AmiWest 2020 Blog - Welcome to the Amiverse

19. November 11, 2020 - AmiWest 2020 Volunteers are the best!

Many thanks to our 2020 volunteers onsite and online!

AmiWest volunteers are the staff lifeblood for our show. They contribute time, effort and expertise to bring AmiWest to pass every year. There would be no show without our volunteers bringing our sponsor contributions to life. First among the AmiWest volunteers are our SACC club members & friends. First presented by a committee of SACC members and friends in 1998, AmiWest has become the yearly community gathering for Amigans on planet earth. SACC is our platinum sponsor and provides much (if not most) of the human capital that presents AmiWest. This blog will dedicate a future feature dedicated to listing them by name soon. We also want to applaud the spouses and significant others that support our volunteers during AmiWest and throughout the year. We couldn't do it without you. Thanks for your encouragement and understanding throughout the year. We also applaud our online speakers and participants. Our speakers are also all volunteers. Your presentation expertise and interesting content helped drive our online stream for 2021. Please see our broadcast link to see who they are. Our participants in the online stream on Saturday and Sunday are too numerous to list. Thanks to one and all for tuning in. And many thanks to our associates in user groups. In this connection, the Amiga Users of Calgary (AMUC) and the Bay Area Retro Computer Club (BARCC) have always been supportive of our show. Thanks also to those who cross-posted on several forums to support AmiWest. Those we know of include Doug Compton, Eldee Stephens, Petah and (Amiga)Bill Winters. Let us know at info@amiwest.net if you cross-posted for us as well. We hope to see your name on the volunteer list for AmiWest 2021. Feel free to spread the links to this blog and our amiwest.net site far and wide to let everyone know about what is going on for AmiWest 2021. Cross-posting blog posts and positive promotion is also always welcome. Of course, we would like to see you in person here in Sacramento as well. AmiWest 2020 was presented October 24 & 25, 2020 at the Holiday Inn Express, 2224 Auburn Blvd., Sacramento, CA. And AmiWest 2021 will be presented there as well. Watch this blog for more information on dates and times for AmiWest 2021.Make your plans to attend now. If you've attended before, bring one other person who is new to the show. If this will be your first time, welcome to the show! See our website at amiwest.net for the latest information and watch this blog for breaking news about the show. See you next October!

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18. November 11, 2020 - AmiWest 2020 Sponsors Rock!

Many thanks to our 2020 sponsors!

We depend upon our faithful AmiWest sponsors to keep the show funded from year to year. It does take money as well as hundreds of volunteer hours to present AmiWest. We have been at this for 23 shows, longer than any of us thought would be the case. Presenting a show also takes in-kind donations as well. They are no less valuable than the financial sponsors. Indeed, those donations can also be evaluated in financial terms. However they did it, our sponsors are vital to AmiWest. Many thanks to our Gold Sponsor, Trevor Dickinson of A-EON, Ltd. for the financial support to pay for our show hall space. Thanks also to Bill Borsari & Jerry Gray of AmiWest Broadcast for creating, producing and executing the streaming platform for our Saturday and Sunday broadcasts. Doug Compton of 10-Minute Amiga RetroCast contributed valuable streaming input, invitied online participants and hosted the Sunday AmiWest conversation for more than 7 hours. Last (but not least) was our commercial sponsor, infocessories. The REBOL community sponsor generated lots of good conversation and REBOL demos at their table ONSITE along with contacts to promote REBOL and AmiWest this coming year. Our sponsors make our show possible! We are pleased that they chose to join us this year and hope for their participation in AmiWest 2021. We also look forward to welcoming the sponsors and exhibitors that could not make it this year back for AmiWest 2021. Many different considerations thinned the ranks this year and all are understandable. We hope to see everyone back for AmiWest in October of 2021. AmiWest 2020 was presented October 24 & 25, 2020 at the Holiday Inn Express, 2224 Auburn Blvd., Sacramento, CA. And AmiWest 2021 will be presented there as well. Watch this blog for more information on dates and times for AmiWest 2021.Make your plans to attend now. If you've attended before, bring one other person who is new to the show. If this will be your first time, welcome to the show! See our website at amiwest.net for the latest information and watch this blog for breaking news about the show. See you next October!

