their effectiveness The conversation concludes with a reflection on the need for critical thinking and questioning in the face of political alignment.Our exciting first podcast sponsor:Alcami Elements - a premium herbal supplement for energy, focus, and concentration. Alcami contains 9 high-quality adaptogens that can help regulate your nervous system and optimize energy and focus. Adaptogens are herbs and mushrooms that help build the body's resilience to stress.Get 10% off your first order or 30% off a monthly subscription using the code "illusion” here:https://www.alcamielements.com/products/alcami-elements-life-enhancing-beverageChapters:00:00 Introduction: Evidence Hierarchy and Conflicting Views on Masks00:30 Cochrane Collaborative's Reviews on Masks06:23 The Limitations of Medicine and Public Health10:36 The Psychological Impact of Masks19:22 The Corrupted Scientific Agency23:21 Lack of Trust in the CDC24:48 Conflicts of Interest in Mask Research26:53 Political Motivations36:08 Lack of RCTs on Masks42:39 Protecting Reputations49:46 Teaching People Masks Work This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.illusionconsensus.com/subscribe
America Out Loud PULSE with Dr. Harvey Risch – In today's conversation with Mr. Paul Thacker, an esteemed investigative journalist, we delve into the murky waters of the biosecurity industry. We examine its dubious methods of sustaining fear through propaganda about impending pandemics. As COVID-19 variants lose their scare factor, we uncover how the fear-industrial complex is escalating its efforts to maintain public anxiety...
America Out Loud PULSE with Dr. Harvey Risch – In today's conversation with Mr. Paul Thacker, an esteemed investigative journalist, we delve into the murky waters of the biosecurity industry. We examine its dubious methods of sustaining fear through propaganda about impending pandemics. As COVID-19 variants lose their scare factor, we uncover how the fear-industrial complex is escalating its efforts to maintain public anxiety...
The Rich Zeoli Show- Hour 2: Paul Thacker—Investigative Journalist & former Fellow at the Edmond J. Safra Center for Ethics at Harvard University—joins The Rich Zeoli to discuss his latest report, “Congress Must Hold the CDC Accountable for Cozy Ties to Pharma.” Thacker writes, “why won't congressional investigators force the CDC Director to explain why Pfizer and Moderna's PR firm is embedded at the agency's vaccine center?” You can find this report, and all of Thacker's work, at his Substack— “The Disinformation Chronicle”: https://disinformationchronicle.substack.com/p/congress-must-hold-the-cdc-accountable While announcing the creation of the Council on Supply Chain Resilience, President Joe Biden blamed increased prices on “price gouging.” On Meet the Press this weekend, panelist Leigh Ann Caldwell of The Washington Post said that “Bidenomics has become a negative word…because it's not working.” Abigail Anthony of National Review writes: “Sieged Security, which describes itself as a group of ‘gay furry hackers,' recently infiltrated a leading U.S. nuclear-research facility and obtained sensitive personal data. The group claimed responsibility for the attack in statements on public forums. ‘Meow meow meow meow meow meow meow,' the group wrote.” You can read Anthony's full article here: https://www.nationalreview.com/news/gay-furry-hackers-breach-u-s-nuclear-research-facility/ Jason Snead—Executive Director of the Honest Elections Project—joins The Rich Zeoli Show to discuss his new book, “The Case Against Ranked-Choice Voting.” You can learn more about the Honest Elections Project here: https://www.honestelections.org. And you can find Snead's book here: https://www.encounterbooks.com/books/case-ranked-choice-voting/.
LED lightbulbs are one of the worst things foisted on us in the name of "going green." Peter Jacobsen has an informative take on the incandescent ban and the lie of LED efficiency. It's bad enough that costs continue to skyrocket. According to Doug Casey, governments are now scapegoating businesses for inflation as if those higher prices are just a grab for more cash. Our addiction to screens is real and is getting worse. Candace McManimon explores how we can break free. Blockchain technology is not just about cryptocurrencies. As J.B. Shurk explains, right now blockchain is being used to keep information in the public record beyond the reach of government censorship. Article of the Day: Mainstream media has passed the point of no return, in terms of its trustworthiness. Paul Thacker says the future of alternative media is unknown, but critical. Sponsors: Monticello College Life Saving Food TMCP Nation Climbing Upward Quilt & Sew
In this episode I speak with Paul Thacker, former Senate investigator and currently of The Disinformation Chronicle about how scientific research, particularly research done by pharmaceutical companies, is not as trustworthy as one might believe. Paul's Website https://disinformationchronicle.substack.com/
GUEST OVERVIEW: Paul Thacker is an investigative journalist who publishes The Disinformation Chronicle, where he reports on the corruption in medicine and science and corporate disinformation.
Investigative journalist Paul Thacker catches Drs. Fauci and Collins violating their own ethics rules against ghostwriting as they tried to steer the public away from their roles in the possible Covid lab leak. How does Thacker know? It has to do with a vintage email. This popular episode was first published on Dec. 7, 2022. Subscribe to my two podcasts: “The Sharyl Attkisson Podcast” and “Full Measure After Hours.” Leave a review, subscribe and share with your friends! Support independent journalism by visiting the new Sharyl Attkisson store. Order “Slanted: How the News Media Taught Us to Love Censorship and Hate Journalism” by Sharyl Attkisson at Harper Collins, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Books a Million, IndieBound, Bookshop! --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/sharylattkissonpodcast/message
Paul Thacker—American journalist based in Spain and former Fellow at the Edmond J. Safra Center for Ethics at Harvard University—joins The Rich Zeoli to discuss his latest article, “Biden White House and Big Disinformation Have Policies to Ban 'True Content' on COVID Vaccines.” You can read all of Thacker's work, “The Disinformation Chronicle,” here:https://www.pauldthacker.com
Battle of the Titans/Theology/God's Creation/Education Musings Newsletter Podcast
Great discussion of latest Twitter File drops, Taylor Lorenz interactions with Twitter. - efd Thank you for reading Battle of the Titans - Good Vs Evil, Christianity, Education. This post is public so feel free to share it. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit efdouglass.substack.com/subscribe
Thank you for joining us for another episode of the Low Carb MD Podcast. Paul Thacker is an American investigative journalist. He has written on conflicts of interests and corruption in science and medicine for multiple outlets over the years. He is the founder of the newsletter, The Disinformation Chronicle, which reports on corruption in science and medicine. He wrote an award-winning series investigating the financial interests of medical experts advising U.S. and U.K. governments during the COVID-19 pandemic. He also investigated and wrote on problems in the clinical trial for Pfizer's COVID-19 vaccine. Kris Newby is an award-winning science writer and the senior producer of the Lyme disease documentary UNDER OUR SKIN, which premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival and was a 2010 Oscar semifinalist. Her book BITTEN won three international book awards for journalism and narrative nonfiction. She has two degrees in engineering: a bachelor's degree from the University of Utah and a master's degree from Stanford University. In this conversation, Tro, Paul, and Kris talk about the history of bio terrorism, the findings of Dr. Thacker's investigative work into the coverup of the lab-leak theory, regulatory capture in the CDC, the findings of Kris' research into the nature of lyme disease and its historical usage as a bio weapon, experiments conducted on Lone Star Ticks and how these experiments led to chronic health issues resulting from lyme disease, why lyme disease is treated the way that it is, some reasons why doctors often get things SO wrong, and wether or not we can trust the CDC. For more information, please see the links below. Thank you for listening! Links: Kris Newby: Website Twitter Paul Thacker: Substack Twitter Website Dr. Brian Lenzkes: Website Twitter Dr. Tro Kalayjian: Website Twitter Instagram Doctor Tro App Join a growing community of individuals who are improving their metabolic health; together. Get started at your own pace with a self-guided curriculum developed by Dr. Tro and his care team, community chat, weekly meetings, courses, challenges, message boards and more. Apple Google Learn more
On this episode of The Young Guides Podcast, Keaton and Kyle chat with Paul Thacker. Paul is is a wealth of knowledge in all things fishing Alaska and draws from his experiences on various destination fisheries. Paul talks about his story racing in the X Games and chasing world record snow machine jumps. They chat about how Paul's perspective on life changed after a tragic snow machine accident. Get to know more about Paul, his accomplishments, how he gives back to the community and his determination to keep grinding everyday. Paul Thacker: https://www.instagram.com/paulthacker11/ Our Website: https://theyoungguidespodcast.com Alaska Rod Co.: https://www.alaskarodco.com Heather's Choice: Use our code "THEYOUNGGUIDES15" at checkout to save some dough (ha, punny) or follow our link at: lddy.no/12lzd ShellART Studio: https://www.shellartstudio.com Slay J's: https://www.slayjtackle.com NWTF South Sound Strutters: https://www.nwtf.org/chapters/south-sound-stutters-wa
AWP episode 114 "Cannonball" w/Paul Thacker, Monster Athlete and X games Gold Medalist . Daniel Buitrago, Brandon Fifield & Emily Thompson go full throttle with X games Gold Medalist and Monster Athlete Paul Thacker . Caribou call, Sci, Emily's snowboard trip. Check the calendar, versa layers, puffy pants, baby on the way, choosing baby names, trey talk, fishing vids, Paul as a kid, first snow machines, banking during the week, racing on the weekends, Vin Diesel stunt guy, long jump brand, X games days, watching the jumps, the accident, the relationship with Monster, jacks trivia, the track rigs of Action Manufacturing, still riding machines, the Paul Thacker spinal cord recovery foundation deets, RC cars, Buy some merch - www.alaskawildproject.com Follow on Instagram - www.instagram.com/alaskawildproject Watch on YouTube - www.youtube.com/@alaskawildproject Become a Patron - www.patreon.com/alaskawildproject
Paul Thacker—American journalist based in Spain and former Fellow at the Edmond J. Safra Center for Ethics at Harvard University—joins The Rich Zeoli to discuss his work, “The Disinformation Chronicle” which documents the U.S. government's missteps regarding the COVID-19 pandemic including Dr. Anthony Fauci's refusal to concede that U.S. taxpayer money funded gain-of-function research in China. You can read all of Thacker's incredible work here: https://www.pauldthacker.com
