This month on Open Apple, Mike and Ken chat with Charles Mangin, the mad scientist who puts Mac Minis inside Apple II cases and inventor of the RetroConnector. It’s our first show since KansasFest, and we share our highlights and favorite products and announcements from the show. The Steve Jobs film is now out, and Ashton Kutcher and Steve Wozniak have words while critics publish their own mixed reviews. However, we have nothing but praise for Walter Isaacson’s biography, and Steve Wozniak gets his own moment in the spotlight courtesy interviews with the Verge and Game Informer. We’re super-psyched that Eric Shepherd has established the S-Prize — how big will the pot grow before some enterprising programmer claims it?

Click past the jump for links mentioned in this episode.

Introduction (0:00 – 7:46)

• Open ANTIChertz KansasFest episode
• Open Apple interview with Steve Wozniak in audio and video
• “Have you ever wondered why we’re here?”

User Login (7:47 – 37:09)

• Charles Mangin of Mental Hygiene, RetroConnector, and Twitter
• Charles’ KansasFest 2013 interview on Computerworld

II News (37:10 – 1:48:44)

• No VCF Southwest 4.0!
• Melissa Barron’s 73H 0r3g0n 7r41L game mod
• Interactive Fiction Competition 2013, as sponsored by Juiced.GS
• Wade Clarke’s Leadlight game for Eamon
• Jason Scott’s Get Lamp documentary
• Steve Wozniak interviewed by The Verge and Game Informer
• Steve Wozniak secretly submitted Tetris scores to Nintendo Power
• The Jobs movie Web site, poster, and trailer
• Ken’s review of Jobs
• Ashton Kutcher and Steve Wozniak trade barbs
• Lawless Legends 8-bit RPG
• The history of Sierra On-Line documentary failed Kickstarter
• Missing in Action: 8-Bit Generation documentary
• When Kickstarter investors want their money back
• Juiced.GS in 2014 & three new Concentrate PDFs
• Sweet16 v3.0.1
• Eric Shepherd’s S-Prize to bring the Samba networking protocol to the IIGS
• Lewis Kornfeld of Radio Shack and Tandy passes away
• Rare Apple-1 fetches $387,750 in Christie’s online auction
• Apple II #0148 sells for $24,099
• Woz-edition IIGS sells for $610
• Shut up and take my money!

While attending KansasFest 2013, Steve Wozniak — inventor of the Apple-1 and Apple II and co-founder of Apple Computer Inc. — takes a moment to speak with the Open Apple podcast about Steve Jobs, Randy Wigginton, and the Apple II.

Be sure to listen to the story of how we got Woz to KansasFest, and watch the video of this interview, too!

Mike Maginnis and Ken Gagne, the hosts of Open Apple, join forces with Carrington Vanston of 1 MHz and Kay Savetz of ANTIC, for one massive retro computing roundtable at KansasFest 2013. We chat about the convention’s two surprise guests — Steve Wozniak and a working Apple-1 — and how both came to be there, as well as our favorite sessions and games of the week, including Michael Sternberg’s tournament of Martin Haye’s Structris.

It wasn’t long before Mike and Ken ditched the two other guys for the most amazing guest ever. Be sure to listen to our interview with Steve Wozniak!

This month on Open Apple, Mike and Ken chat with Mike Willegal, Apple-1 and Apple II reproduction expert extraordinaire. His topic is hot this month: five Apple-1 computers were simultaneously on display at the History San Jose museum; one is being auctioned online; Willegal was interviewed for a Kickstarter-funded book about the Apple-1; and his clones are appearing in a feature-length film about Steve Jobs — what a guy! He even went to Vintage Computer Festival Southeast this spring, though he’ll be absent from VCF Southwest, KansasFest, and Oz KFest, all occurring this summer. We watch the trailer for the Jobs movie and find we all have different reasons to see (or skip) Ashton Kutcher in the title role. We may or may not have dressed up to see the recent Star Trek and Man of Steel films; maybe we’ll fit the part by wearing some Apple t-shirts from 1986 to see Jobs.

