Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!swrinde!cs.utexas.edu!solo.csci.unt.edu!vaxb.acs.unt.edu!news From: wright@etsuv2.etsu.edu (BRIAN WRIGHT) Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.misc Subject: Re: AMIGA DEMOS: Europe VS. USA Keywords: demos Message-ID: <1991Apr23.071311.46295@vaxb.acs.unt.edu> Date: 23 Apr 91 11:40:48 GMT References: <20691@brahms.udel.edu> Reply-To: wright@etsuv2.etsu.edu Organization: East Texas State University Lines: 66 Nntp-Posting-Host: etsuv2.etsu.edu In article <2491@swrinde.nde.swri.edu>, kent@swrinde.nde.swri.edu (Kent D. Polk) writes... >In article <20691@brahms.udel.edu> jon@brahms.udel.edu (Jon Deutsch) writes: >> >>About amiga demos: >> >>It just seems to me that from the evidence I've been shown, >> >>-- Europeans seem to get the 'head start' on computing, seeing that the >> average demo-writer in Europe is still in his teens. > >I think you have hit on something here. I wonder if it isn't that >comparatively few U.S. teenagers are developing software on any >platform. I personally only know of a couple who do. Most are too busy >going to the mall, etc. on weekends. I may be flamed for what I am about to say, but here it is anyway. :-) I think this comes to the difference between Europe and the US. Teens in America are very short on attention span. I think this comes from watching television too much. I mean, the commercials are so fast, the shows are so fast it teaches the teens to have a short attention span. Programming something like a demo takes patience and perserverance that only limited numbers of teens here actually have. I know my attention span as a teen was very limited and I didn't feel like I want to spend my free time learning a computer. I think it also comes to computer literacy too. A lot of teens are afraid of learning the computer as being branded a nerd or something. Peer pressure is always a factor as to what teens will and won't do. Obviously, in Europe it is 'COOL' to code demos. Here you'd be branded a computer nerd or a brain if you coded demos, no matter how cool they were. Teens don't like to be branded, they want to be one of the crowd. >Those who are older, with jobs, are writing the productivity software. >I know I certainly have no time to even THINK of anything other that >what I absolutely have to create. Cash is always on everyone's mind. That is how to get cash. I think (and I may be flamed for generalizations) that teens here are pushed by their parents to be bread winners early on. As well as teens want to 'go to the movies' 'mall' 'have a car' 'eat out' 'buy clothes' etc etc. So they need cash. To get cash they have to get a job. Hence, less time for coding. This isn't to say the European teens don't want this too, but more European teens choose to do computer coding than do American teens. I think it partly because of the peer and parent pressures here and probably several other factors as well that keep teens from learning to code. >Sure wish we could harness all that European creativity and free time >into better productivity software... Yes, they could make some awesome productivity software with all of their coding ability. I know that some really awesome Multimedia software could come from them. Unfortunately, most coders do not like the multitasking part of the Amiga. They prefer to hit the hardware and by pass the slow multitasking. Just to think, having some of the vectorgraphic, vectorball, plasma, copper tricks at your disposal along with IFF images and sounds all rolled into a productivity multimedia package. I can't imagine. >===================================================================== >Kent Polk - Southwest Research Institute - kent@swrinde.nde.swri.edu > "Duct Tape is like the Force... >It has a Light Side, a Dark Side, and it holds the Universe together" >===================================================================== -------------------------------------------------------------- Brian Wright wright%etsuvax2@ricevm1.rice.edu or wright@etsuvax2.bitnet --------------------------------------------------------------