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17. October 28, 2020 AmiWest 2020 is history!

Many thanks to one and all for sterling efforts and the success of the streaming show!

We had a great time onsite as well. Another blog post will be devoted to the onsite show. Although the onsite numbers were small, we had great opportunities to interact and pursue long lines of conversation that developed into helping many with their Amiga interest. As always, new people came to the onsite show in Sacramento. Those people were very enthusiastic. We hope to see them at SACC meetings during the year. As for show reports, Petah did an excellent review on Amigaworld.net. You can find it posted here. Thanks for your summary, especially of the online streaming content that AmiWest Broadcast (led by Bill Borsari, Jerry Gray and Doug Compton) provided. Other AmiWest 2020 show reports will be linked as they become available to us. Many thanks to the onsite volunteers as well. Another blog post will be devoted to the many onsite and online volunteers and participants that made AmiWest 2020 yet another great AmiWest show. AmiWest 2020 was presented October 24 & 25, 2020 at the Holiday Inn Express, 2224 Auburn Blvd., Sacramento, CA. And AmiWest 2021 will be presented there as well. Watch this blog for more information on dates and times for AmiWest 2021.Make your plans to attend now. If you've attended before, bring one other person who is new to the show. If this will be your first time, welcome to the show! See our website at amiwest.net for the latest information and watch this blog for breaking news about the show. See you in October!

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16. ONLINE - October 19, 2020 AmiWest Broadcast speakers

The wait is over - we now know who the "Special Guest" is!

Our schedule of AmiWest Broadcast speakers is now complete! After the show is introduced by Brian Deneen, SACC President (from Sacramento), the speaker line-up will begin with Trevor Dickinson (from New Zealand) and his development announcements. Trevor is our AmiWest GOLD Sponsor this year. Many thanks, Trevor! Now we can say it! We are free to announce our "Special Guest" will be David John Pleasance (from the UK), former MD of Commodore UK. He and Trevor are involved in a project which we're sure he will discuss. And our other speakers are also stellar! Among them are Jens Schoenfeld (from Germany) with a new product announcement, Steven Solie (from Canada) with Exec SG multicore developments, Doug Compton (from Arizona) with the Amiga Art Contest, and Amiga Bill (from New York) with our AmiWest games competition and new games. Then there is Samuel Crow (from Colorado) presenting Amiga alternatives AROS and ARIX, George Sokianos (from Ireland) discussing Cross Platform Development, and Jamie Krueger (from Wisconsin) promoting GUI Programming in Python on AmigaOS4 That's a really full broadcast day! Simultaneously, the show floor in Sacramento will be viewing the broadcast as it's presented and visiting with our exhibitors as well. Thanks to Bill Borsari (from Orinda), Jerry Gray (from Sacramento), Doug Compton and all of our volunteer speakers! Bill, Jerry and Doug are handling the technical end of the broadcast. This coordination of speakers and sources from around the world should be very interesting! So remember: AmiWest 2020 and associated events will be October 24 & 25, 2020 at the Holiday Inn Express, 2224 Auburn Blvd., Sacramento, CA. Make your plans to attend now. If you've attended before, bring one other person who is new to the show. If this will be your first time, welcome to the show! See our website at amiwest.net for the latest information and watch this blog for breaking news about the show. See you in October!

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15. ONLINE October 14, 2020 How about that NEW AmiWest logo!?!

Taken from the A-EON blog site.

We now have a new custom logo for AmiWest 23, celebrating 35 years of Amiga! While reading through Trevor Dickinson's blog post of a few days ago, I found a great logo for this years' show posted on his blog site. He wrote a great article about our show. We will miss him and all of our international and US guests who are unable to attend this year. What a great new logo to celebrate our great platform! The author is not cited but it does look like work familiar to me. I'll have to do some more digging to find out who did it. In any case, it is very colorful and dynamic. Our many thanks to whomever took the time to do a great logo for our AmiWest 2020 show. Our website has been updated to include it. So remember: AmiWest 2020 and associated events will be October 24 & 25, 2020 at the Holiday Inn Express, 2224 Auburn Blvd., Sacramento, CA. Make your plans to attend now. If you've attended before, bring one other person who is new to the show. If this will be your first time, welcome to the show! See our website at amiwest.net for the latest information and watch this blog for breaking news about the show. See you in October!