Click past the jump for links mentioned in this episode.

Introduction (0:20 – 7:10)

User Login (7:11 – 31:51)

• Mike Willegal’s homepage
• Vintage Computer Festival (VCF) East 7.0
• VCF Southeast 1.0
• Apple II Rev 0 motherboard clone
• Apple-1 Mimeo Project
• Apple-1 Registry
• Computerworld: Apple-1 goes for $213K in Christie’s auction
• Vince Briel’s Replica 1
• Mike Willegal’s SCELBI reproduction

II News (31:52 – 1:44:47)

• Melissa Barron on the Open Apple podcast
• Melissa’s glitch art to appear at the Furtherfield Gallery in London
• KansasFest
• The 30th anniversary of WarGames
• Oz KFest
• Mt. Keira Fest
• Google Fiber arrives in Kansas City
• Tokyo Video Chat at KansasFest 2012
• Rockhurst recognized in the Computerworld Honors Program
• VCF Southwest
• Apple pop-up museum
• Classic Computing list
• Robert J. Luther’s The First Apple on Kickstarter
• Robert J. Luther on Bloomberg News
• Jason Scott feels “there’s no book there”
• What’s Where in the Apple on Kickstarter
• Five Apple-1 computers at History San Jose
• Conway’s Game of Life for Apple II
• Conway for iOS
• Apple-1 auction expected to go for $500,000
• Original Apple II #47 sels for $23,099 on eBay
• The geeks who saved Prince of Persia’s source code from digital death
• Prince of Persia source code from Jordan Mechner, Adam Green, and Fabien Sanglard
• Electronic Arts is America’s worst company
• Apple II developer of Madden sues Electronic Arts
• Apple’s clothing collection from 1986
• Apple T-Shirts: A Yearbook of History at Apple Computer
• Appledesign: The Work of the Apple Industrial Design Group
• Dave Finnigan’s The New Apple II User’s Guide
• Jason Scott’s upgrade guarantee
• Juiced.GS Concentrate
• Doug Cuff with Wil Wheaton and Felicia Day
• Steve Jobs: “All my work will be obsolete by 2005”
• Mom’s first iPad: An unexpected reception
• Jobs starring Ashton Kutcher releases August 16
• Official movie trailer for Jobs
• Matthew Modine
• Rhode Island Apple Group Floppy Disk Crate 001, courtesy Jason Scott
• Oregon Trail on eBay
• Darth Vader Bell & Howell Apple II with A/V backpack

This month on Open Apple, Mike and Ken chat with Lon Seidman, sysop of the Matrix Returns BBS and co-host of Behind the Video. The dial-up bulletin board is making a comeback, thanks to Warp Six and the Raspberry Pi! It’s so easy, anyone can do it — unlike buying an Apple-1, the going rate for which has skyrocketed to $668,000 USD. But even that is a pittance compared to what Steve Wozniak’s former house is selling for. How long before he sells his current house and moves to Australia? Jordan Mechner’s Karateka reboot has paved the way for Karateka Classic on iOS, just the way we remember it. Charles Mangin also blends new and old with his USB interfaces for the Apple II — get yours next month at KansasFest! Finally, if you want a GET LAMP coin or any of Jason Scott’s documentaries shipped overseas, you’re outta luck — but he has four new films coming, with a colleague’s pinball film en route as well.

Click past the jump for links mentioned in this episode.

