 The magazine of the Melbourne PC User Group Ed Said Rod Thompson |
Without a December issue of our Newsletter, I did not get the opportunity to offer tell members the very best wishes for the Christmas season, so let me now, even though we ere well into this new year, wish you all a successful, prosperous and joyful year from the Executive of the Group.
Reflecting momentarily on last year we saw this industry go through a number of phases. First we had The Mouse; the rodent came and went. Integrated software packages have been very big, windows have been very important and we have had the announcement of the IBM AT and the beginnings of networks. What does 1985 bring? Who knows? Lloyd may have some clues in his "I Heard it on the Grapevine" column. It does seen to me that this industry is becoming extremely consumer sales oriented, with some new gimmick each month or so.
The New Year resolution around here is to get out 11 newsletters this year. During the pest year we have had to learn a lot about publishing. More people have volunteered their services (many thanks) and there is now some semblance of forward planning.
Each recent newsletter has had a these, with a number of articles on that theme. It is proposed to continue that arrangement, and the themes proposed for the first few newsletters in 1985 will be:
| February March April May June July |
Communications Public Domain Software and Bulletin Boards Software Update Hardware Update Education & Training Networks |
If you would like to contribute an article in any Newsletter please contact
the Editor in your State, or me directly, for some guidance on our requirements. We will help in ell ways
that we can. This newsletter is for members of the affiliated User Groups in Australia, how about some more
Australian Contributions.
Overseas
You will have noted that much of the material we use comes form overseas, particularly from the IBM SIG of
the Boston Computer Society and also from the Capital PC User Group, as well as from IBM in the USA. Now we
are sending our newsletter to those groups and hope to see some of our articles published in their
newsletters.
New Staff
With this issue we welcome a new member to the editorial team. Leon Shappiro, Manager of the Myer Business
Computer Centre has taken on the production of the column for LOTUS 1-2-3 users. I thank him for accepting
this position, and know that he will get quite a lot of pleasure out of assisting the Group in this way.
We have a new Advertising Coordinator, Joe De Simone. This is an important position both financially for the
newsletter and also for promotion of the group in the industry. Thank you Joe for your help, end welcome to
the team.
Reviewers
I have had an offer from a Publisher of books on computer software for review. Are you interested in being a
reviewer? I am certain we could also get equipment for review. Anyone else interested? If you are, then phone
me at your convenience or see me at the next meeting and we can get organised. The only obligations are to
write a review article.
Newsletter Material
I am now equipped with a modem, and have been using the PC Connection Bulletin Board regularly. As well as
leaving some interesting reviews of software for downloading I have had some material left for inclusion in
the newsletter. This makes it very easy for me to use, rather than having to type in articles from hard copy.
If you are interested in writing something, you can leave messages for me on the Bulletin Board and upload
material into the Newsletter Directory.
Next Issue
Submission date for material to be included in the March issue of the Newsletter is 20 February 1985.
Reprinted from the February 1985 issue of PC Update, the
magazine of Melbourne PC User Group, Australia
