July 2013
NEWSLETTER for July 2013 President’s Corner by Michael Current July 2013 In Atari bankruptcy news, on May 29 Atari SA (the parent company in France) announced the auction dates and minimum bids for the assets of its US subsidiaries: Atari Interactive Inc. (the entity owning the rights to the classic Atari intellectual properties along with the Atari trademark itself), California US Holdings Inc., Atari Inc., and Humongous Inc. 11 separate sets of assets will be up for auction over July 16-19, 2013. The Battlezone Franchise auction is set for July 18, minimum bid $250,000. The Atari Brand / Atari Classics / Atari Casino auction, the final and largest set of assets up for auction, is set for July 19, minimum bid $15,000,000. (Atari Casino, by the way, was the last significant thing they were developing before the bankruptcy process started in January. It's a real-money gambling app for iOS.) Stay tuned! My Atari research has been in high gear lately. I just recently "discovered" another head of Atari computer marketing from the early years. On February 2, 1981, Atari announced that Rigdon Currie, previously of Diablo, had joined Atari (Computer) as VP of marketing, replacing Conrad Jutson in the role. (Jutson was reassigned to be Atari VP corporate planning, consumer & computer products.) Currie was subsequently replaced by Thomas M. McDonough, who joined Atari (Home Computer) as SVP of sales and marketing in March 1982. I also recently learned that the very obscure Atari VIDCOM portable communications system for the non-verbal was more than a failed R&D experiment from the late 1970's, it actually got advertised! The new Atari Professional Products Division ran an ad on page 386 in the Oct/Nov 1978 issue of The Volta Review, the journal of the Alexander Graham Bell Association for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing. The ad appeared again in the December issue that fall as well. I actually visited the Wilson Library at the U of MN to see the ads in original paper format. I must admit, part of the draw was that I was expecting to find them in full color, but it
turned out they ran in black & white. A pretty amazing find nonetheless! SPACE Newsletter digitization update: Going back in time, month by month, I've made it back through September 1986 as of this writing. I expect to be able to make a lot of progress this summer. Visit space.atari.org to bring back old memories! Thanks, keep using that Atari, and come to your next SPACE meeting, Friday July 12, 2013. **********************************************
Treasurer's Report by Greg Leitner For June 2013
First off!! NO party next month as only Glen and myself have attended both the May and June SPACE meetings. Since no one else was there to discuss the event or to plan it, Glen and myself agreed as we were the only members present to hold off on the party until we get at least five members to decide the party. If interest in the Club is waning then let's have that discussion before we rack up more room rental expense. If we continue on until the end of the year we will need to collect another $100.00 from our members in the way of memberhips and dom purchases. The question I have is that if the Club can't survive into next year why would our current members want to renew this year. If that is going to be the fact then it would be better to discontinue the Club after the August meeting so we save the $100.00 room rental for the last four months of 2013. I definitely would not renew our room rental agreement at the end of this year knowing the lack of commitment I have witnessed the last two months. I don't want to be left holding the bag at year's end. As far as the treasury report for June just add another $3.00 for the DOM I purchased to the balance from last month and the $3.00 for the DOM I purchased in May. Sorry to be so negative but when I had the chance to accept an invitation to my son's cabin that he had rented for the week of our meeting, I declined to go until Saturday because I hold the
keys to the SPACE meeting and I figured I had to be there.
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I hope we can work everything out for the Club's sake, but there just doesn't seem to be enough interest anymore.
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Secretary's Report By Steve Peck For June 2013
No Secretary’s Report was submitted for the July Newsletter.
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