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14. ONSITE & ONLINE October 14, 2020 Game Competition Update!

Our SACC VP Jerry Gray has been very busy!

Our game competition this year will occur both onsite and online! We have stepped up our "game" (pun intended!) this year for a wider audience and participation. We have linked our instructions on the new AmiWest 2020 Game Competition page. That link is HERE Everything you need to know is on that page. We hope you will play our AmiWest game this year and compete for the custom trophy! That trophy is being created this week. We will have an image of the trophy on this blog as soon as it becomes available. So remember: AmiWest 2020 and associated events will be October 24 & 25, 2020 at the Holiday Inn Express, 2224 Auburn Blvd., Sacramento, CA. Make your plans to attend now. If you've attended before, bring one other person who is new to the show. If this will be your first time, welcome to the show! See our website at amiwest.net for the latest information and watch this blog for breaking news about the show. See you in October!

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13. ONLINE - October 13, 2020 Sunday conversations at AmiWest.

We are hosting a chat around Amiga interests.

Sunday, October 25 will see an AmiWest first. We will be presenting an online chat around special Amiga interests. Tune in to listen, then jump in and make your contribution. Our moderator will be Doug Compton of 10-Minute Amiga Retrocast. Doug has a strong pulse of the Amiga community and we are looking forward to his leadership. Some of these interests may include Amiga classic enhancements, NG Amiga setups, OS4.x development, Amiga reimplementation and others. We hope that you will tune in to participate. Links will be published soon, along with times to log in. Of course we are counting on your most collegial attitude to make something like this interesting to everyone. It's another new feature for AmiWest 2020. Again, many thanks to our tech team for testing, organizing and presenting these conferences. So remember: AmiWest 2020 and associated events will be October 24 & 25, 2020 at the Holiday Inn Express, 2224 Auburn Blvd., Sacramento, CA. Make your plans to attend now. If you've attended before, bring one other person who is new to the show. If this will be your first time, welcome to the show! See our website at amiwest.net for the latest information and watch this blog for breaking news about the show. See you in October!

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12. ONLINE - October 12, 2020 Speakers and bios posted to amiwest.net!

The schedule for Saturday, October 24 is now online.

Our online presence is greatly expanded for 2020! We now have speakers, their bios and a schedule posted to amiwest.net here. "Stream on" starts on October 24 at 9:30 AM PDT. From that time until 6 PM, AmiWest 2020 will have presentations from our volunteer speakers. They include some familiar AmiWest faces along with some that are new to our show. You can count on interesting content from fellow Amigans during the broadcast. Bill Borsari and Jerry Gray have tried to keep the schedule moving and the topics varied. Thanks to one and all for your participaiton, the life blood of a volunteer event like AmiWest. The broadcast will be available to view later on YouTube as well. We hope that this will help compensate for time zone differences for our viewers througout the planet. So remember: AmiWest 2020 and associated events will be October 24 & 25, 2020 at the Holiday Inn Express, 2224 Auburn Blvd., Sacramento, CA. Make your plans to attend now. If you've attended before, bring one other person who is new to the show. If this will be your first time, welcome to the show! See our website at amiwest.net for the latest information and watch this blog for breaking news about the show. See you in October!

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11. ONSITE - October 6, 2020 A different AmiWest banquet this year

This year you can choose your own banquet cuisine.