Investigative journalist Paul Thacker catches Drs. Fauci and Collins violating their own ethics rules against ghostwriting as they tried to steer the public away from their roles in the possible Covid lab leak. How does Thacker know? It has to do with a vintage email. Subscribe to my two podcasts: “The Sharyl Attkisson Podcast” and “Full Measure After Hours.” Leave a review, subscribe and share with your friends! Support independent journalism by visiting the new Sharyl Attkisson store. Order “Slanted: How the News Media Taught Us to Love Censorship and Hate Journalism” by Sharyl Attkisson at Harper Collins, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Books a Million, IndieBound, Bookshop! --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/sharylattkissonpodcast/message
Our guest is Paul Thacker, an investigative journalist who reports on science, medicine and the environment. He recently received the British Journalism Award in Specialist Journalism for a series of articles in the BMJ investigating undisclosed financial interests among medical experts advising the US and UK governments on vaccines.GUEST:Paul Thacker: Twitter and SubstackWATCH ON YOUTUBE:Watch the episode on our YouTube channel
In episode #18 of the Bally Alley Astrocast podcast, the hosts, Chris and Adam, cover two games written in Bally BASIC called "Cross Country Racer" and "Star Wars" by Doug Shaeffer, an amateur Astrocade programmer. These games were archived, along with other programs, by Paul Thacker in February 2022 from an Astrocade collection bought on Ebay by Nate Reeder in January 2022. Paul says, "These seem to me to have been made for personal use rather than with a goal of publication, but there's still some cool stuff in here [...]." Also covered is one piece of feedback and some recent updates to the Bally Alley website." Recurring Links BallyAlley.com - Bally Arcade / Astrocade Website What's New at BallyAlley.com Bally Alley Blog Orphaned Computers & Game Systems Website Bally Alley Discussion Group Bally Arcade / Astrocade Atari Age Sub-forum Bally Arcade/Astrocade High Score Club Bally Alley Astrocast Facebook Page The Classic Gaming Bookcast - By Chris Federico Show Notes We have limited show notes again for this episode. If there's something in the podcast that you want to hear more about and a search on the Internet won't turn it up for you, then contact the Astrocade discussion group on Groups.io. "Cross Country Racer" by Doug Shaeffer - This is the first of two Bally BASIC games from the early 1980s that is covered in Astrocast #18. "Star Wars" by Doug Shaeffer - This is the second of two Bally BASIC games from the early 1980s that is covered in Astrocast #18. Doug Shaeffer Tapes - The complete tape archive of Doug Shaeffer's Astrocade Tape Collection. Bally Alley Update (October 22, 2022) - "Max Performs Magic" - This an ad called "Max Performs Magic" about the Datamax UV-1R ZGRASS Graphics System. It is from page 16 of "Back Stage," December 3, 1982. Bally Alley Update (October 24, 2022) - The Bally Shrine - This is a three-page printout of "The Bally Shrine" Website from 1999. The Bally Shrine was a website run by Charles Taylor in the mid-to-late 1990s. Bally Alley Update (October 26, 2022) - Montgomery Ward - 1983 - Astrocade for $29.99 - This is a Montgomery Ward advertisement for a blow-out sale on many game systems, among them is the Astrocade for $29.99. This ad, from the bottom-right of page 6-A, is from the December 4, 1983 edition of "The Baytown Sun," a newspaper from Texas. "CHRDIS" Articles by Mike Skala - The three-part "CHRDIS" articles describe how to use the Bally Arcade's built-in Character Display routine from within Bally BASIC to create fast graphic displays. First published in the November and December 1982 and February 1983 Arcadian newsletter. Mike Skala says, "I've seen quite a bit of software lately utilizing the Graphic Character Maker, a machine code routine that Arcadian has published in the past year. This allowed us to use a display routine from the on-board ROM and put complex graphics on the screen instantly, rather than a slow series of BOX and LINE commands. The major drawback here was when moving the graphics, erasing and redrawing: it left us with considerable flashing or blinking. If you have been with us for a while, you know that we are continually evolving and improving; the following tutorial is our new generation of screen animation for the Astrocade!" "CHRDIS" Software by Mike Skala - This is the AstroBASIC software in archived format. Feedback There is some feedback covered in this episode, and we would love to hear your thoughts and comments about this (or any) Astrocast episode or about your history with the Bally Arcade/Astrocade. The best way to contact us is via email at BallyAlley or through via the Bally Alley Discussion Group at Groups.io. Next Episode's Coverage Perhaps "AstroBASIC" will get some coverage in Episode #19. It makes sense, since Astrocast #18 covered two BASIC games. Astrocast #17 was supposed to cover the material in the "AstroBASIC" manual and it was recorded, but it didn't turned out the way I had hoped that it would sound, so the "AstroBASIC" manual overview has been put off until I can cover it with a co-host like Chris, a BASIC programming ninja, or Paul, who has also programmed in BASIC. We will also cover "Outpost 19," an AstroBASIC game by WaveMakers that will fit naturally into an episode that shares its numbering with the game. We also may try to cover a game that was released on cartridge, but that coverage may be bounced to a future episode because "Outpost 19" may be the most involved game written in BASIC on the Astrocade.
Dr. Robert Redfield, former director of the Centers for Disease Control, in a September 15 interview with Paul Thacker's Disinformation Chronicle newsletter. According to Redfield, “Everyone had to agree to the narrative” enforced by Dr. Anthony Fauci and other health officials that the C-19 virus came from a “wet market” in Wuhan and not the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV). And Dr. Fauci “clearly misled Congress,” about funding dangerous gain-of-function research at the WIV. So there you go….we already knew this. Confessions are being made everyday and everywhere by the actors in this C 19 conspiracy. They are admitting to the lies that we have been told about Covid…...but what is being done about it? Absolutely nothing! In fact current CDC director Walensky this month encouraged everyone to get the “booster” shot without any qualms whatsoever! It doesn't matter how many lies they get caught telling…. people will still follow them. Why? Because they have had their consciences seared and the minds are reprobate concerning the truth. They would rather believe “the Lie” than the truth.
Dr. Robert Redfield, former director of the Centers for Disease Control, in a September 15 interview with Paul Thacker's Disinformation Chronicle newsletter. According to Redfield, “Everyone had to agree to the narrative” enforced by Dr. Anthony Fauci and other health officials that the C-19 virus came from a “wet market” in Wuhan and not the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV). And Dr. Fauci “clearly misled Congress,” about funding dangerous gain-of-function research at the WIV. So there you go….we already knew this. Confessions are being made everyday and everywhere by the actors in this C 19 conspiracy. They are admitting to the lies that we have been told about Covid…...but what is being done about it? Absolutely nothing! In fact current CDC director Walensky this month encouraged everyone to get the “booster” shot without any qualms whatsoever! It doesn't matter how many lies they get caught telling…. people will still follow them. Why? Because they have had their consciences seared and the minds are reprobate concerning the truth. They would rather believe “the Lie” than the truth.
GUEST OVERVIEW: Paul Thacker is an investigative journalist who runs 'The Disinformation Chronicle', where he reports on the corruption in medicine and science and corporate disinformation. Last year he won the 'British Journalism Award' for a series of articles in the BMJ on COVID policies.
GUEST OVERVIEW: Paul Thacker is an investigative journalist who runs 'The Disinformation Chronicle', where he reports on the corruption in medicine and science and corporate disinformation. Last year he won the 'British Journalism Award' for a series of articles in the BMJ on COVID policies.
David Gornoski comments on the concentrated effort to push COVID vaccination onto Americans through various forms of media. Joining David Gornoski is investigative journalist Paul Thacker who exposes Weber Shandwick, a PR firm for Pfizer and Moderna embedded in the CDC. Also in the show, Jason Jones calls in to comment on Tulsi Gabbard's departure from the Democratic Party, Wokeism's connection to imperialism, true liberalism in conservatism, and more. Check out Paul Thacker's Substack here. Check out the Jason Jones Show here. Visit A Neighbor's Choice website at aneighborschoice.com
In this interview Paul Thacker is interviewed for the August 26, 2022 episode of the General Tire Jim Beaver Show with the interview being uncut, unedited, and in its raw form.
On this episode snowmobile legend Paul Thacker joins the show to talk about his career and what he has been up to, and Jim and Brittney talk on the auto industry, X Games, crazy event schedules, and electric cars, and blown shocks.
Thank you for joining us for another episode of the Low Carb MD Podcast. Paul D. Thacker is an investigative journalist with over 15 years uncovering campaigns to distort science. He has written on scientific ethics for outlets including the New York Times, JAMA, Washington Post, NEJM, Los Angeles Times, The New Republic, BMJ, and Mother Jones. He has been quoted by the Wall Street Journal, the Associated Press, and Rolling Stone, and has been profiled by Nature and PBS. While serving as an investigator in the U.S. Senate, he helped to produce stories that ran in dozens of outlets including the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, CBS News, Reuters, ABC News, Science, Nature, BMJ, and the Associated Press. His congressional investigations led to passage of the landmark Physician Payments Sunshine Act, a bill that has altered the field of medicine, and is now being copied in several countries including England, France, the Netherlands, and Scotland. In their conversation, Tro, Brian, and Paul talk about the great ‘aWOKEning' in American journalism, why vaccines are historically such a touchy subject in medical and science journalism, the anti-vaccine hysteria so prevalent in our current day, corruption, suppression, and disinformation in and from the pharmaceutical industry, financial relationships between doctors and pharmaceutical companies, the relationship between the FDA and big Pharma, narrative-based censorship, and lawsuits against the federal government for colluding with social media companies to violate free speech. For more information, please see the links below. Thank you for listening! Links: Paul Thacker: Substack Twitter Dr. Brian Lenzkes: Website Twitter Dr. Tro Kalayjian: Website Twitter Instagram
GUEST OVERVIEW: Paul Thacker is an investigative journalist who was just nominated for a major science award after being 'fact checked' and criticized for reporting against the narrative on the Pfizer vaccine. Paul runs 'The Disinformation Chronicle', that examines the corruption in medicine and science. Last year he won the 'British Journalism Award' for a series of articles in the BMJ on COVID policies.