Introduction (0:08 – 5:39)

• Arrested Development season 4
• The Pubcast podcast

User Login (5:40 – 27:09)

• Lon Seidman
• Behind the Video
• Synchronet BBS
• Age of Reason BBS shuts down
• Matrix Returns BBS
• Raspberry Pi
• Warp Six by Jim Ferr, as featured on TWiT
• SyncTERM
• Space Ship of Death door game
• Apple II Enthusiasts on Facebook
• BBS: The Documentary
• Lon’s Apple IIGS on TWiT
• Dick DeBartolo, MAD‘s Maddest Writer

II News (27:10 – 1:38:48)

• Apple-1 sells for record price of $668,000
• Full lot includes Curta calculators
• CurtaSim wins at HackFest 2012
• The Geeks Who Saved Prince of Persia’s Source Code From Digital Death
• Prince of Pesia source code, now with documentation and quick start
• Jordan Mechner’s development journal e-books
• How to pronounce “Karateka”
• Karateka Classic for iOS
• Classic Prince of Persia for Xbox
• Boulder Dash XL for iOS, Android, and Xbox 360
• Spy vs Spy for the Apple II and iOS
• Wings of Valor
• Apple II-themed Minecraft server on Apple2Forever.ca
• Brendan Roberts’ Minecraft mods
• XCOM: The Enemy Unknown
• John Carmack’s Apple IIc for Christmas
• Dan Budiac’s Apple IIc unboxing album on Flickr
• Shareware Games > DuelTris”>DuelTris by Steve Chiang of Zynga
• Apple pop-up museum at Vintage Computer Festival Southeast 1.0
• Steve Wozniak gives commencement speech at UC Berkeley
• I, Woz autobiography
• The Apple II on G4’s ICONS
• Steve Wozniak’s house for sale, but nobody wants it — check the listing!

This month on Open Apple, Mike and Ken chat with famed demo programmer Daniel Kruszyna, aka krüe. We chat about @party, the upcoming fourth annual demoparty to be held in recently beleaguered Boston, and how even non-programmers will find plenty to like. The first of three movies based on the life of Steve Jobs is now available for free online streaming — what’s the popular verdict on iSteve? There’s still more CFFAs coming from Rich Dreher, and they’ll work on even an original Apple-1, of which Mike Willegal is making yet more replicas. Speaking of clones, we found a “Redstone” Apple IIe clone in Australia that looks like a PC XT and is certainly no Tiger Learning Computer.

Click past the jump for links mentioned in this episode.

Introduction (0:13 – 4:56)

• Boston Marathon bombings and their effect on MIT and Boston
• StarFest

User Login (4:57 – 23:34)

• Daniel Kruszyna, aka krüe
• @party 2010
• Waterline demo, as seen on Apple II Bits
• Drift demo disk, as seen in Juiced.GS
• Treehugger printer driver for GS/OS
• Opus II: The Works from Syndicomm
• Programming the 65816 by Western Design Center
• Wade Clarke, Antoine Vignau, and Melissa Barron
• Notacon 2011
• pixeljam
• Leadlight interactive fiction game
• Brazil demo
• Satin Weave

II News (23:35 – 1:10:38)

• KansasFest opens for registration
• VCF Southeast 1.0
• Vintage Computer Festival Southeast 2013 in 5 minutes
• Apple Pop-Up Museum
• @party 2013 demoparty to be held at MIT
• Moleman 2: The Art of the Algorithm
• Gina Saikin passes away
• iSteve on Funny or Die
• Reviews of iSteve from Wired and Macworld
• Steve Jobs’ Apple IIe is back on the market
• PCWorld slideshow: What’s your obsolete tech really worth on eBay?
• T40 ASCII art editor from Brutal Deluxe
• fortycolumns gallery of T40 art, curated by krue
• ADTPro updated to v1.2.7
• Ivan Drucker’s A2SERVER
• March issue of Juiced.GS ships
• Another run of Rich Dreher’s CFFA3000
• CFFA1 for Apple-1 and replicas
  

Apple Pickings (1:10:39 – 1:27:23)

• Redstone Apple IIe clone in Australia
• Restoring and repairing Apple II clones
• Tiger Learning Computer licensed Apple IIe clone
• Steve Wozniak now has his very own baseball card — available from Amazon and eBay

This month on Open Apple, Mike and Ken chat with Earl Evans, Retrobits podcast host and Commodore 64 enthusiast — but we don’t hold that against him. Registration for KansasFest 2013 is open, and we all want to go, but Earl has another destination in mind. Tech history is being unearthed before our eyes, with schematics for operating systems and circuit boards appearing in museums (where the price is right) and art galleries (where it’s not). Brutal Deluxe is on a tear, releasing retroprogramming utilities for Windows and commercial games for the Apple II; we’re big fans! But not all news is happy news: the Steve Jobs film has been delayed, and LucasArts has closed its doors — will we ever get another Maniac Mansion game for the Apple II? Maybe not, but Richard Garriott’s successful Kickstarter gave fans a chance to pick up an original copy of Akalabeth. Better late than never!

