ZX Computings - OpenLibra

Clive sets
the pace
Uncle Clive will be donning his
sweaty tracksuit to set the
pace in a half-marathon to be
held in July.
The half-marathon, to be
included in this year's
Cambridge Festival, will be
sponsored for £5000, by
Clive's company — Sinclair
Research — which is, of
course, based in Cambridge.
The race is expected to attract
a number of top-class runners
to the city. Clive will be
among an expected 2000
competitors following a threelap
course through the city's
historic streets. Starting in
King's Parade, close to
Sinclair's offices, it includes a
riverside stretch along
Chesterton Lane, the 'Backs',
and finishes in the Market
Square at the Guildhall Steps.
Co-organised for the
Festival by Cambridge City's
recreation department and the
Cambridge and Coleridge
Athletic Club, the event is
open both to club-based
runners and general
enthusiasts. Entries have
already been received from as
far afield as Wales and
Durham.
Uncle Clive told us his
company sees its sponsorship
of the marathon as oart of its
commitment to supporting and
developing cultural life of the
city. It is also sponsoring, as
part of the Festival, a concert
in King's College on July 31.
News
1 Clive Sinclair
Sinclair miss the bus
Sinclair and Timex, were
most conspicuous by their
absence at the giant West
Coast Computer Faire held in
San Francisco at the end of
March.
The booth listed in the
catalogue as being the Sinclair
one was unmanned
throughout the show, the
most important computer
show in the world. Some
40,000 people crammed into
a show with over 600 stands,
to be confronted at the alleged
Sinclair booth with a tiny,
handwritten notice saying that
Clive's people would not be
there.
I found a disconsolate set
of four ZX81 owners — who
are very much in a minority
among computer users in
America — sitting sadly in the
booth swapping Zee-X81'
stories.
One enterprising ZX81
owner in the States, Eric
Reiter of 16th Avenue, San
Francisco, had a tiny, one-yard
wide booth, in which he was
showing his expansion board,
which is suitable for ZXSOs.
ZX81 s and the ZX80lookalike,
the MicroAce. The
expansion board was a
complicated, spaghettijunction
type motherboard
which was controlling little
lights and squawkers.
A series of seminars were
held throughout the show.
One talk was given by the
president of Mindware,
Michael Levy. It was
fascinating to hear questions
from those present at the talk
who had never heard before of
the ZX81. Michael tried to
explain the excitement the
ZX81 was generating in the
UK, but I could see his words
were received with some
scepticism. When he told the
seminar about the crushing
crowds at ZX Microfairs, the
disbelief reached fever pitch.
Schools
lap it up
More than 2500 UK
secondary schools have
bought ZX81 s to give their
pupils hands-on computing
experience.
Last May, Sinclair Research
worked out a deal with the
educational distributors Griffin
and George to sell ZX81 s at a
cut price to schools. The
scheme, which is now closed,
aimed to provide a wider and
more economic choice of
equipment than was available
under a government-assisted
scheme for the purchase of
computers. Although the
government thought it was
wonderful for schools to buy
micros, it was not prepared to
give cash for the purpose to
Mindware is one of the few
American companies which
have realised how big the
ZX81 is going to be when it
takes off in America. Michael
Levy has visited the UK three
times in the last few months
to sign rights and distribution
deals for UK products. He says
that the standard of UK
software, hardware and
publications is very high, and
thus was anxious to ensure
schools that insisted on
buying a ZX81.
Putting it diplomatically.
Uncle Clive said: "Although
welcoming the government
initiative, we felt it did not
fully account for the needs of
the best of it was made
available for American
consumers.
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all schools."
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66 ZX COMPUTING SUMMER 11 COMPl