Paul Thacker is well known in the world of snow cross and X games and is a world record holder for longest jump on a snowmobile. On this episode Sheldon and Chase chat with Paul about his progression into power sports, his accident that left him paralyzed, overcoming adversity, fly fishing Alaska, trout fishing, track chair exploring, and much more. Paul's Instagram Thanks to: Swellfish Outdoor Equipment shellfish.co Mr. Heater mrheater.com Harvester Outdoors https://www.instagram.com/harvester__outdoors/?hl=en iHunter (PANORAMIC30) https://www.web.ihunterapp.com/ Jiffy Augers https://www.jiffyonice.com/ Del Barber (Podcast Music) https://delbarber.com
Brook Jackson has a near 20-year career spent in the clinical research industry working at individual clinical trial sites, SMOs, and CRO organizations. Her experience includes research in all phases of development for medical devices, pharmaceuticals, and biologics with key experience in Gastroenterology, Hepatology, Immunology, and Infectious Diseases. Brook's range of expertise has developed from her roles in clinical trial coordination and management, clinical trial monitoring, clinical trial auditing and director-level responsibility for quality control and assurance, regulatory compliance, and data management. On the podcast we discuss her speaking out about a Pfizer vaccine clinical trial with evidence suggesting it was fraught with problems, her conversations with Paul Thacker, some 80's movies and more. PLEASE SUBSCRIBE LIKE AND SHARE this podcast!!! Social Media https://twitter.com/IamBrookJackson
Paul Thacker: Scientific Corruption and Conflicts in Covering Covid Investigative Reporter Paul Thacker has insight into Dr. Fauci's emails and the conflicts at play when it comes to scientists, public health officials, and science reporters. For more from Thacker, subscribe to his newsletter on Substack. Subscribe to my two podcasts: “The Sharyl Attkisson Podcast” and “Full Measure After Hours.” Leave a review, subscribe and share with your friends! Support independent journalism by visiting the new Sharyl Attkisson store. Order “Slanted: How the News Media Taught Us to Love Censorship and Hate Journalism” by Sharyl Attkisson at Harper Collins, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Books a Million, IndieBound, Bookshop! Visit JustTheNews.com, SharylAttkisson.com and www.FullMeasure.news for original reporting. Do your own research. Make up your own mind. Think for yourself. --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/sharylattkissonpodcast/message
Paul Thacker: Scientific Corruption and Conflicts in Covering Covid Investigative Reporter Paul Thacker has insight into Dr. Fauci's emails and the conflicts at play when it comes to scientists, public health officials, and science reporters. For more from Thacker, subscribe to his newsletter on Substack. Subscribe to my two podcasts: “The Sharyl Attkisson Podcast” and “Full Measure After Hours.” Leave a review, subscribe and share with your friends! Support independent journalism by visiting the new Sharyl Attkisson store. Order “Slanted: How the News Media Taught Us to Love Censorship and Hate Journalism” by Sharyl Attkisson at Harper Collins, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Books a Million, IndieBound, Bookshop! Visit JustTheNews.com, SharylAttkisson.com and www.FullMeasure.news for original reporting. Do your own research. Make up your own mind. Think for yourself. --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/sharylattkissonpodcast/message
The fact-checkers who flagged Paul Thacker's British Medical Journal article about a Pfizer subcontractor for Facebook admitted they police narrative, not fact.Read by Jared Moore.Original text version published 2/1/2022:Find TK To Go on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. This is a public episode. Get access to private episodes at taibbi.substack.com/subscribe
Investigative Reporter Paul Thacker has insight into Dr. Fauci's emails and the conflicts at play when it comes to scientists, public health officials, and science reporters. For more from Thacker, subscribe to his newsletter on Substack.Subscribe to my two podcasts: “The Sharyl Attkisson Podcast” and “Full Measure After Hours.” Leave a review, subscribe and share with your friends! Support independent journalism by visiting the new Sharyl Attkisson store.Order “Slanted: How the News Media Taught Us to Love Censorship and Hate Journalism” by Sharyl Attkisson at Harper Collins, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Books a Million, IndieBound, Bookshop!Visit JustTheNews.com, SharylAttkisson.com and www.FullMeasure.news for original reporting. Do your own research. Make up your own mind. Think for yourself.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
The rise of mass formation psychosis wouldn't have happened without a compliant media who've abandoned their posts of objectivity and truth telling. Brilliant investigative journalist Paul Thacker exposes how far the news business has fallen with riveting inside stories of how it used to be and the tragedy of what it has become. Plus, Trish reports on the absurd pushback against objective inquiry. Find Paul's reporting here: https://disinformationchronicle.substack.com/
The British Medical Journal backs the investigation by Paul Thacker and whistleblower Brook Jackson, who spoke out about a Pfizer vaccine clinical trial with evidence suggesting it was fraught with problems. There's been pushback from the contractor running the trial and from Pfizer, but Thacker and Jackson are standing firm— producing documents and recordings that back up her story.
Former Head of UK Border Force Tony Smith discusses the number of migrants crossing the channel to the UK hitting new records today as another 1000 reach our shores. Harry Wilkinson, head of policy at Net Zero Watch gives Mike the latest on COP26. Investigative journalist, Paul Thacker explains his ongoing investigation into Pfizer for the British Medical Association and Medical Director and former radiologist Lizzie Barclay closes the show with an innovative way to tackle NHS pressure and shortages with AI. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.
Support the show by making a one time donation: https://www.patreon.com/DoubleAsteriskMedia Or donate via Cash App: $DAmedia2021 In Part 6 of Origins, Paul Thacker joins us again to talk about the revelations contained within the NIH grant award documents to the Eco Health Alliance, as well as what was contained in the Eco Health Alliance's DEFUSE grant application to DARPA. Drastic made the DEFUSE documents available to the public after a whistleblower leaked these documents to them. We also hear Dr. Linfa Wang defend why he kept quiet about Eco Health's stated goal of adding a furin cleavage site to SARS-like viruses back in 2018. Drastic's website is: http://drasticresearch.org
Support the show by making a one time donation: https://www.patreon.com/DoubleAsteriskMedia Or donate via Cash App: $DAmedia2021 In Part Four of Origins: Birth of a Pandemic, we meet Paul Thacker, an independent journalist who has written for the British Medical Journal, and discuss just how various scientific publications were used to steer public opinion away from the lab leak hypothesis. We also speak with founding member of DRASTIC, Yuri Deigin, about some of the more suspicious characteristics of the SARS-CoV-2 genome. #lableak #covid-19 #coronavirus #wuhan #gainoffunction #fauci #drastic
Paul Thacker, pro freestyle snowmobile and para snow bikecross athlete, meets with Simon this week to talk about his life and athletic career. Paul shares his journey from Alaska to hockey to finance to stuntman for Vin Diesel to X Games. Paul and Simon discuss injuries and the lessons that they have learned from them.
Paul Thacker, pro freestyle snowmobile and para snow bikecross athlete, meets with Simon this week to talk about his life and athletic career. Paul shares his journey from Alaska to hockey to finance to stuntman for Vin Diesel to X Games. Paul and Simon discuss injuries and the lessons that they have learned from them.
I am pumped to bring you guys this episode. Paul Thacker is an all around badass! Thacker has set many world record distance jumps on a snowmobile and has competed in X-Games freestyle. In this podcast Paul shares his crazy story of going from a successful banker to world class snowmobile rider, and even being […]
In episode 12 of the Bally Alley Astrocast, Adam is joined by his good friend, and sometime-co-host, Chris++. Adam and Chris review the Bally Arcade/Astrocade game "ICBM Attack." This is one of the very rare third-party programs that was released on cartridge. This 4Kb game was released in 1982 by Brett Bilbrey, Mike Toth and Marian Nalepa (Spectre Systems). It requires a special controller called the "Spectre Handle" to play the game. Recurring Links BallyAlley.com - Bally Arcade / Astrocade Website What's New at BallyAlley.com Bally Alley Blog Orphaned Computers & Game Systems Website Bally Alley Discussion Group Bally Arcade / Astrocade Atari Age Sub-forum Bally Arcade/Astrocade High Score Club Bally Alley Astrocast Facebook Page The Classic Gaming Bookcast - By Chris Federico "ICBM Attack" Notes ICBM Attack by Spectre Systems - Video overview and how to use a trackball to play the game in the Astrocade emulator included with MAME. "Two Astrocade Cartridges Released into the Public Domain" - By Adam Trionfo (May 10, 2001) - This article is about the public domain release of two Bally Arcade/Astrocade cartridges by Spectre Systems: "ICBM Attack" and "Treasure Cove." Spectre Systems Documentation Area - This area of BallyAlley.com holds documents related to Spectre System's games and products. Spectre ICBM Attack Handle Pictures - Analog controller used with the very rare ICBM Attack cartridge by Spectre. Notice that this plugs into two controller ports. Spectre Handle Instructions - This is the documentation for the special controller (joystick) used for ICBM Attack. It contains program examples so that the controller can be used from BASIC, plus a letter explaining some problems people have been having regarding the ICBM cartridge. Tid-Bits - This is one page of tid-bits of information from Brett Bilbrey. This information was originally included in Russ Perry Jr.'s newsletter Slap Dash. ICBM Attack Cassette Description by Brett Bilbrey - June 22, 1982. This is the concept of ICBM Attack as originally envisioned by Brett. This game was eventually released on cartridge. ICBM Attack Programming Notes - Twelve pages of handwritten programming notes by Brett Bilbrey about ICBM Attack. In the notes, the game is called "Missile Command." Playing ICBM Attack Using the MESS Astrocade Emulator by Paul Thacker and Adam Trionfo - Each ICBM Attack cartridge came with an analog controller that is absolutely required to play the game. In order to play the game using the MESS (or MAME) emulator, it is absolutely essential to setup the emulator correctly. This article explains how to go about doing that so that you can play ICBM Attack perfectly. ICBM Attack Concept Art - Original concept art for ICBM Attack as drawn on graph paper. The art includes the title screen and game screens. ICBM Attack (Tape) - Early version of the game that is loadable with Bally BASIC. ICBM Attack (Prototype Cart) on Tape - This prototype cartridge loads into an Astrocade with expansion RAM. ICBM Attack Disassembly - A disassembly of ICBM Attack begun November 18, 2011 by Adam Trionfo. ICBM Attack (Low-Res) ICBM Attack (Alternate Picture) iMissile Attack (Picture of Cart) - Mike White's modified version of ICBM Attack. ICBM Attack (Prototypes) for Bally BASIC - Three early versions of the cartridge game archived from tapes in Brett Bilbrey's collection. Load with :RUN, not :INPUT. ICBM Attack (Prototypes) for AstroBASIC - Two early versions of I.C.B.M. Attack by Spectre Systems. These should be loaded with :RUN. They're not actually playable games at this stage. Astrocade News/Updates 8-Bit Workshop - Write 8-bit code, including for the Astrocade, in your browser. Ever wanted to be an old-school game programmer? Learn how classic game hardware worked. Write code and see it run instantly. Gorf Coin-Op: Latest Disassembly - David Turner's original posting to the Bally Alley discussion forum on Groups.io. Dave says, "I've made a little progress on the Coin-Op version of Gorf and thought I would make it available. It will assemble with zmac." Dave added comments from the GORF source code written in TERSE. BallyAlley.com hosts the Gorf Arcade Disassembly, but (as of Feb. 6, 2020) it doesn't have Dave's newest update yet. TERSE Documentation and Source Code - Alan McNeil programmed TERSE, which is short for either "Terse Efficient Recursive Stack Engine" or "Terse Efficient Reentrant Stack Engine." This programming langauge was used at Dave Nutting Associates to program arcade games such as The Adventures of Robby Roto!, GORF and other games from the late 1970s and early 1980s. The TERSE language is based on FORTH. Next Episode's Coverage Cosmic Raiders by Astrocade, Inc. - (Cartridge Game) In deep space lies the alien sector Larkin. You are there on a mission to obtain energy sources that have been seized by the evil Larkins. Radar and a superior guidance system help you avoid attacking fighters and Kamikaze ships. The energy stars are near the Larkin command ship: you must retrieve them before you can leave the enemy sector. Outpost 19 by WaveMakers - (BASIC Game) You are stranded on an alien outpost with nobody to help you. While you wait and pray for a rescue party, the only hope you have of surviving is to gather the food parcels that exist in each of the 16 rooms of the outpost. While you're chasing after the food parcels, the alien is chasing after you! His advantage is that he can go through walls, so his path toward you is more of a straight line, while your escape must be around obstacles in the rooms and through doorways provided. Feedback Sideswipe by WaveMaker - Mike Peace, the author of this Sideswipe, left feedback in January 2020 on this overview of this BASIC game. Astrocade at Magfest! - December 12, 2019 forum thread by "ubersaurus."