Availability of catering is uncertain in the fall of 2020. The best anyone can do this year is a "box lunch" kind of meal for a somewhat amazing price. So this year, you're in charge. Choose your own banquet cuisine. Maybe it's Mexican for you, or Thai, or hamburgers, a great salad or monster sub sandwich. Whatever it is, order whatever you want online through your favorite delivery service, drive through fast food, or pick up takeout. Then bring it to dine together at the AmiWest show hall. We will have beverages and table service available to help with commencing the meal. Indeed, you can even do this online. Share the meal with us through our online broadcast to be there "in spirit" if not in person. We will have our SACC annual awards and thanks to our sponsors. Following the banquet there will be a movie shown (watch for more on that) for the evening's entertainment. We will likely be far below the onsite room capacity even in these times. So remember: AmiWest 2020 and associated events will be October 24 & 25, 2020 at the Holiday Inn Express, 2224 Auburn Blvd., Sacramento, CA. Make your plans to attend now. If you've attended before, bring one other person who is new to the show. If this will be your first time, welcome to the show! See our website at amiwest.net for the latest information and watch this blog for breaking news about the show. See you in October!

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10. ONSITE - October 4, 2020 At AmiWest, it's all about Amigans.

Come and join us for some very creative conversation

This is our 23rd AmiWest show celebrating 35 years of Amiga! Many creative people have attended AmiWest over these many years of annual gathering. This creativity of the group continues to be a major feature of our show. Our attendees run the gamut from computer designers and other IT pros to Amiga users who just enjoy the platform. Whether it's game play, productivity elegance, system configurability, or just doing things differently, the people who attend AmiWest are in a very relaxed mood. Indeed, one of our attendees says it's the best annual event on his entire social calendar. So come to AmiWest and get acquainted with a very creative group of people. Everyone is willing to share their Amiga experience and listen to yours as well. Whomever attends, we extend a relaxed AmiWest welcome to one and all. So remember: AmiWest 2020 and associated events will be October 24 & 25, 2020 at the Holiday Inn Express, 2224 Auburn Blvd., Sacramento, CA. Make your plans to attend now. If you've attended before, bring one other person who is new to the show. If this will be your first time, welcome to the show! See our website at amiwest.net for the latest information and watch this blog for breaking news about the show. See you in three weeks!

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9. ONSITE - October 3, 2020 The Classic Amiga Games Competition returns for 2020!

Prizes will be awarded for the top score!

The AmiWest 2020 Classic Amiga Games Competition kicks off Saturday, October 24! We'll start when the show floor opens and keep going all day. We may continue into the night! Who knows? You can find out by attending this year! We will have a great crew of Amigans for 2020 as evidenced by the number who have said they are coming. You can be here as well! We will have the game running on a classic Amiga machine yet to be chosen. Our club has a great collection of classic Amigas. Our games organizer, SACC VP Jerry Gray, will be making the choice in coming weeks. He'll be choosing the game as well. Players will register and play during the day, pushing the score higher and higher. The highest score for the day wins a custom-made, hand-finished trophy. A different trophy will be awarded for each day of the show. Come and join the fun here in Sacramento. So remember: AmiWest 2020 and associated events will be October 24 & 25, 2020 at the Holiday Inn Express, 2224 Auburn Blvd., Sacramento, CA. Make your plans to attend now. If you've attended before, bring one other person who is new to the show. If this will be your first time, welcome to the show! See our website at amiwest.net for the latest information and watch this blog for breaking news about the show. See you in three weeks!

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8. ONLINE - September 29, 2020 AmiWest Broadcast 2020 on October 24!

It's the biggest online event we have ever hosted!

Mark your calendar now! The Saturday AmiWest Broadcast happens on October 24! With participants from around the world, you don't want to miss it! There will be some familiar faces and voices. One of them will be A-EON's Trevor Dickinson. Others from years past will also be presenting. And there will be some new-to-AmiWest faces and voices. We think you'll be challenged and entertained by everyone who presents. Presentations will be both recorded and livestream content. It will all be produced by the AmiWest Broadcast crew with Bill Borsari and Jerry Gray cooperating on heading up the broadcast tech. More details about presenters and an online link to 6.5 hours of content will follow. It all starts PDT on the morning of October 24, 2020! So remember: AmiWest 2020 and associated events will be October 24 & 25, 2020 at the Holiday Inn Express, 2224 Auburn Blvd., Sacramento, CA. Make your plans to attend now. If you've attended before, bring one other person who is new to the show. If this will be your first time, welcome to the show! See our website at amiwest.net for the latest information and watch this blog for breaking news about the show. See you in October!

