Professor Schröter points out the historical significance of the C64: “For many people it was the first computer they ever interacted with outside the workplace. Through this machine, awareness of what a computer even is began to spread, giving rise eventually to a broad and diverse computer culture.” The C64 is the very root of today’s computer culture, and thus eminently suitable as a research object in media studies, Professor Schröter contends, who will be giving a talk at the conference on the emergence of subversive computer usage (cracking), which got started with technical gadgets on the C64.
Gaming researcher and computer archaeologist Stefan Höltgen, who teaches media and cultural studies courses using C64s at a C64 Lab he set up specially for the University’s Media Studies section, emphasizes how the platform is still usable today. The computer’s accessible architecture affords a didactic reduction that facilitates teaching the principles of hardware and software to students of non-technical subjects and the general public, he says, which remain the same principles underlying the systems in use today. “Actively using historic hardware furthermore enables ‘hands-on’ teaching of computer history, going beyond mere text, diagrams and museum pieces on display.”
At the conference, the Commodore 64 will be considered in its identity as pop culture icon, alongside presentations of a technical nature. The defining influence of the C64 on aesthetic practices, a persisting legacy, will be the subject of lectures on its pixel graphics and chip sounds, with an SID chiptunes lecture performance to be held on the first evening of the conference revealing the C64 to be a musical instrument. The content of the conference is to be documented and disseminated in book form.
The conference will be held in Bonn on Friday and Saturday July 5–6 in the Media Studies section at Lennéstraße 1, which is just across from the Arithmeum building. A hands-on workshop will then be held in the C64 Lab on Sunday, July 7 for anyone interested to learn how to program a C64, applying some of the things discussed and learned at the conference. The conference will be held in English, and all talks and lectures will be live streamed on the internet.
Admission to the conference is free of charge, which may be attended in person or online (the lectures only in the latter case). Registration and program at: http://rtro.de/c64