Micah got to hang out with Paul Thacker and his fiancé, Erin Ersland. Paul is a Monster energy sponsored athlete and X Games medalist, even while being in a wheelchair. Erin is an engineer and has an online fitness coaching program. Since both of them share a love of fly-fishing, they were two stars of a film we were producing for Fishe wear, called “No Excuses”. That project allowed me to join them on an incredible fly-fishing adventure to Patagonia. We talk about that trip, the challenges of fishing with a trackchair, and how they have both been able to pursue their passions from action sports to fitness.
The southern end of the famous Patagonian region in Argentina is a remote but luxurious destination that boasts the largest rainbow trout in the world. Strobel lake or as we have come to call it “Jurassic Lake” is one of the most remote, wild and best fishing destinations in the world! It is not uncommon to land multiple double digit rainbow trout a day with chances at fish in the 20’s. With excellent food and comfortable accommodations this is a trip of a lifetime. LEARN MORE ABOUT THIS FISHING TRIP: https://outdoors-international.com/strobel-lake-fishing/ PATRICK KISSEL: https://outdoors-international.com/about-us/patrick-kissel/ PAUL THACKER: https://www.instagram.com/paulthacker11/ SUBSCRIBE: https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/outdoors-international/ --- ARE YOU A MEMBER? If you'd like to go on one of this discounted scout trips, all you have to do is be an OI Member. It's only $10 a month. https://outdoors-international.com/oi-membership/
Jim Beaver has snowmobile legend, X Games medalist, and 2019 X Games competitor Paul Thacker on the show to talk about the 2019 event, the evolution of his career, and his love of fishing. Be sure and subscribe on iTunes to both Project Action and the Down & Dirty Radio Show, and follow @JimBeaver15 on social media.
On this weeks Down & Dirty Radio Show Powered By Polaris RZR Jim Beaver will have Supercross title contender Justin Barcia on the show as well as X Games competitor Paul Thacker. Tiffany Stone will be on the line with a motorsports news update and we’ll talk Dakar, Supercross, and all of the latest in action motorsports.
Did you know that the biotech industry works to discredit and silence scientists who question the health and safety of genetically engineered crops and their associated herbicides? Join Food Sleuth Radio host and Registered Dietitian, Melinda Hemmelgarn, for her interview with Paul Thacker, investigative journalist and former Fellow at the Edmond J. Saffra Center for Ethics at Harvard. In his article, “Flacking for GMOs: How the Biotech Industry Cultivates Positive Media – and Discourages Criticism,” (The Progressive, July 21, 2017) Thacker exposes the inside workings of agribusiness giant Monsanto and their relationships and strategies with Academia, reporters, and social media.
The Down & Dirty Radio Show Powered By Polaris RZR has some more epic guests joining Jim Beaver and Ami Houde this week! We have Miss Supercross Juliana Daniell on air talking about the 2018 Supercross season, X Games medalist Paul Thacker talking about the upcoming X Games in Aspen, and Mad Media’s Matt Martelli on the line talking Dakar and the latest on the Mint 400. We will have a full Supercross recap, and all the latest news from the Dakar Rallies well as all the latest in action motorsports. Don’t forget to tune in to Jim Beaver’s new show Project Action on PodcastOne.com every Thursday or subscribe on iTunes. Please RATE, REVIEW, & SUBSCRIBE on iTunes to both shows. Game On!
Professional snowmobile rider and action sports legend Paul Thacker joins Jim Beaver on Project Action this week. Paul is a former world record holder for distance jumping, X Games medalist, and one of the original Monster Energy athletes. We catch up with him as he prepares for X Games in Colorado. Jim Beaver also has the latest news in action sports, racing, MMA, and pop culture on the show.
The show's two hosts discuss what will be covered in future episodes of the Bally Alley Astrocast. Recurring links: BallyAlley.com - Bally Arcade / Astrocade Website What's New at BallyAlley.com Orphaned Computers & Game Systems Website Bally Alley Yahoo Discussion Group Bally Arcade / Astrocade Atari Age Sub-forum Bally Arcade/Astrocade High Score Club Episode Links: Bally Arcade / Astrocade FAQ Bally Software Downloads - Cassette TapesAudio Recordings from Bob Fabris Collection Arcadian Newsletter Software and Hardware for the Bally Arcade - A Technical Description Picture of the Crazy Climber homebrew cartridge Picture of the War homebrew cartridge ZGRASS Documentation Arcade Games Based on the Astrocade Chipset Gorf Arcade Game Seawolf II Arcade Game Space Zap Arcade Game Wizard of Wor Arcade Game Full Bally Alley Astrocast - Episode 0 Transcription Adam: Hi, everybody. My name's Adam Trionfo, otherwise known as BallyAlley on the AtariAge forums. And I'm here with... Chris: Chris, otherwise known as "Chris." Adam: And you're listening to the zero-ith episode of Bally Alley Astrocast. See, I barely know the name of it yet. Chris: I think me and Adam believe that we thought up the name Astrocast ourselves, and we came to find out that there had already been one, it just hadn't been started. And I guess it was Rick and Willy (I think it was only those two). Adam: Yup. Chris: And, it kinda sat there for a year. Hopefully they will be contributing to Adam's podcast here. Adam: I don't think of this as "Adam's podcast." (And I just used finger-quotes, sorry about that.) This is our podcast. Chris and I are recording this right now. Also, Paul Thacker, who is a regular of the Bally Alley Yahoo group (which we can talk about at a later time). We're hopefully going to do this together at some point. I wanna sound natural as possible for this podcast. So, I'm trying to not read anything off a piece of paper. I don't like the sound of my voice, and the fact that I'm letting you hear it means that I love you guys. Chris: It's a great level of trust he's exhibiting, you guys. Plus, I would immediately take his script away from him if he had one because... Adam: Oh, thanks, Chris! Chris: Yeah. Extemporaneous is more fun to do, and I think it's more fun to listen to. Adam: So, in saying that, we do have some notes we wanna talk about. For this episode we wanna basically go over what we want to cover. Which is what people seem to do in these episodes. Saying, "Hey, there's gonna to be an episode of a podcast called 'this'." And, that's what we're doing here. So, here's what we're going in our podcast number zero. Chris: It was always funny to me, like oxymoron, like: episode number zero. Adam: Right. Right. Chris: Let's go negative one. Let's be rebels. Adam: You may or may not know what a Bally Arcade, or an Astrocade, is. It was a console that was developed in about 1977. It was released in 1977, but the first units were not actually shipped, for various reasons, until January 1978. And very few people got them. They were first released by catalog-only, by a company called JS&A. Those systems had overheating problems. Most of them were returned-- or many of them were returned. JS&A only sold approximately 5,000 units (so it says on the Internet). I don't know where that number is quoted from. I've never been able to find the source. Bally eventually started selling them through Montgomery Ward. Now, Bally also had something called the Zgrass that it wanted to release. This was going to be expanding the unit into a full-fledged computer. This never was released. The Bally system itself did not come with BASIC, but it was available nearly from the start. Many people used it. A newsletter formed around it called the ARCADIAN. The system has 4K of RAM and it does not use sprites, but it could move object just as well as the Atari [VCS] and other systems of its time period. It could show 256 separate colors and through tricks and machine language, it could show all of them on the screen at once, but not normally in a game. Although there are a few screens that did it (but not actively during a game). The system is fun to play... if you can find one that works. If you don't already have one, you're going to discover (if you go searching for one) they're not inexpensive. They're becoming pricey on the Internet because of the overheating problems they had, since the beginning (with the data chip), you will find that if you own [should have said buy] one now, you're getting a unit that "has not been tested," which means, of course, it is broken. If you find one on the Internet that says, "Not tested," please, do not buy it. Just let it stay there and let someone else buy it. And, when they get it and it doesn't work, if they're surprised then they did not read the "Bally/Astrocade FAQ." We'll go into much greater depth about this system in the next episode. I just wanted to let you know that's the system we'll be talking about. It has a 24-key number pad. It has a controller that is-- is it unique? Well, I think it's unique. Chris. Um-hum. Adam: It has a paddle built into the top knob. It's a knob-- it's called. And it has a joystick-- an eight-directional joystick. It's built like a gun controller-style pistol. It's called a "pistol grip." It's sorta shaped like one, if you picture a classic arcade-style gun, and then just cut off the barrel. That's basically what you have. Something that was originally mentioned, and I think Bally might have called it that for two years, are Videocades. Videocades are the cartridges. These were actually also referred to as cassettes. These are not tapes. These are about the size of a tape, but they are ROM cartridges. In the beginning they held 2K and later on they held 4K for Bally. Astrovision, or Astrocade, Inc., later released some 8K games in about 1982. Those were usually considered the best games on the system because they had more ROM to spare and to put more features into the games. Now, BASIC was available from about the third or the fourth month after the system was released to the public. It was originally called BALLY BASIC. It did not come with a tape interface, but one was available for it. BALLY BASIC cost approximately $50. The tape interface, which could allow the user to record at 300-baud... which is pretty slow. To fill the 1.8K of RAM, which is available to BASIC, would take about four minutes to load a complete program. Better than retyping it every time, isn't it? But, it's not a great speed. Later on, the system (when it was rereleased), it actually came with BASIC. It was still called BALLY BASIC, but today to differentiate it from the original BASIC cartridge, most people call it ASTROCADE BASIC or AstroBASIC. The reason for this is the later BASIC has a tape interface built into the cartridge itself. This can record and playback information at 2000-baud, which is an odd number because it's not a multiple of 300. Because when 300-baud tapes were speeded up by a newer format later, they were 1800-baud. Tapes were available, which meant the user community was able to grow because they could share programs. It was sometimes a problem for them because I could record a program on my tape drive and I could send it to you in the mail. And you'd say, "It's not loading. It's not loading!" Well, you'd sometimes have to adjust your read and write heads to match it. Imagine having to do that today? To having to... uh, I wouldn't want to think about doing it. So, even if you can believe it, with that kind of an issue, with users having to adjust their tape systems in order to load programs sometimes, there were commercially released tapes. These have been