Softalk
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ISSN 0274-9629 | |
Softalk (
The startup capital for Softalk came from Margot Comstock, who had won on the television game show Password, along with a generous contribution after a few months from John Haller and from Comstock and Al Tommervik's second mortgage on their house. Partners William V R Smith III, William Depew contributed early office space in their Softape storeroom and arrived unexpectedly with office desks when Softalk moved into its own location.
Unlike other computer magazines that generally focused on a specific, narrow subject matter or market segment (e.g., business applications, games, or professional programming), Softalk gave broad coverage to all parts of the Apple world of the time, from
Another characteristic of the magazine was a playful, insider-like voice.[according to whom?] The experts in those early days chatted in their own relaxed language about the techniques and elements of their world. Bert Kersey, Beagle Bros, was one columnist; as were Doug Carlston, co-founder of Broderbund software; Mark Pelczarski, founder of Penguin Software; Bill Budge, creator of Pinball Construction Set; and Bill Depew, creator of Apple 21 and Magic Window.
A regular feature was a monthly chart of the most popular software in various categories, which was the Apple community's equivalent of the
Related publications
When the IBM PC came on the market, Softalk Publishing started "'Softalk for the IBM PC."' And with the advent of the Macintosh, Softalk Publishing launched Softalk Mac, written as ST. Mac. For a few years Softalk Publishing published a magazine begun by On-Line Systems: Softline, renamed to ST. Game for its final issue.
The disk magazine Softdisk was originally partly owned by Softalk, and survived on its own.
References
- ^ "Early Computer Game Genre Preferences (1980-1984) – Jonathan Lessard".
- ^ "Issue Profiles". The Softalk Apple Project. Retrieved 17 December 2015.
External links
- Softalk at the Internet Archive