Interview
Handle: GINNIE - WWW SITE (ISDN PERMENANT CONNECT)
How did you come up with your alias ?
Knickname from school - nothing to do with computers (derived from my surname).
City / Country:
Melbourne - Australia
Born year:
1973
What was your first computer, and when did you get it?
Oric Atmos - relative was excl. distributor
How did you get into the scene and what groups have you been a member of ?
Knew some people from the c64 dayz who were doing cc's. Got hooked up with The Kent Team on Amiga and the rest was history.
Groups - ACU (Australian Crackers United), QUARTEX, ELITENDO, RAZOR 1911 etc
What was the proudest moment in your career ?
Z
For what specific reason(s) do you think that you are remembered ?
Running Razor 1911 Australian HQ (The Brewery BBS - 4 lines)
Author of many great PCE utils!
What would you like to be remembered for ?
My programming ( my bbs utils??)
Put Australia on the scene map..
What made you stop the scene activity ? (and do you remember when?)
Fedz!! Got busted in July 1993 by Australian Computer Crimes Devision of Federal Police. They confiscated everything (and i mean everything) and kept it for 2 years while the stuffed around in court until they were ordered to give it back by the judge. Had no desire to continue after all that!
Thinking back on the good old days, is there anything you regret?
Piracy - it sux.. Well hey - we were kids then werent we! Nothing I would want to tell my kids about if and when i have them!
What was your favorite
GAME(S)
PGA Tour golf... Speedball... Whizz Ball!
DEMO(S)
Future crew stuff.. on Amiga TRSI set the standard for a long while..
PROGRAMMER(S) (OR PROGRAMMING TEAM(S))
Bitmap Bros..
CRACKER(S) (OR CRACKING GROUP(S))
Razor 1911
OVERALL GROUPS :
Razor 1911 (The biggest and best ever)
COMPOSER(S)
Romeo Knight, SLR
BEST COMPOSED TRACK(S)
Cant remember
EVENT(S) (E.G. COPYPARTY)
We never had any in down under.
MEMORY(S)
Alliance conference where we got the national security advisor to Dan Quale online and got them to get DQ to ring our Prime Minister the following day!
DRINK ?
Coke!
What are you doing nowadays ?
Believe it or not - I am in partnership in a software company. In 1 1/2 years we have released 27 CD titles and are exporting to over 10 countries around the world. We are known as 'Sprint Software' and have 12 workers inc myself and the other owner. Almost the entire staff is made from people who used to be in the scene (infact we have what was the 'elite' of the scene in Australia). I am programming a game in 'c' under Win 95 using Direct X at the moment and we have some 3d titles due out as well.. We also just got worldwide publishing rights for the sequel to Apogee's Halloween Harry for Win 95.
If any of you have written products you want distributed/published worldwide contact us on
Niall@sprint.com.au
What are you doing on your spare time?
Spending time with my girlfriend..
Playing Music (have a midi setup)
Listening to techno
Smoking lots of weed.
Is there anything you'd like to say to the public (read: admires)
STOP WASTING YOUR TIME ON THE SCENE! Do something useful for the industry. You don't need Uni degrees and other paper qualifications to make it all happen!
I am only 23 + 1 month and I own a successful business. Getting busted was the best thing that could have happened to me... I wouldnt be where I was now.. might still be running a bbs!
What is the meaning of life?
If I knew that I wouldn't be surfing the net...