archived and are available and you can download them from BallyAlley.com. Chris: So, the play and record head on anybody's tape recorder... there was the possibility that it had to be adjusted to play a tape his buddy had sent him because he had a tape recorder with differently aligned play and record heads in it-- I mean, that's something else! Adam: Now, the recorders that were normally used were called shoebox recorders. These were recommended. If you tried to record to a home stereo, maybe Chris can understand this better and tell me more about it in a later episode, but you really couldn't record to one and then get that information back. I'm not sure why. But, the lower quality that was available from the low-end tapes that were less expensive were actually better. Just like there were better audio tapes available, which you should not have used for data because... because, I don't know why! So, ideal podcast length. In my mind I see about an hour, or an hour and a half. While I listen to many podcasts, among them Intellivisionaries (and others) that are not short. And, as has been discussed on the Intellivisionaries, there's a pause button. So, if somehow we do end up at five hours, please understand that there is a pause button. If we end up less, you don't need to use the pause button. Isn't that great? Technology... right? Chris: Well, a very good idea that you had was obviously to conduct interviews with some, I guess, what, Bally game writers, people who are really knowledgeable about it. Adam: Well, there's quite a few people I'd like to interview. If we can find people from the 70s and the 80s, and even now, there's some people who have written some modern games-- at least written some programs for the system. Chris: It would help if they're still around. Yeah. Adam: Something that's interesting, that I wanna use, is that there's actually recorded interviews that we have from the early 80s and late 70s of phone conversations that Bob Fabris did (from the ARCADIAN publisher). There was a newsletter called the ARCADIAN and it published for seven years (from 1978 to 1984 or 85, depending on how you view things a bit). He recorded some conversations with some of the more prominent people of the time. Chris: That's cool! Adam: We've made WAV files of those or FLAC files and they're available for download (or many of them are already) from BallyAlley. But, it might be interesting to take out snippets from some of those and put them in the show. I hadn't thought of that before, but that's why we're going over this. Chris: Yeah. Absolutely. Adam: Right. Chris: That's really cool. We say Bally Astrocade, like we say Atari 2600, but it was never actually called the Astrocade when Bally owned it. Adam: Not when Bally owned it; no. But after it was resold they had the right to use the name Bally for one year. Chris: Oh. Adam: And Astrovision did do that. So, for a short time, for one year, it was known as the Bally Astrocade. And it actually was called that. Chris: Oh. Okay. Adam: But, somehow that name has stuck. And that is what the name is called. And many people think it was called that from the beginning. It was originally released under a few different names, which we'll get into at a later date. I think of it... I like to think of it as the Bally Arcade/Astrocade. Chris: Yeah. Adam: It depends on how you look at it. Sometimes I go with either. Sometimes I go with both. Sometimes I call it the Bally Library Computer. It just on how I'm feeling at the time. So, we also don't plan to pre-write episodes. You might have noticed that by now. We do have a list that we're going by, and we do wanna use notes, but reading from a script is not what I wanna do. I don't want to sound dry and humorless. I like to have Chris here making fun of me-- well, maybe not making fun of me, but, you know, Chris here... helping me along to give me moral support. And I enjoy that I'll be doing this with him, and hopefully Paul as well. Chris: It is strange for you and I to sit around talking about old videogames. Adam: Oh... isn't it! Isn't it though! Chris: [Laughing] Some of the sections that Adam has come up with are really interesting. They sound like a lot of fun. And what's cool is that they are necessarily unique to a podcast about the Bally console. For instance, we were talking about the ARCADIAN newsletter. There's going to be a segment-- it will probably be every episode because there is a LOT of source material. This segment will delve into ARCADIAN notes and letters that did not make it into the published newsletter. It's kind of a time capsule. In some ways it will be fascinating even for people who don't know a lot about the Bally Astrocade because what you're getting is correspondence from the 70s and 80s, before anybody really knew what was gonna happen with the 8-bit era, you know? Adam: There's material in the archives. All of this material is from Bob Fabris. He was the editor or the ARCADIAN. Two people, Paul Thacker and I, we bought that collection from an individual who had bought it in the early 2000s directly from Bob. It was never broken up, so it's all together in about eight boxes-- large boxes-- all in different folders. Bob Fabris kept a really, really detailed collection and in great order. He kept it in that shape from 1978 until, what?, about 2001 or 2002 when he sold it. Chris: Wow. Adam: So the fact that it survived and then someone else bought it and didn't want to break it up and sell it is pretty amazing to me. We were able to pool our funds together, Paul and I, and purchase it. All of it has been scanned. Not all of it is available. Oh, and by the way, BallyAlley, in case there are some listeners who don't know... BallyAlley is a website that I put together. It's mostly from the archives of the ARACADIAN. But, there's a lot, a LOT, of interesting material there. If you're interested in the Bally Arcade, you should check it out. It's BallyAlley.com. Chris: Adam is being kinda modest. He's done a lot of work on this. You're gonna find archived materials that will make your eyeballs pop out of your head. Adam: [Laughing] Chris: You know, he's... Adam: If you saw Chris, then you'd know that's true. Chris: Yes. Absolutely. I'm recording blind. You know, he's very picky about high quality scans (as high as possible only). He's vey meticulous about it. And I definitely recommend that you guys visit BallyAlley period com. I know it's a lost battle; humor me. They're not dots. All right... anyway. Adam: All right. Cartridge reviews. The Bally Arcade... it has a lot of perks, one of them is not it's huge library of games. I take that back. It has a huge library of games. Many of them, as some people may not even know who are listening to this, were released on tapes. But the vast majority of games, that people would think of as the console games, are cartridges. The Bally could "see" 8K at once. It didn't have to bankswitch or anything like that in order to do that. There was never a bankswitching cartridge that was released for the Bally. At least at that time. Since the library is so small, I'm not sure if we're planning to cover a game per episode, or since we plan to cover all of the games (and there are certainly less than fifty, if you include prototypes) and some of them are not games. Some of them were... BIORHYTHM, so that you could know when it would be a good time to get it on with your wife to have a baby. You know... [laughing] So, if that's what you wanna talk about and listen to... write us and say, "That's sounds great. I want you to tell me when I can get my wife pregnant." [laughing] The other day my wife was taking a look at a game I was playing for a competing console, the Atari 8-bit game system. Chris: I thought you were gonna say the Arcadia. Adam: No, not the Arcadia. I was playing a SUPER BREAKOUT clone. She took a look at it and didn't know what it was. I said, "You know, it's a BREAKOUT clone." She's like, "I don't know what that is." I said, "No. Look at the game for a minute. It looks like BREAKOUT." And she still didn't get it. And I said, "Okay, so you're gonna have a ball that bounces off a paddle and it's gonna hit the bricks up above." And she goes, "I've never seen this before." And I said, "Okay. You've heard of PONG, right?" She's like, "Well, yes I've heard of PONG." I said, "It's that." Chris: [Laughing] It's that... except better. Between you and all of the people you're in contact with from the Bally era, and people like Paul. People who actually wrote games back then... Adam: Um-hum. Chris: Information about how the console works and its languages and stuff... is that pretty-much taken care of, or are there more mysteries to be solved. Adam: There's some mysteries. The neat thing about this system was that even in the ARCADIAN, in the early issues, you could get access, for like $30, to the photocopies that were used at Nutting Associates. These are the people who actually designed the Bally system for Bally. They did arcade games-- we'll go more into that in another episode. This information was available to subscribers... almost from the get-go. So, if you wanted to have a source listing of the 8K ROM, you could get it. Of course, it came with a "Do Not Replicate" on every single page, but... it was... you were allowed to get it. You could purchase it. It was freely available and it was encouraged for users to use this information to learn about the system. Chris: The reason I ask is that I'm wondering what the next step is. Whenever I think of this console... do people refer to it as a console or a computer, by and large? Adam: A game system in my eyes. I mean, it's a console. People don't think of it as a computer. No. Chris: I'll start over. Whenever I think about this system, what usually comes to mind is the fact that it is unexploited. And that is perhaps the, not quite an elephant in the room, but that is the only real disappointment about the Astrocade is that there are these amazing, vivid, brilliant, games. I mean, the arcade conversations on the Astrocade are, for all intents and purposes, arcade perfect. This was a superior machine. And yet, players were teased with a handful of astonishing games and then that was it. So, "what could have been," comes to mind for me a lot. And the phrase tragically untapped. What I'm wondering is why nobody has brought up the initiative of making new games. The last two were arcade conversations. They were not original, but they are, of course, phenomenal. I mean, two of the best titles, you know are WAR (which is a conversion of WORLORDS) and, of course, CRAZY CLIMBER. You were in charge of all the packaging and EPROM burning for those. I'm not saying... Adam: Partially. Partially. For all of one of them I was, but the other one was handled by a man name Ken Lill. I did... I came up with the package design and stuff like that, and made a lot to make it happen. But, I didn't program the games. No. Chris: Right. But I mean, somebody else did the coding, but didn't you have all the cartridge shells. And you were burning... Adam: I made sure it all happened. Chris: Okay. Adam: Yeah. I mean, I didn't do all the work though. Chris: Okay. Adam: It helped that I was there. Put it that way. Chris: We're talking about CRAZY CLIMBER, mainly, right? Because you helped with WAR as well. Adam: Yeah. I did both. Yeah. Chris. Okay. Adam: Um-hum. Chris: And you wrote some of the back of the box copy. Adam: I did all of that. Yeah. Chris: As expensive and limited as such a run would be, that's not really quite what I'm talking about. As having to go through all that to give people physical, boxes copies, I guess. Another reason why people