I totally see where your coming from Mayhem, but where i would draw a distinct line between the 2 is somewhere like this:Mayhem wrote:There is, and I agree. Where I see Marty coming from, and I do see his PoV, is that people can and will read what people post on forums, and take that as fact, when there may actually be a degree of uncertainty about it. Propagation of incorrect information. Dress a lie up convincingly, and people think it's real, even if it's later proven to be false. They've forgotten by that point, and don't care. It's how many tabloids get their sales, and the later retractions are in a small box that nobody reads or recalls in the future.Lost Dragon wrote:but if you cannot understand my point of view that there's a massive gulf between writing a forum post and that of writing for a professional publication
Yes, I know that's definitely not what you're doing here, but having tried to cut through enough misinformation in pursuit of the Atari book, Marty still has his cautious hat on, it appears to me. Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong here Marty.
I post something on a forum, which to best of my knowledge is 'true', i feel it's reasonable to put up, as i know it's source, unlike say something a quick Goggle search might throw up and i know it was made at that point, in realation to that incident, so by the by bloody good chance it's real.However, if it's not, by the very nature of the forum, others can say hang on, your almost right or...you don't want to believe that, here's 'proof' of what really happened and here's 2 accounts to 'prove it'.
Now, with a forum, an incorrect fact or statement can be ammended, very easily and a wealth of resources brought to bear to make a case.
On the flipside, i as a subscriber to RetroGamer magazine, paid my money, mag pops through door, ahhh article on Myth (sorry JD
) a game i know pretty damn well, now researcher has done his/her bit, tracked down publisher etc, but, oops, said publisher gets bit confused, gives a false claim (here ST Myth was finished and released), in it goes to the article, readers think it must be 100% correct as look, publishers named, spoken to directly, it's 'in' the magazine, it must be right...Said magazine gets read by far, far greater % than the mags forum and there's no physical way to correct that error, unless following months issue prints a correction, (other than fact being corrected on forum and even then the magazine readership won't all be reading the post, let alone the forum), so falsehood is out in the wild.
Now Marty was kind enough to say he was taken on by RG as a 'fact checker' but is that just in terms of the magazine articles, or does it also include the forum? and (please DO NOT take offence at this Marty...) whilst Marty is, without question an expert in his field, from personal observations, i guess he's far more an expert on Atari in terms of the US side and not so much the UK side, as if he were, he'd perhaps have been aware of what the likes of Bob Gleadow were telling the UK press back in the day?.
I've seen this 1st hand on Atari Age forum, where US posters were totally unaware of things like the System 3 adverts in UK magazines proclaiming Last Nija coming soon on Atari 800/130 XL/XE and when it's mentioned, initally there's uproar.It's almost as if they panic as there's gasp, stuff..they were not aware of....hence the defensive approach i've encountered and it's only once likes of myself explain sources, things calm down.
Basically the door swings both ways, no-one, least of all myself is trying to disprove anyones claims or put ourselves in same league as Marty G and say we're resident Atari experts, as that'd be laughable and brings me back to difference between throw away forum posts and paid for work.
I've not read Marty (and Curt's) book,on Atari, but quick look at the blurb on Amazon talks of it being:nearly 8 years in the making, thousands of documents, 100's of interviews etc etc, which is fantastic, researched to the hilt, but then it's for a paid for product so as a potential buyer, i'd expect research of this type and the book to deliver articles with depth not found elsewhere, but you cannot seriousily expect anywhere near that level of research for a forum post, let alone an article in RG magazine, that'd just be crazy, the articles/post's just are'nt expected to stand up to that level of examination.Using the System 3/Myth feature again, researcher did everything he needed to do for that article, spoke to the right people etc, but errors still crept in and he was'nt aware of the C64 cartridge release either, until i mentioned it.
The simple fact is, if you go back a few years, RG lacked enough people with A8 knowledge and it showed.A8 versions of games at best got a mention, i saw more detailed looks at C16/BBc versions of games than the A8 in cases, the A8 version left off formats a game appeared on etc etc as the writers simply were not aware of them in any detail, if at all.Thankfully the situation has greatly improved, but it's clear there's still a lack of knowledge in terms of the UK side of Atari, be it from the corporation or gamers point of view as some of the staff writers only now discovering the hardware in any real depth (which is great) and did'nt own hardware at the time or are far more USA based in areas of expertise, which you need also as RG is sold overseas.
The forum allows likes of myself to post up extra layers of info to the articles in RG.The information is freely given, for benifit of all.As far as i'm aware no-one has yet mentioned Atari's UK TV ad.falling foul at a crucial time and the huge impact the delay had, there's unreported material on other Atari formats i've put up, people enjoyed (Jaguar 20 thread) got even more to come and yes, sources will be named.
Yapping about Atari UK claims/quotes etc is just a time killer for myself, harmless, i like to get debates going, shed new light on subjects, whatever, but it's not, nor do i intend it to become, my day job, or a source of any income, so no, i'm not, in a month of sundays going to do more than i currently do, when posting:Name the source and the time quote was made and let people decide for themselves if it was worth beliving.
Think Marty was a little 'harsh' on UK magazines as, along with Atari Uk figures being interviewed, they'd also interview and get the story from retailers and dealerships.Silica shop (main UK Atari dealer) often interviewed with it's MD, Tony Deane talking about A8 sales, along with marketing manager John Arundel, so the news articles always had balance, it was'nt just Atari UK's side of the story.
Other than Atari UK figures mentioned so far, you'd also find quotes from Atari V.P Sig Hartman, UK sales/marketing manager Paul Welch, etc so it was'nt just Bob Gleadow and Bob Katz who gave the interviews.So, you see there were multiple sources to these claims i've put up Marty.
Fact is, at time Atari said they were looking to replace the 7800 with the 65XE, there were around 350,000 A8 users in UK, if figures are to be believed (early'87) and by Autumn of 1987, the 2600 had a R.R.P of £49.99 here in UK and Atari UK saw it as a low end product, one aimed at the younger end of the market, the 65 XE was intended to replace it (or as Atari UK said, carry the flame for the A8 range), as the flagship A8 product.Atari Uk were hoping it'd revitalise theat sector of the UK market for them.So i'm more than happy to stand by claims i've made regarding the UK scene, based on research and multiple sources or accounts, i've to hand.If you or anyone else has differing material, please post it up.
Plus, if the claim made in the quote is wrong, i've told those who might want to correct it, just who said it, so they can track'em down, interview them and ask them just why they said it, rather than ask me to name source material, era quotes were made etc, so kinda baffled why they (who have the resources to find and interview Ex-Atari staff/coders etc for books and RG articles) are'nt jumping on Skype/Facebook/whatever else whizzkids use these days and asking the industry figures themselves...could be good few future articles in those themselves....If i had the tools to track down these figures i'd search'em out and put the questions..so over to our Atari writers and fact finders to do just that.I've given you the quotes, you've the ball, run with it...
One for Marty G, who might not be aware of how some UK software houses treated arrival of Atari's 8-bit games console, The XE:
