@coolboymew Burgerlanders would never understand the happiness of having a cheap home computer that was designed, not only for playing, but also for learning and tinkering. Most of us discovered the pleasure of computer programming and electronics thanks to the Spectrums, Amstrads, MSX, etc.
Also, having a whole ecosystem of microcomputers, as opposed to today’s PC/Mac monopoly, lead to the publishing of technical books and magazines where you could learn more about your systems and get in touch with other fans.
It is my belief that the PC becoming the dominant architecture is responsible for us not having flying cars today, as we were promised, but a fuckton of js frameworks instead.
@josemanuel@qoto.org @coolboymew@shitposter.club I mean I get it, but at the end of the day the PC is a tool to get work done. There's a reason no one but gamers hand hobbyists bought the spectrum after all.
@swurl The PC in the 80s was a useless piece of metal and much more difficult to configure (I remember needing a professional to make MS DOS work in Spanish. That’s where the meme about “not repairing your computer” came from) than a Spectrum, but that’s not even the point.
A Spectrum was affordable. In a way, it was the first personal computer. IBM PCs were mighty expensive. You could say sir Clive Sinclair was the real creator of home computing.
Also, a Spectrum (and by Spectrum I mean all Z80-based computers, and even the Commodore and the Amiga) put you in control of your machine, which is what delighted us. The PC demoted all of us to users until Linux appeared. Nobody programmed on a PC in those days. We didn’t even know it was possible until the 1990s, and even then only with crap like GW BASIC.
So, yes, if you wanted to use WordPerfect or dBase III, I guess a PC was fine, but if you wanted to do real, creative, amazing stuff with computers, a PC was not the best option.