might not have written anymore Astrocade games is that the relatively few surviving consoles could be prone to overheating themselves to death at any time. But, then there's emulation. Adam: Right. Chris: MESS is all that we have, and it's not perfect. So, wouldn't that be the first step for somebody to write a really good Astrocade emulator? I would do it, if I knew how. Adam: Yes. If there's one of you out there who's like, "Who couldn't write an Astrocade emulator?" Chris: Yes. Adam: Please, would you do me a favor and send that to me tomorrow? Chris: It's time. ...Tomorrow... [laughing] Adam: Something that I wanna get at is that MESS does work for most games. There are a few that don't work. Some of them used to work and now they're broken. MESS was updated to make it "better," and now some games don't work. I don't understand why that happened. The biggest drawback to MESS is that is doesn't support the tape. It doesn't support-- it supports BASIC, but you can't save or load programs. And since they're hundreds... there's probably over 500 programs available. And there's... many, many of those have already been archived and put on BallyAlley.com. So you can try them out on a real system, but not under emulation. And it's quite easy to use under real hardware. We'll get into that at another time too. Chris: In terms of cartridge reviews. And I'm only going to say this once. Thanks, by the way, for saying that this is our podcast Adam: Sure. Chris: I thought I was just being a guest. Adam: No. No... you're just a gas. Chris: I'm just a gas. So, should I help you pay for the the Libsyn? Adam: I think we'll be okay. Chris: All right. Adam: All of our users are going to send donations every month. Chris: Oh, that's right. Adam: [Laughing] Just kidding there, guys. Chris: So, I'm just going to say this once. And you're welcome. Review is a word I have a problem with when it comes to my own, well, stuff I write. But now, apparently, stuff I talk about. Because I associate the word review with critics. I think I was telling you the other day, Adam... Adam: Yes, you were. Chris: I would never hit such a low level of self-loathing that I would ever call myself a critic. Talk about a useless bunch. For me they'll be overviews. It's very picky. Very subjective. It has nothing to do with anybody else. You wanna consider yourself reviews-- totally respect that-- but I don't do reviews. So, either that, or I'm in some sort of really intense denial. But, personal reflections on games, reviews leaves out... when you call something a review, it leaves out the fact that taste is subjective. It's a personal thing. I can't review food for you and have you think, "Oh, now I like that food I used to hate." One's tastes in games, music, etcetera is just as personal. So, Adam was saying that there's so few of them, that we're not going to cover a game every episode. So, what we're going to do is alternate, so that you don't go completely without game "content" (isn't that a buzzword, a frequent word online now: "content"). Adam: That is. Yeah. Chris: Everybody wants content. I gotta table of contents for ya. We're going to alternate actual commercial cartridge games with commercially available tape games and even type-in programs, because there were a lot of good ones. Adam: Most of them were written in BASIC. Chris: Which is just awesome to me. Adam: Yeah. Chris: We were thinking of alternating the games stuff I was just talking about with this: Adam: The Astrocade system, well, the Bally Arcade system, as it was originally designed for home use, it had two versions. There was an arcade version, which came out in 1978 with the first game, Sea Wolf II in the arcades. And there was the version that was released for the home. It had 4K of RAM, while the version in the arcades had 16K (and some additional support), but they use the same hardware (like the data chip). They're so similar in fact, that many of the systems games were brought home as cartridges. They don't use the same code. They are not-- you can't run code for the arcade and vice-versa. You can, for instance, take a Gorf and run Gorf on Wizard of Wor hardware. It'll look the wrong direction, but you can do that. The systems are very similar in that respect. But, you can actually take an Astrocade (and it has been done before) that is a 4K unit, and actually do some fiddling with it, change the ROM a bit, give it more RAM (there's more that you have to do)-- there's actually an article about it, it was written in-depth (it's available on BallyAlley, the website). And you can make it into an arcade unit. It wouldn't be able to play the arcade games, but it would have access to 16K of RAM and that sort of thing. Chris: When you say Sea Wolf II, you mean the arcade game was running this hardware that you're talking about. Adam: Right. Chris: Much of which was also in the console. Adam: Yes. Chris: Okay. And that goes for WIZARD OF WOR, GORF, SPACE ZAP. Well, that explains why there are so many arcade perfect home versions. Adam. Um. Right. They don't share the same code, but they are very similar. The Hi-Res machine could display, in what was considered then a high resolution. The Bally display in 1/4 of that resolution. I think perhaps will have the first episode cover specifically the hardware of the astrocade. Chris: So, you are saying that this segment would cover the arcade games that used the astrocade hardware, and I find that really, really interesting (because I never knew that). I thought that they were just, you know, very similar and some of the same people created the home versions, but I didn't realize that... I never realized they were so close. Adam: So, another segment that we plan to do is called, "What the Heck?!?" It's going to focus on unusual hardware and maybe even released items, but something that, while it was released through the Arcadian newsletter or perhaps the Cursor newsletter (and maybe even one of the other small newsletters that were around for a short time for this system exclusively). When we're talking about a released product here, we are probably talking about in the tens-- the twenties. I mean, new homebrew games get a wider release than games that are considered released back then. Maybe not the games, but hardware peripherals. There was something called the Computer Ear which could do voice recognition-- sort of. But the software for that isn't available, I don't think… maybe it is. I have the hardware, but I've never tried running before. Chris: We're also gonna-- I say "we," even though Adam's knowledge about, well pretty-much all of this stuff is much greater than mine, hoping to cover the Zgrass keyboard/computer. Is that a fair description? Adam: Yeah. That's what you would read on the Internet about it. And if you can call that true, then that's what it is. Chris: Right. And not just on the WikiRumor page. Adam: Yeah. Chris: It's a very unusual system and it's worth learning about. See, you don't hear about any of this stuff anywhere else and that's what's really cool about this podcast. Everything you've got archived, everything you've learned, you just never read about it back then, you know? Adam: It was available to read about, but not in the normal sources that people read about the Astrocade. Which would have been Electronic Games and some of the other computing magazines at the time. But they didn't talk about, I mean, it was mentioned briefly... but only as a product that was supposed to come out. But, in a way, ZGrass did come out. The product, the language, ZGRASS, was available. There was a hardware system, a computer (which could cost upwards of $10,000) that used some of the custom chips that were available in the Astrocade. It was called the UV-1. It was-- I'll get more into that when I cover the Zgrass system in some future episode, which is why we're talking about it here. I would like to discover more about it. I wanna learn. I want-- I don't think I can use it, because it has not been archived. But, the documentation is available on BallyAlley. I have that. Maybe I'll go through that a little bit. It was... something to learn about and share... Chris: Yeah. Really cool. Adam: It's all about sharing, man. And caring. Okay. The Bally Arcade and Astrocade history. History of the month is something that we are going to have. It's going to start with the "Arcadians" #1, which was the first available newsletter. The "Arcadians" was a newsletter that published for just four issues. And it was published-- and it was only two pages. The first one, I think, was only front and back. Then, I think, maybe the next one was four pages, but that was only two pages front and back. It was really just a round-robin letter. It predates the "Arcadian." It was only available to a few people. These have been archived. You can read them online. I'm gonna start there. As soon as BASIC was released, it took a few months after the Astrocade came out (excuse me, before the Bally Arcade came out). Once that system came out with Bally BASIC (which required a separate BASIC interface so that you could record to tape), then Bob Fabris, the editor, said, "We've got something we can explore together. Let's do this. Let's pool our resources and come up with a way to share information. That was what they were all about. They did this very early on. That's something that interests me greatly about the system, and I want to be able to share that and compare it with knowledge of other systems that were out at the time. Chris: That's really cool. I mean, it's one of the earliest systems of any kind, that I know of, that actually did have a community. You know, that were really trying to goad each other into doing new things and write programs and stuff like that. I mean, I can't imagine there was an Altair community. I'm trying to... Adam: There was an Altair community. Chris: Oh. Well, but they were all very rich. And they had a lot of time on their hands! Adam: ...those switches, right? Chris: I hope that you're gonna to do a "What's New on Bally Alley" I know I keep going on about this, but that is just an amazing website to me. You do a lot of updates to it, so when you do add new things to the BallyAlley website. And, who knows, maybe this will give you a reason to add more things to the website. Adam: It could. The website isn't updated very frequently. I have great intentions, everyone. So, if you've been wanting to see updates, give me some motivation to do some. I don't mean send me money. We, as the two of us (and other people on the Yahoo group), we do like to BS about the system. But, there's so much information in my archives, and there are only a few people who share it with me. Basically, two other people. We're thinking about putting it up on archive.org, but some of it is kind of-- I think it should, might remain hidden from viewers, even though it might be archived there. Because, it's personal letters that, I think, probably shouldn't be shared. Because, there's personal information there. I mean, when I got the collection, there was actually checks still that were un-cashed in it that were written in the 70s. Chris: Wow! Adam: Those kind of things I did not scan. Because I was like… what? [sounds of exasperation and/or confusion], it was very strange to me. They are un-canceled, unused checks out there in some boxes that were people subscribing to the newsletter. I'm not sure why he didn't cash the checks, but... they're there! Chris: So you could have them in the archive, I guess. Adam: Right. But I don't think I wanna-- I don't think that sort of information should be shared. Chris: Oh, I agree. But, you know, I mean back then a dollar, back then, was the equivalent of fifty grand today. Don't you love it when people say stuff like that? It's like... well, you're going a little overboard. Adam: Right. [Laughing] We had to walk up and down the hill both ways... Chris: Both ways! Adam: ...in the snow. Pick up the coal from between the tracks. Chris: Any Cosby reference, I'm on! What I'm hoping... do you think that Paul is going to take part in some way in this first episode? Adam: I would like him to. If we take a long time, then probably. Chris: Well, I'm hoping we're going to hear a lot from Paul Thacker. Adam: Paul Thacker, he will definitely join us, at least, for the... if he can't make it into this zero episode, he will be in for the first one. He's a good guy. He has helped me-- more than helped me!