Click past the jump for links mentioned in this episode.

Introduction (0:00 – 9:20)

• An apology to Mr. Egan Ford
• Behind the scenes with Open Apple
• Boston’s WordPress community
• Dave Ross (csixty4) on Twitter

User Login (9:21 – 23:16)

• Brent Spiner is unhireable since “the incident”
• Earl Evans of the Retrobits podcast
• Martin Haye’s Super-Mon
• Ivan Drucker’s Structured Applesoft
• Rooster Teeth

II News (23:17 – 1:22:44)

• KansasFest 2013 registration opens
• Randy Wigginton to keynote KansasFest
• Steve Wozniak & Randy Wigginton at Denver Apple Pi
• Apple schematics as works of arts
• Disk II operating system schematics and code revealed
• “The best minds of my generation are thinking about how to make people click ads.”
• Where’s the tech in The Social Network?
• New batch of Alex Freed’s Applicard 20 MHz Z80 cards?
• Bill Buckels’ BMP2RAG, HMONSTER, and BIN2RAG
• Brutal Deluxe’s Mr Sprite
• Celebrating the 20th anniversary of Brutal Deluxe
• Brutal Deluxes releases physical, commercial Apple II game, Zephyr
• Battle Kid: Fortress of Peril for 8-bit Nintendo Entertainment System
• David Schmenk’s QuickCam capture
• Lego Apple II by Chiukeung
• jOBS film delayed
• iSteve trailer starring Justin Long hits FunnyorDie
• Apple II at PAX East 2013
• Disney closes LucasArts
• ScummVM game emulator
• The Dig on Steam
• Another World (aka Out Of This World) for Mac
• Eamon Deluxe newsletter for March 2013 (PDF)
• Eamon for Apple IIGS tech demos
• GET LAMP text adventure documentary
• Richard Garriott’s Shroud of the Avatar: Forsaken Virtues on Kickstarter
• Brian Fargo’s Torment and Veronica Mars projects on Kickstarter

Apple Pickings (1:22:55 – 1:32:21)

• Stephen Buggie’s Computist magazine collection
• 11 new Atarisoft games
• Arcade Ambience
• Google Nose (beta)
• Z-80 expansion card

This month on Open Apple, Mike and Ken chat with Egan Ford, aka the datajerk, the Apple-1 and II programmer extraordinaire responsible for the Apple II Game Server Online! Egan expertly demonstrates which CPU is faster, the 6502 or 8088, running circles around everyone listening. Laurie Spiegel is an Apple II user you may not have heard of, but extraterrestrials have, thanks to her contributions to Voyager’s Golden Record; we have some of her music for you to listen to. Courtesy Facebook and scanners, we save Don Worth’s magazines from the trash and Softalk from extinction, but we can’t save derelict hardware from abandoned buildings. Will Steve Wozniak be as good a commencement speaker as the late Steve Jobs? Having heard Woz at KansasFest, we weigh in.

(Please also note a correction to this episode.)

Click past the jump for links mentioned in this episode.