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7. September 27, 2020 AmiWest 2020 is also an on-site event!

We will have an on-site show as well for 2020

Our on-site schedule is being developed right now! We will have an on-site schedule that includes the online presence plus more "after hours" activities. Our venue is equipped with the latest in participant health measures. We do understand that some have concerns about attending an on-site event. Our venue is conducting business daily with all required safety measures in place. We will even be providing a safety measure of our own that only on-site attendees will receive. (More on that later) So from now on, our blog posts will be identified as "On-Site" and "Online". We hope to avoid confusion with this designation. Hopefully this will help everyone stay informed about both phases of our show this year. So remember: AmiWest 2020 and associated events will be October 24 & 25, 2020 at the Holiday Inn Express, 2224 Auburn Blvd., Sacramento, CA. Make your plans to attend now. If you've attended before, bring one other person who is new to the show. If this will be your first time, welcome to the show! See our website at amiwest.net for the latest information and watch this blog for breaking news about the show. See you in October!

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6. September 26, 2020 AmiWest - Volunteers all

We have new volunteers for 2020!

Since 1998, AmiWest has been a volunteer effort. Inspired by the St. Louis Amiga show organizers, John Zacharias and his committee assembled the first AmiWest to bring vendors to Sacramento so Northern California Amigans could continue to upgrade their hardware and software at a yearly Amiga show. AmiWest was born. That first committee has expanded over the years as SACC members and friends from around the world have collaborated to make each AmiWest better. For 2020, we have even more volunteers contributing to AmiWest. In these last five weeks before AmiWest, we will highlight the 2020 volunteers in this blog and how they are making AmiWest 2020 a gathering that you won't want to miss! Let's start with a much greater online presence for 2020! This year will see a much greater presence with what we're hoping is better production and content than ever before. Saturday October 24 will see our seminar format expanded to an all-day online schedule with presenters joining us from around the world. Sunday October 25 will be an interactive conference that you can join to share your positive Amiga interests. Watch this blog for more details to come! You'll also find out more about who is bringing all of this to life in future posts. So remember: AmiWest 2020 and associated events will be October 24 & 25, 2020 at the Holiday Inn Express, 2224 Auburn Blvd., Sacramento, CA. Make your plans to attend now. If you've attended before, bring one other person who is new to the show. If this will be your first time, welcome to the show! See our website at amiwest.net for the latest information and watch this blog for breaking news about the show. See you in October!

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5. August 23, 2020 A-EON to sponsor AmiWest 2020!

Trevor Dickinson confirms A-EON sponsorship

We just received word that A-EON is sponsoring AmiWest 2020! One of our long-term sponsors, A-EON is supporting our show for 2020 at the Gold Level. We hear from Trevor that he will be here in person if travel restrictions are lifted! Thanks again to A-EON for this tremendous support for our Amiga community efforts. We are looking forward to news from A-EON as well. Many of you have participated in their developments in years past. We know that other developments are in the works and look forward to hearing about and seeing those developments presented. So welcome to A-EON. So remember: AmiWest 2020 and associated events will be October 24 & 25, 2020 at the Holiday Inn Express, 2224 Auburn Blvd., Sacramento, CA. Make your plans to attend now. If you've attended before, bring one other person who is new to the show. If this will be your first time, welcome to the show! See our website at amiwest.net for the latest information and watch this blog for breaking news about the show. See you in October!

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4. July 20, 2020 10MARC to be at AmiWest 2020 in Sacramento!

Doug Compton will be with us in October!

