 The magazine of the Melbourne PC User Group Monthly News |
Our most recent meeting was held on Wednesday 20th February at the regular venue. A group of about 50 people attended, for what turned out to be a rather entertaining and informative night. Past President, Lloyd Borrett, (still lingering in Melbourne) chaired the meeting.
The Random Access session as at most recent meetings continued the discussions on the IBM AT. It is obvious that there is plenty of interest in the new model. A recent rumour has it that IBM will cease support for the PC in 1986.
Felicity St. John (of Kairinsky & Associates P/L) from Sydney provided a demonstration of a new hardware/software package called PENPAD, a Graphic Arts system. Despite the difficult conditions encountered in trying to demonstrate use of such a system to this number of people using a normal colour monitor, the demonstration was well presented and members were extremely interested in the very powerful package.
Calls for a volunteer to take on the position of President fell on deaf ears. A sheet outlining the vacant positions on the Newsletter production team was circulated seeking help. Without volunteers to fill these positions, the Group will shortly slide into decline. A second sheet sought details of member interests in Hardware and Software products to assist planning of future meetings and Newsletter content.
Main speaker for the evening, was Kevin Fitzgerald from the Computer Abuse Bureau of the Caulfield Institute of Technology. It was obvious from the almost continuous exchange between speaker and members, that the subject was of interest to all. In addition to detailing how the various forms of abuse had been categorised, Kevin produced statistics for these in Australia, which in fact show that at present the reported abuse is only a small problem by comparison with other crime. However, abuse can be expected to increase significantly and Management can and needs to put in place safeguards for prevention. The Law currently cannot handle the rapid change in Technology, but it is expected that Legislation will in the future adapt as the problem becomes more significant. From discussion it became obvious that reported cases of abuse were only a small fraction of the actual position. Thanks Kevin for your time and very informative talk. If any members have details of specific cases of computer abuse I am certain that Kevin would like to hear from you.
Ron Dunn, has offered to coordinate a new SIG, the Programmers and Technical Special Interest Group.
Thanks to the ten members who handed in the survey sheet. For further details refer to the relevant section of this issue.
Discussions continued well after the close of the meeting, moving over to a very sociable gathering in the Bar.
See YOU at the next meeting.
Reprinted from the March 1985 issue of PC Update, the magazine of Melbourne PC User Group, Australia
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