Introduction (0:00 – 5:37)

• No Quarter podcast
• Small Wonder TV sitcom
• Operation Rainfall: How a fan campaign brought Nintendo to its knees
• Videogame History Museum
• Will Win/Should Win: The NAVGTR Awards Debate, a PAX East 2013 panel moderated by Ken

User Login (5:38 – 35:12)

• Egan Ford’s the jerkwerks
• Aztec C compiler
• Codebreaker game for the Apple-1
• c2d (code to disk) utility
• Apple II Game Server Online! & Disk Server (based on the original Apple Game Server
• π Day: Apple II vs. HP-41C & Rematch
• Which is faster, 6502 or 8088?
• Apple II emulator for iPad

II News (35:13 – 1:21:52)

• Bill Budge releases source code for Pinball Construction Set, to be followed by GDC postmortem
• Laurie Spiegel’s Web site
• JPL’s Starship Voyager and its Golden Record
• Laurie Spiegel’s Music Machine
• “The Harmony of the World“
• An interview with Laurie Spiegel
• “The Expanding Universe“
• More music by Laurie Spiegel
• Music Mouse — an intelligent instrument
• David Greelish’s Kickstarter for Vintage Computer Festival Southeast 1.0
• VCF SE 1.0 to feature a “pop-up museum”
• Robert Tinney to keynote VCF SE 1.0
• VCF East 9.0 postponed
• “Brisfest” an Australian Apple II convention

Apple Pickings (1:21:53 – 1:40:38)

• Apple II Processor Cards: The Book
• Steve Weyhrich‘s Sophistication & Simplicity: The Life & Times of the Apple II Computer, from Variant Press
• Apple IIe w/original packaging — rare!
• Apple II (not plus) #6684
• Apple IIGS ROM 03, excellent condition
• Apple IIe, brand new, in original box, never unpacked

This month on Open Apple, Mike and Ken chat with Jimmy Maher, the historian behind the renowned blog The Digital Antiquarian. A published author, Jimmy provides us with his perspective on the pros and cons of going with a publishing house over the recent trend in retrocomputing toward self-publishing. We gripe about the Steve Jobs film sacrificing historical accuracy for mass appeal and recommend some alternative movies that get it right. We’re still loving iOS as a platform for classic gaming ports, from the adventure game Transylvania to the recently released Lode Runner Classic. Speaking of platforms, which is better: the Apple II or the Commodore 64? The answer may not be as obvious as you think! Finally, we offer a cautionary tale to vintage computer collectors whose inventory may be at the mercy of an avaricious landlord.

Click past the jump for links mentioned in this episode.

Introduction (0:00 – 13:45)

• Open Apple #1, two years ago this month
• No Quarter classic arcade game podcast
• The 1Up barcade in Denver
• 1Up purchases Twin Galaxies
• Funspot‘s American Classic Arcade Museum
• Going Cardboard
• MIT Medical
• PB403: Electronic Publishing at Emerson College
• Visual 6502
• Drift demo disk by Daniel Kruszyna, Antoine Vignau, Melissa Barron — and Wade Clarke!

User Login (13:46 – 36:23)

• Jimmy Maher’s The Digital Antiquarian
• The Future Was Here, an Amiga book by Jimmy Maher
• Jimmy’s posts about Oregon Trail and The Hobbit
• Let’s Tell a Story Together: A History of Interactive Fiction
• “Why You Should Follow the Digital Antiquarian“, by Jason Scott

II News (36:24 – 1:28:33)

• First look at jOBS biopic
• Steve Wozniak on what’s wrong with jOBS
• Feedback about jOBS on Facebook
• jOBS to feature Mike Willegal’s Mimeo!
• Micro Men, a BBC documentay about Clive Sinclair
• Sophistication & Simplicity book of Dr. Steve Weyhrich’s Apple II History
• Atari Inc.: Business is Fun by Curt Vendel
• The New Apple II User’s Guide by David Finnigan
• Every Apple TV ad (ever made)
• Atari files for bankruptcy
• Kickstarter in the UK
• Elk Cloner virus creator Rich Skrenta looks back
• RetroChallenge Winter Warmup
• ByteBagger
• A2Central Down-Under Chat, hosted by Andrew Roughan
• Samurai IRC CDA
• Lode Runner Classic for iOS, Android, Windows Phone
• Transylvania Adventure for iOS
• Choplifter for XBLA on Microsoft Xbox 360
• AtariAge asks what’s better: Apple II or Commodore 64?
• Super Crate Box coming to C64, as reported by CheckPoint

