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Re:81 Jokes for the ZX81 by stephbu on Wednesday October 28, 2026 @12:52AM (#50269472)
Yes, my dad bought me a ZX81 when I was nine, and got bitten by the thrill of creation. At 18 I dropped out of college, my then lecturer told me I’d never get paid to play games. I bullied my way into the industry, and ended up in the US working for the two of the Mag7, many AAA titles, and a couple of game console platforms.

I’m only a few months away from retiring. I still remember Z80 mnemonics and machine code equivalents even today.

Re:81 Jokes for the ZX81 by neilwilson on Wednesday October 28, 2026 @05:25AM (#50270987)
Oh to C9 to those days...
Re:81 Jokes for the ZX81 by Scubabear68 on Wednesday October 28, 2026 @09:37AM (#50273334)
I was able to talk my dad into getting the U.S. equivalent, the Timex-Sinclair 1000, which had double the RAM - 2K! It was only possible because it was only about $100, compared to every other computer at the time which was way out of our lower-middle class reach.

I spent a lot of time doing stupid animations using the character set and it set me on my path of software for life.