-- he has... he is in control of archiving tapes. That is his department. After I wasn't really updating the site too much anymore (I actually had even pulled away from it), in about 2006, Paul Thacker came forward and he introduced himself to me through an email. He said he would like to help with archiving tapes. And... he really, really has. He's the leader in that department. He has contacted people to make archiving programs possible. He has followed up with people with large collections. He has archived them. Not all of it is available on the website yet, but it is... it has been done. They're truly archived. And, what's neat about Paul he has tapes that were available between users. If you're familiar with growing up with these old systems, you might have had a computer like an Atari 800 or a Commodore 64. Maybe you had some tapes that you recorded to (or disks). You would write a "Game Number 1." And then that was what you'd name the program-- even if the program was a type-in from a "Compute!" magazine or an "Antic" magazine. Chris: Oh, you would save it as "Game Number 1" Adam: This is how these tapes were. People would write one program on it... maybe, maybe even give it a clueless name, that meant nothing to either Paul or I. Paul would record the whole side. Paul would go through and say, "What's on here?" Paul would find a program. Paul would find SIX different versions of that program! Paul would find programs that had been halfway recorded over. Paul made sure to archive all of that, separately (and as efficiently as possible), document it. So, something I want to cover... there are so many topics... I should back up here, and I should say that there are a lot of topics available to anyone who is starting a podcast. Something that has to be zeroed in on (and that's not supposed to be a pun on the zero episode) is that you have to choose. You have to narrow. You have to focus. I am no good at that. I am not good at that... I can't do it. Chris: How many fingers am I holding up? Adam: Chris is holding up a finger, and I'm supposed to see one. And I'm hoping that is what he was doing-- and not giving me the finger. Chris: [Laughing] Adam: So, I would like to cover the ancestry of the Bally Arcade. Something that came up and about 2001, perhaps 2002, is someone named Tony Miller, who was responsible for working on the Bally Arcade when it was created, mentioned that the Bally Arcade's chipset is actually a direct descendent of "Space Invaders" arcade game's... the CPU for "Gun Fight". Or something to that affect. I didn't understand it then, I might be able to understand it better if I find those exact posts (which are definitely archived). Now, "Gun Fight" used the Intel 8080 CPU, which is why the Astrocade uses the Z80. Because it's compatible... sort of. The Z80 can run 8080 but not the other way around. As you can see, my knowledge of all of this is completely limited. What I just told you, is pretty much what I know. There's obviously a story there. If I could find people to interview, if I can dig into this, there is a GOOD story there. And I would like to discover it and present it. Chris: Yeah, 'cause that would mean Taito took some technical influence from Midway. Because it was Midway that added a CPU, at all, to "Gun Fight," right? So... that's pretty interesting. Adam: We'll find out, Chris. Chris: Yeah. So, I've already talked about writing new games as the next logical step once one has a lot of information about any game system, or any computer (or anything like that). So, are we going to encourage activity in the homebrew Astrocade scene? Because, there is a latent one there. You should definitely cover the two released games that we've already talked about: WAR and CRAZY CLIMBER. Those were pretty big deals. The first new Astrocade game since... what?... 1985-ish? I mean, on cartridge... Adam: It depends on how you look at it. There were actually some people in the community, who were just sending cartridges back and forth to each other, who were sharing code in the 80s. They're not considered released cartridges. Something that is available to the public… yes. Chris: In terms of talking about homebrew programming, you can also talk about people who just play around with this system, or even interview them. What do you find interesting about the… Adam: Yeah. I would like to do interviews with people who actually have a lot of experience with the system and maybe grew up with it, which I did not do. I didn't learn about it until... the 90s. About homebrew programming: I believe, and I would love to make you guys believe, that homebrew programming did not start in the 90s. I would like to let you know that homebrew programming has been around since 1975 (in my eyes) and earlier. The very, very first PCs, and by that I mean "Personal Computers," not "IBM Personal Computers," (alright?)... these systems were programmed in people's living rooms, in people's kitchens. If that is not homebrew programming, I don't know what is. Chris: Right. Adam: These people were learning for the sake of learning. They were playing for the sake of the experience of touching the hardware, learning the software-- they weren't doing this for work, they were doing this for pleasure. This is the same exact reason people are homebrewing games today. They were doing this back then. An insight that you get to see very clearly is in the in the "Arcadian" newsletters, and in the "Cursor" newsletters as well, is people want to teach other people. They are about sharing. They are about, "Hey I wrote this. This is great. You guys should type it in and try it out... and if you find out anything about it, let me know what you think. If you can add something to it… if you can cut off six bytes and add a sound effect, please do that, because there's no sound." These people wanted to help each other, and through that it is available in archives, and we can look at this and learn today. I would like to have that happen, so that people of today, people who have the knowledge, have modern computers that can cross-compile and create new games-- that would be neat... to me. Chris: Yeah. Adam: It has been neat, went two have been released already. But, even if new games don't get created, what about MESS? Let's make that better. Chris: Before we go any further, I think you should "share" your email address so that you get feedback. Adam: My name is Adam, and you can reach me at ballyalley@hotmail.com Chris: You can private message me on AtariAge. I'm chris++. Adam: Now we expect to get loads of email. We are gonna be clogged. We're going to have to have the first episode be nothing but reader feedback. Chris: I'm telling ya, we really got a good thing going, so you better hang on to yourself. Adam: [Laughing] Chris: That's a Bowie quote. Well, before we wrap this up, let's cover the obvious thing. How did you get so involved in the Bally Arcade/Astrocade? Adam: When I first began collecting some of these older consoles and home computers... I never stopped playing them, but when they started becoming available for a quarter, I said, "You know, why don't I just buy each one of them." I had a very large collection for awhile, until I finally gave some of it to Chris... got rid of most of it, and... I am glad I did, because now I play the games I own. What I don't play, I get to eventually. In about 1994... '93... I read about this system in one of the books I had that was from the early 80s that covered the Zgrass, actually. It was the system, I was like, "I want to get a Zgrass, that'd be neat." I don't have one. I did find out that it was related to the Bally Arcade. From there... I wanted one. I found my first one for a quarter. I picked it up at a flea market. Chris: Oh. Adam: It came with a few games. In fact, I saw the games first, and I was like, "How much you want for these?" Each game was a quarter. I think there was four or five of 'em. Then I saw the system, but I didn't have that much money with me. I had like a dollar left or something (I'd already bought some other things). I was talking to a friend that I'd gone with, and he said, "Why don't you go back there and offer him your buck for it?" I went back, and I said, "How much do you want for the game (the system)?" And he goes, "A quarter." Chris: Wow. Adam: So, I still had change to go by another: 2600, an Intellivision... no... [laughing] But, I didn't find anything else that day. Chris: Those were the days before you people let eBay ruin that part of the hobby. Adam: So, I did know that there was an "Arcadian" newsletter. But, I was a member of an Atari 8-bit user group here in town. It so happened, I was bringing it up... talking with someone there, and they said, "Oh, I've heard of that!" I'm like, "Oh, you've heard of the Bally?" They said, "Oh, sure. You should talk to Mr. Houser" (who was the president of the Atari club). Then he said, "I think he wrote some games for it." I said, "Hmm. That sounds interesting." So, I approached him. By 1994, there were very few users left in the Atari 8-bit group. Who was left, we all knew each other very well (or, as well as we could-- even though some of us only knew each other from meetings). We started talking. He told me that he'd been involved with the "Arcadian." He had published tapes. He had something called "The Catalog" [THE SOURCEBOOK], which I now know was the way most people order tapes (but, back then I didn't). He kept track of all this, and he still had all of his things. He invited me over one Sunday afternoon and he showed me what he owned, which was... pretty-much everything for the Astrocade that was released. We went through it one Sunday afternoon, and his son (who was in his early 20s) shared his memories of the machine. I fell in love: I thought, "Wow, this system is great!" While I was there Mr. Houser, his name was Richard Houser, he said, "Hey, you know what... we should call up Bob." I said, "Bob, who?" He said, "He was the person who used to publish the "Arcadian." I said, "... Really?" He's like, "Yeah, let's call him." So, he called up Bob. They chatted a bit (for a while) and he told him who I was-- I didn't talk to Bob. But, he was available back then. I thought that was great, so I wrote Bob a letter. I said, "Would it be okay if I get some of your information..." Later on, in the late-90s, he gave me permission to do that. At the time, I just said, "Hey. Here I am." What's really neat, is I started sending him ORPHANED COMPUTERS & GAME SYSTEMS (which was a newsletter I did in the early-90s. After three issues, Chris, here, joined me on board). I sent them to him. When I bought the Bally collection from him, those issues that I'd sent to him brought back to me. Which, was, like, this huge circle... because it came through several people, in order to come back. I found that really neat. Chris: Yeah. Adam: Eventually, with Chris, we discovered the system together. We played around with it. What was it...? About 2001, I started BallyAlley.com. It doesn't look great now, and it looked worse then. Now, here I am... having a podcast. How about you, Chris? Chris: I never stopped playing all the way through either. You know? Adam: Why should've we? Chris: Well, yeah. I kept playing the old games through the period when they started to be called "classic" and "retro." This happened at some point in the mid-90s. Adam: During the HUGE crash during in the 80s (that none of us saw). Chris: Yeah... that none of us knew about, except for the great prices (which I attributed to over-stock). Adam: I didn't even think about it. Chris: Well, they weren't all cheaper. Even into '83/'84, I remember spending thirty-odd dollars on PITFALL II: LOST CAVERNS for the 2600. Adam: Yeah, right. I got that for my birthday, because it was $30... and I didn't have $30, I was a kid. Chris: Right. 