Ian Griffiths, editor of Amiga Addict will be joining us at Kickstart 5 on Sunday.
The essential read for all Amiga owners and fans, Amiga Addict is a fantastic magazine and a great supporter of the user group community. Ian will be bringing a range of back issues and Amiga Addict merch with him, but again, do get in touch with him ahead of the meet if there’s anything in particular you are after.
Jakub Kosiec from Retro Lemon will be joining us once again at Kickstart 5 this Sunday.
Retro Lemon sells a wide range of upgrades and accessories for the Amiga, as well as other systems such as the ZX Spectrum, Commodore 64, various Atari systems and more. If there are products you are interested in, it’s worth contacting Jakub ahead of the meet.
Our merchandise site is now live! T-shirts and polo shirts are now available, with hoodies, fleeces, jackets, hats, mugs and more being added over the coming days.
Time has flown by and as I write this, we are just a month away from Kickstart 2, the next Kickstart Amiga Group meet. There are some new announcements below about the February meet around our special guests. I will be emailing out and posting the final update with all the logistics info two weeks before the meet.
The big thing to say is that we have just two table spaces left for Kickstart 2 in February, so if you are not already in, time has almost run out!
David Pleasance, Commodore’s former UK MD, will be joining us at the February meet. We’ll be having a chat with David on the stage after lunch and he will have his latest book available for sale and signing, as well as his previous books. David will also be bringing a range of Commodore merchandise for sale as well.
Jakub Kosiec from Retro Lemon
Also joining us will be Jakub Kosiec, who sells a wide range of Amiga and other system upgrades via his company Retro Lemon. Jakub will be bringing a range of Amiga add-ons for sale, along with some of his Medusa retro scandoubler boxes and Hydra SCART switches. However, if there’s anything in particular you want from his range for your Amiga, Atari, Sinclair or Commodore machine and you want to save some postage, please drop Jakub a line at info@retrolemon.co.uk and he’ll bring it with him on the day.
One of the things we really wanted to get in the diary for 2024 was a barbecue. The annual barbecue was a mainstay of the Kickstart Amiga Group annual diary, providing a great social environment as well as the fun of a regular meet.
We are pleased to confirm that we have booked Saturday 22nd June 2024 for the Barbecue meet. Ticket price includes the barbecue and tickets are on sale now, along with a few remaining tickets for our February 2024 meet:
Key Information
When: Saturday 22nd June 2024
Where: Ottershaw Village Hall, Brox Road, Ottershaw, Surrey, KT16 0HG
Time: 9am-9pm
Cost: £14-16 per person (price includes BBQ lunch, snacks and soft drinks throughout the day)
Hot on the heels of the success of our first meet, we are pleased to announce the date and details for our second meetup. Following a survey of members coming to our first event, we have confirmed Sunday 18th February 2024 for the meet. Tickets are on sale now, so please be quick as we did sell out of table spaces for our first meet.
Key Information
When: Sunday 18th February 2024
Where: Ottershaw Village Hall, Brox Road, Ottershaw, Surrey, KT16 0HG
Time: 9am-9pm
Cost: £14-16 per person (price includes lunch, snacks and soft drinks throughout the day)
Kickstart is a non-profit event. The price we are charging is purely to cover the cost of renting the hall for the day and for the cost of the refreshments. If by some miracle, we have money left over, 100% of it will be put towards the cost of booking the hall for the next meet.
Firstly, a big thank you to everyone who stopped by the Kickstart stand at Zzap Live this past weekend. It was great to see so many people and to talk about our plans for the group. We even met a few Kickstart Originals (members from before hour hiatus) which was wonderful.
We had a double table in the Amiga room at Zzap, where we originally had five machines on display for people to use as part of our promotional efforts, but soon we were down to four after a customised A1200 we had on show decided to malfunction. We think its a Chip RAM issue, so should be easy enough to fix.
For the day, the remaining four machines were an example of member-owned computers, either modified and updated for 2023, or brand new hardware.
Ahead of our next Kickstart meet in Ottershaw in October, Kickstart will be on the road in August and September, popping up at some events and supporting some of our friends at their user group meets.
On 12th August 2023 we will be heading to the Holiday Inn Kenilworth (it’s about half way between Warwick and Coventry) for Zzap! Live 2023. It’s a hands-on show celebrating all things Commodore, from the early 8-bit days right the way through to the Amiga and even Commodore’s difficult history as a PC maker. We are there in conjunction with our friends at the South West Amiga Group, helping to populate the Amiga area. Some of the Kickstart team will be there showing off some modified and updated member machines, showing how you can make the most of the Amiga in 2023.
Zzap! Live 2023 will feature over 50 interactive exhibits, representing the entire history of Commodore computing from the humble pioneering days right up to the present. Not only will there be plenty to play, but other ways to spend your time and your money while you socialise!
The Commodore Amiga – A Range of Computers That Spanned Two Decades
Back in 1997, the Amiga as a platform was dying. Commodore had gone bust, Escom (the company that bought most of Commodore’s assets, including the Amiga) also went bust after over-stretching itself. Various other attempts to rescue the Amiga platform from the wreckage ended up being little more than a joke that came to nothing. It fell to the remaining users and the rest of the grassroots community such as the vendors still in the market and the last embers of Amiga media to support each other and keep the platform alive. This is how Kickstart was born.