Apple Pickings (1:28:34 – 1:41:31)

• Pravetz 8C Bulgarian clone of Apple IIe
• Apple IIc prototype
• Sellam Ismail’s tale of woe

Having gathered the treasures of 2012 and being tempted by the promises of 2013, the hosts of Open Apple are joined by Andy Molloy of Juiced.GS, Peter Neubauer of KansasFest, Vince Briel of Briel Computers, and Antoine Vignau of Brutal Deluxe to reflect on all that has happened with the Apple II and its community in the past year. We pick our favorite products, share memorable events, and make predictions for 2013. Topics include Apple-1 auctions, Kickstarter-funded sequels, progress in emulation, and more.

Click past the jump for links mentioned in this episode.

Introduction (0:00 – 4:58)

• Andy Molloy’s homepage
• Peter Neubauer’s homepage
• Vince Briel’s homepage
• Brutal Deluxe’s homepage

Hardware (4:59 – 17:43)

• Rich Dreher’s CFFA3000
• Mike Willegal’s SUPERPROTO and Apple-1 Mimeo projects
• Briel Computers’ A2MP3 card
• a2RetroSystems’ Uthernet card
• Cedric Peltier’s Smartport Virtual Hard Drive (SPVHD)

Apple-1 (17:44 – 26:02)

• Brain Board with Wozanium Pack
• Ray Borrill’s VCF 4.0 auction of an Apple-1

Emulation (26:03 – 33:32)

• Eric Shepherd’s Sweet16 emulator
• AppleWin
• Gerard Putter’s Virtual ][ emulator
• GSport, based on Kent Dickey’s KEGS
• Java Apple Computer Emulator (JACE) by Brendan Robert
• VICE
• Eamon Deluxe
• The Lost Treasures of Infocom for iOS

Software development (33:33 – 46:42)

• Ewen Wannop’s SNAP & SAFE
• Drift demo disk with custom floppy sleeves
• The Deadly Orbs game by Brian Picchi
• Martin Haye’s Structris
• Jordan Mechner’s Deathbounce
• Brutal Deluxe’s Fishhead copier
• Dagen Brock’s KansasFest 2013 demo

Game remakes and Kickstarter projects (46:43 – 54:11)

• Bard’s Tale for iOS (includes IIGS originals)

Publications & media (54:12 — 1:01:50)

• Dave Finnigan’s The New Apple II User’s Guide
• Kay Savetz’s Terrible Nerd memoir
• Rob O’Hara’s Commodork
• Jeff Atwood’s “I Was a Teenage Hacker”
• What’s Where in the Apple e-book
• Steve Weyhrich’s Sophistication & Simplicity
• Retro Gamer magazine
• Jimmy Maher’s Digital Antiquarian
• Juiced.GS: The Early Years

Podcasts (1:01:51 – 1:11:50)

• Retro Computing Roundtable
• 1 MHz by Carrington Vanston’s Monster Feet
• RetroMacCast
• Brian Picchi’s YouTube computer game reviews
• Not Another Apple Podcast?!
• Vintage Computer Festival Southeast 1.0

Top stories (1:11:51 – 1:18:02)

• Prince of Persia source code saved

KansasFest (1:18:03 – 1:27:19)

• Randy Wigginton to keynote KansasFest 2013
• Randy Brandt’s History of AppleWorks session
• Sara, an Apple III emulator
• Multi Emulator Super System (MESS)
• Melissa Barron’s Etsy shop
• ReactiveMicro.com — will it ever come back?
• Charles Mangin’s Mac mini inside a Disk II case

Participant picks from 2012 (1:27:20 – 1:34:12)

Predictions for 2013 (1:34:13 – 1:41:23)

• The now-defunct iDisk card

Parting shots (1:41:24 – 1:45:50)