'Cause... that was about two-million dollars in today's money. Adam: Also, for us, I think, we went onto computers, like many people our age at the time. So, we sort of distanced ourselves. The prices for computer stock stayed about the same, as they had for Atari cartridges, and things like that. Chris: That's a good point. Yeah. In coming across "classic," after I hadn't really stopped playing my favorites (and discovering new favorites, thanks to the advent of thrift shops and video games at Goodwill, and stuff), I'd read that and say, "Oh, they're classic now. Oh, all right. If you say so." I thought that was really funny. So, by the late 90s, I thought I was the only person on earth (not literally, but pretty close) who is still playing these "old" videogames. All I had when we started hanging out again, Adam, was an Atari 2600 and a Commodore 64. That was all I wanted. I didn't want to know about anything else, I didn't want to know about this new CD-ROM, with the "multimedia." Adam: So, let's... this time period would have been...? Chris: This is 1997. By this point, I had been writing my own articles and essays for my own amusement (saving them as sequential files on 1541 floppies using the Commodore 64). I wrote a file writer and reader program. I thought I was the only one doing nerdy stuff like this, but I had fun doing it. And I was still playing all the old games, picking 'em up for a buck or less, while making my rounds at the thrift shops and at Goodwills and everything like that. I was in a subsidiary of Goodwill that was attached to the largest Goodwill store in Albuquerque. I ran into a buddy of mine, from ten years previous. He and I have been freshman in high school, and then I went to another high school and lost touch with all of my friends. This guy's name, if you can believe this goofy name, was Adam Trionfo. The store had an even goofier name: the U-Fix-It Corral, but then it changed into Clearance Corner. Is that right? Adam: Correct. Yes. Chris: Adam was working there. So, I'm going through a box of... something... from the 80s. He came over, "Are you Chris?" I said, "Yeah. Adam?" He and I, you know, sort of shook hands. I said, "Well, that's cool, you're working at Goodwill." "Yup." Then I left, and I never saw him again... Adam: [Laughing] Untill today. Chris: Until today. That's why it really sounds improvised here. He gave me a newsletter he had written about... old videogames (and they weren't even all that old yet, at the time). He started ORPHANED COMPUTERS & GAME SYSTEMS (on paper, kids!) in 1994. I asked him, "So, you write about video games too?" He said, "Yeah." We started hanging out playing games... a lot. I didn't know anyone else at the time who liked to play Atari 2600 and Commodore 64 games. He eventually nudged me to the Internet (or, dragged me... kicking and screaming). When I encouraged him to start up his newsletter again, he said he would if I'd collaborate. We did that for couple of years. Sent out a lot of paper issues. Had a ball writing it. Going to World of Atari 98 (and then CGE 2003). Using interviews that we had conducted at those to feed the material for the newsletter. In 1999, it became a website. We've actually been pretty good about adding recent articles... Adam: Recently. Yeah. Chris: ... which is good for us. I don't know what any of this has to do with what you asked me. In 1982, we took a trip back East to Buffalo to visit family. My mom's sister's best friend had a son named Robert, who was a couple of years older than me (I was ten, he was probably twelve or thirteen). He was the kid who first showed me Adventure. Adam: Never heard of it. Chris: Summertime of '82 [mumbling/talked-over??] I got my mind blown by it. This same guy, Robert, took me into his basement to show me his Atari computer (I believe). He said not to touch it, because he had a program in memory. He was typing in a program and he had a magazine open. That's all I remember. I wish I had focused on the model number or which magazine it was. It looked like all of this gobbledygook on the screen. I was absolutely captivated because-- who didn't want to make his own videogames? I'd been playing Atari VCS games since February of '82. It became an obsession with me, on par with music (believe it or not). He said not to touch it because he hadn't saved it yet. I said, "How do ya save it?" You know what I mean? I didn't ask him any smart-ass questions: "Okay, ya gonna take a picture of the screen?" Adam: [Laughing] Chris: He said, "I save them on these." He showed me just a normal blank cassette, like you would listen to music on. That just entranced me: all of these innocent music cassettes hiding videogames on them. Adam: [Laughing] Chris: I learned how to program in BASIC that summer from a book checked out from the library. I mean, I just really got interested in talking to this new thing. This home computer: the microcomputer (as it was called quite often). The "micro" to separate them from "mainframes," because, you know, a lot of our friends had mainframes in their bedrooms. Adam: Right. Chris. Then he brought me over and showed me one more thing before we had to go. This was the Bally Professional Arcade. I thought it was one of the most amazing things I've ever seen. We played THE INCREDIBLE WIZARD. He let me play for a little while. I said, "This is just like WIZARD OF WOR!" He said, "Yeah, it is." I can't remember if he had an explanation, or had read an explanation, of why the name was changed. That was my only experience with the Astrocade. I loved the controller. To this day, it is still one of my favorite controllers. I love the trigger thing, and I love the combination of a joystick and a paddle in one knob on top of it. I didn't see another Astrocade until I started hanging out with you again in '97. It figures that you were able to collect all of that amazing stuff because you worked at Goodwill. Adam: I didn't use that to my advantage. Chris: [sarcastically] I'm sure you didn't! Adam: I wasn't allowed to do that. Chris: Yeah, well, I'm sure you didn't steal it... Adam: No. Chris: But I mean, come on!, you probably made note of what came in. Adam: There was actually a rule that I had to follow. When anything came in, it had to sit on the shelves for 24 hours before it could be purchased by an employee. That didn't mean we had to show everyone where it was, but it had to be out. And, that was true: it was out. That didn't mean we said... (because there were people that came in every single day, just like I used to like to go around too). It would be on the shelf, but that didn't mean it would be right on the front shelf, saying, "Buy me please, Atari game collector." It was in the store somewhere! Chris: You put it in the back, near the electric pencil sharpener! Adam: No, I didn't hide it either. I didn't want to get in trouble. Chris: Nah. I know. Adam had an original Odyssey with all of the layover-- the "layovers?" With all the airplane stops. No, with all the overlays. Adam: [Laughing] Chris: Which, is pretty amazing! You had an Odyssey, with original 1972 Magnavox console, with everything else: an Intellivision, he had an Odyssey 2 (with boxed QUEST FOR THE RINGS)... and... Adam: I had 43 different systems. Chris: Holy cow! Adam: I am so glad that I don't have that anymore! Chris: That is a lot for an apartment. Adam: So, now I have a few left. Chris: Yes, folks, he does have an Astrocade. Adam: I do. Chris: He does have all of the original cartridge games for it. I think you got all of them? Adam: I had them, but now I have a multicart. I got rid of most of them. I feel... I kept some of my favorites. I kept my prototypes. Chris: Which is cool. Obviously, you have WAR and CRAZY CLIMBER. Adam: Right. Chris: THE INCREDIBLE WIZARD. Adam: I think, I have number 2's, because the programmer got number 1's. Chris: That's pretty cool. Adam: Yeah. But, honestly, I don't care about the numbers on them. They were hand numbered, because collector seem to like that. Personally, since I did the numbering, I found it annoying. Chris: Well, there were fifty sold? Adam: There were fifty each. Yeah. There was a run of 20 for WAR, because we didn't have any cartridge shells. We got more, and we did the second run. The run of CRAZY CLIMBER was always 50. It was released all at once. Chris: You have number two, and [sarcastically], that's a collectors item.. Adam: Right! Chris: ...if anyone knew what it was. Adam: I should have got number 0! Think of this, this episode is a collector's item already! Chris: You taught me a great deal about the Astrocade and how it worked. You've told me some things that I just find... so cool. Like, you had to use the screen for code, because part of your available RAM was the Screen RAM, right? (And still is.) Adam: Under BASIC, that's correct. Chris: That's how I became even more interested in the Bally Arcade/Astrocade. Adam: We are about finished wrapping things up here. Just for the last few things to say. We are going to have an episode every two weeks (or so). So, that would be bimonthly. I hope you guys... if you have any ideas that you want to come up with, will send in some feedback. If we get no feedback by the first one, that's okay... because we expect... a couple of people... to listen to this. Chris: Thanks for listening, and thanks for inviting me along, Adam. Adam: Good to have ya! [End of episode]
Jim Beaver and the Down & Dirty Radio Show Powered By Polaris RZR are blowing up the X Games today! We’ve got 3 time X Games Gold Medalist Colten Moore on air talking about his new book “Chasing the Sky” and what it will take to win Gold this weekend. We’ve also got snowmobile legend and Snocross Adaptive racer Paul Thacker on air with Ami and Jim giving us the latest from Aspen and snocross. We’ll have a stacked DirtFish Rally Report with WRC, Rally America, GRC, WRX, and Ken Block news, Supercross talk with Ami Houde, and of course our Fantasy Supercross picks for Round 4 as well as all of the latest from the world of off-road and action motorsports! #GameOn
Jim Beaver and the Down & Dirty Radio Show Powered By Polaris RZR are bringing you another packed episode with some of the best in off-road and action motorsports! Lots of guests and lots of event coverage today! We’ll be talking Terracross, GRC LA, and WRC Australia, and on the line we will have FMX Legend and LOORRS and Terracross racer Ronnie Faisst, Snowmobile legend and TV personality Paul Thacker, the UTV Wolfpack will be on air talking about their big announcement, and Ami Houde will be back capping things off in typical Ami Houde fashion. It’s #GameOn on the #1 off-road and action motorsports radio show in the world!
© 2020-2025 Ivy Podcast Discovery LLC