Doug Compton of 10 Minute Amiga Retrocast (10MARC) is attending AmiWest 2020 in Sacramento! We just met Doug last year for the first time and have already developed a very good collegial relationship. He will be bringing his classic Amiga exhibit with him. He brought lots of goodies last year and we expect he will do the same this year. Indeed, he is driving a larger vehicle this time. We might even get treated to an episode of 10MARC done right from AmiWest. We're still working out the details and know we'll get the best when it comes to his presentation and expertise. And if that wasn't enough, he has also volunteered to help out with show logistics as well! Thanks, Doug, for all the help we know you are bringing to the table for AmiWest 2020! So remember: AmiWest 2020 and associated events will be October 24 & 25, 2020 at the Holiday Inn Express, 2224 Auburn Blvd., Sacramento, CA. Make your plans to attend now. If you've attended before, bring one other person who is new to the show. If this will be your first time, welcome to the show! See our website at amiwest.net for the latest information and watch this blog for breaking news about the show. See you in October!

3. July 19, 2020 Steve Solie to present at AmiWest 2020

Steve's online presentation will be hosted by AmiWest

Steve Solie will be presenting at AmiWest 2020! Through the capability of online technology, we will be hearing and seeing what he has been doing this year in the field of AmigaOS 4.x development. He is keeping us informed about the content of his presentation as he develops it. Details are still being worked out. Our online team is still developing capabilities to enhance our presence on the web. We hope to provide a platform for more information than ever to be presented through our AmiWest show. The schedule will be published as it is developed. We are taking international time frames into account this year as much as possible to make our content more available to a wider audience. We will have a list of additional presenters shortly. Be sure to check back and see who will be presenting at AmiWest 2020! So remember: AmiWest 2020 and associated events will be October 24 & 25, 2020 at the Holiday Inn Express, 2224 Auburn Blvd., Sacramento, CA. Make your plans to attend now. If you've attended before, bring one other person who is new to the show. If this will be your first time, welcome to the show! See our website at amiwest.net for the latest information and watch this blog for breaking news about the show. See you in October!

2. June 26, 2020 Make Your Hotel Reservations NOW!

Holiday Inn Cal Expo has our block reserved

Our AmiWest room reservation block is now open! Actually, it's been open since January. We already have people who have reserved for this year's show in October. We don't want you to be disappointed! Make your reservations now. Details are on our reservation page. Your credit card will NOT be charged until after your stay. If need be, you can cancel up until the day before the first day of the reservation. Right now, 25% of the reservation block is already reserved! We can increase the number of rooms we want, but we need to know your plans NOW so we can increase the block if needed. Be sure to reserve your rooms now. Even though the show is shorter this year, the rates are available from October 20 through October 25. Come see Northern California while you're here! Museums, state parks, restaurants and hotels are open now. Make your AmiWest reservations now! So remember: AmiWest 2020 and associated events will be October 24 & 25, 2020 at the Holiday Inn Express, 2224 Auburn Blvd., Sacramento, CA. Make your plans to attend now. If you've attended before, bring one other person who is new to the show. If this will be your first time, welcome to the show! See our website at amiwest.net for the latest information and watch this blog for breaking news about the show. See you in October!

1. June 16, 2020 There will be an AmiWest show, October 24 & 25, 2020!

We will be presenting in-person in Sacramento!

Change has been the "order of the day" since 2020 dawned. And as you can see, our blog has been delayed by uncertainty about what could be said about our favorite Amiga gathering: AmiWest. Local conditions here have stabilized. Our hotel venue held their first business meetings last week. They are actively booking new events and confirming current contracts for meetings. So we will be here in October. International travel restrictions still in place have, for the time being, largely eliminated our international participants and sponsors. However, modifications to our contract are allowing us to continue with our original, two-day format for AmiWest. We are now in the process of confirming exhibitors. If you are one of our usual exhibitors, look for email regarding your participation in AmiWest 2020 soon. And everyone, watch this blog for updates as they are confirmed! So remember: AmiWest 2020 and associated events will be October 24 & 25, 2020 at the Holiday Inn Express, 2224 Auburn Blvd., Sacramento, CA. Make your plans to attend now. If you've attended before, bring one other person who is new to the show. If this will be your first time, welcome to the show! See our website at amiwest.net for the latest information and watch this blog for breaking news about the show. See you in October!