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Juiced.GS in 2011, online index, and digital issues

Juiced.GS Concentrate

It is the pleasure of the staff of Juiced.GS to announce that the longest-running and last remaining Apple II print publication will continue to shatter records in 2011 when it publishes its sixteenth volume. Subscriptions and renewals are $19 for United States customers and $26 for all other territories and are now being accepted.

After so many years of news, reviews, how-tos, and interviews, the Juiced.GS catalog of back issues has grown quite extensive, making it challenging to find a particular article, be it by topic, author, or headline. That’s why staff writer Mike Maginnis has pored over all 58 issues and catalogued their entire contents into an online index that can be searched, sorted, exported, and more. Whatever piece of content you’re looking for, you can now find its details online.

Juiced.GS Concentrate

Now that all this content is easy to find, we also want to make it easier to purchase and read. Although sales indicate that a majority of subscribers are happy with the current hardcopy edition, we understand the benefits of digital publication in PDF format. Instead of creating PDFs that compete with our existing and popular print-edition back issues, we have created a new line of products: Juiced.GS Concentrate — thematic packs of content assembled from our archives and updated and consolidated into one edition. No longer do you need to flip between several issues or purchase separate volumes to have a complete series of articles; instead, you’ll have a single, full-color, searchable, printable file. Our launch lineup includes three Concentrates with plans to introduce more on a regular basis.

Subscriptions, back issues, and downloads are all available in our new online store.

We hope these announcements, introductions, and changes will help us serve our readers for years to come. Please let us know what you think, and how we can continue to grow!

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Juiced.GS at KansasFest 2010

Juiced.GS publisher Gamebits will be in attendance at the KansasFest 2010 vendor fair, where Apple II merchants and users buy, sell, and swap hardware, software, and publications. We will be selling subscriptions as well as complete hardcopy volumes, 2002–2009.

If you will be at KansasFest and would like to buy any back issues, please let us know in advance. As challenging as it is to anticipate demand for these products, it is even more tiring to lug a suitcase full of magazines to Kansas City — and then back home to Boston! By letting us know what stock to have on-hand, you help us ensure that our merchandise goes to readers who want it. No advance notice is required for subscriptions to current or future volumes.

If you decide to make an impulse purchase of back issues at KansasFest without previously submitting a request, you will still be eligible for any special KansasFest discounts, but you will leave the event empty-handed and will have to wait for the product to ship to your home. (Why anyone would want to wait to get their hands on Juiced.GS, I have no idea.)

See you at the show!

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Meet the staff

Juiced.GS at KansasFest 2007

In my June 2010 editorial in Juiced.GS, I sang the praises of the staff, without whom this quarterly publication would not be possible. But who exactly are these people bringing you the world’s longest-running Apple II print publication?

The Juiced.GS staff consists of over a dozen men who are constantly communicating and collaborating behind the scenes. They pitch ideas, exchange resources, share drafts, and provide feedback on each article and issue. Not everyone writes for every issue, and some don’t write at all, instead choosing to provide insight and expertise. Every writer and editor is an integral component of the staff.

Juiced.GS at KansasFest 2007

Each staff member has been profiled in his own “Meet the Staff” page, starting with Ryan Suenaga in Volume 10, Issue 3 (September 2005) and finishing with Martin Haye in Volume 15, Issue 1 (March 2010). You can also find brief profiles on this site’s “About” page, where you you can click on their headshot captions to visit their non-Juiced.GS homes on the Internet. There, you will find that their talents extend beyond writing and editing into programming, podcasting, blogging, and vending.

What our online staff roster doesn’t include are the many members of the Apple II community who have submitted articles without joining the official staff. Some occasional contributors end up joining the staff; others have commitments elsewhere in the community that prevents further obligations; still others come with a specific story to tell and move on when they’re done. We’re grateful for each and every author and article. Such contributions have come from Margaret Anderson, Evan Koblentz, Mark Munz, Mark Percival, Kelvin Sherlock, Antoine Vignau, Peter Watson, and Steve Weyhrich, to name a few.

Juiced.GS will remain in publication as long as there are stories to tell and people willing to tell them. To that end, we are always looking for new ideas, perspectives, and content. If there is an article you want to write or an author you’d like to see in Juiced.GS, please drop us a line!

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Volume 15, Issue 2 now shipping

Volume 15, Issue 2 (June 2010)
Volume 15, Issue 2 (June 2010)

It’s the last day of second quarter, which means if this news hasn’t come out by now, it has to be today: the June 2010 issue of Juiced.GS is now shipping!

The cover story of this twenty-page issue is a review of the FC5025, a controller card that lets a 5.25″ floppy disk be connected to a modern computer via a USB interface. Given that this storage medium was phased out around the same time USB was created (1996), it’s amazing that it’s only in 2010 that a commercial product bridging the two technologies has become available. Mike Maginnis looks at the strengths and weaknesses of this new device.

I didn’t want to represent this story on our cover with a shot of the actual hardware, as we’d published a similar cover in March when Mike reviewed the iDisk. Mike and I both had some great and creative ideas for the cover, but life conspired against us. I think what we ended up using is pretty fun, though I’m wondering how many readers will notice the floating laptop.

Other stories in this issue include Martin Haye’s tutorial for using his Super-Mon programming utility; Ivan Drucker’s opinion piece on the growing divide between users and programmers of Apple products; and the second in a five-part series on transferring files between the Apple II and other computers. Our thanks to Cabel Sasser at Panic for letting us use a still from a cool video they shot last month. (Their FTP client is pretty sweet, too!)

Despite having only four feature articles, this issue’s content was contributed by seven staff writers and seven readers — the latter in the form of letters to the editor. I can’t remember the last time we had this much feedback to publish, which probably means it hasn’t been during my four-year watch as editor. I’ve enjoyed getting to know Juiced.GS‘s readers more personally and hope to continue hearing from you, either on the blog, via mail or email, or next month at KansasFest.

Enjoy the issue, and check out the online issue links for related online content and resources!

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Retro Gamer spotlights the Apple II

Retro Gamer #76

Although Juiced.GS is the longest-running Apple II publication, it is by no means the only retrocomputing magazine out there. 300 Baud recently joined the scene, but we are both dwarfed in number of issues by Retro Gamer, a monthly, full-color, 100-page magazine.

Games are the genre of software that has possibly driven the most advances in technology. They are also the most prolific software on our hard drives, and that which we often remember as introducing us to computers. Retro Gamer not only reviews this seminal art form but also unearths untold stories, going back to the games’ roots by talking to the designers, developers, and publishers of said software. Their multi-page spreads are riveting and capture the magic of the era, somehow making it seem more new than nostalgic.

Retro Gamer #76

As a UK-based publication, Retro Gamer has a love affair with the Sinclar ZX Spectrum, BBC Micro, and other computers indigenous to the region. But a recent issue (#76) has an eight-page feature on the games of the Apple II, in which author Craig Grannell efficiently covers the origin, success, and abandonment of Apple Computer Inc.’s most successful game machine. The article includes a sidebar of four Web sites that comprise the modern Apple II community: A2Central.com, Apple2History.org, Virtualapple.org, and … Juiced.GS!

Despite the lead time on large-scale print publications, the article is surprisingly recent, as indicated by the brief writeup: “Juiced.GS is the last surviving Apple II publication, and, having recently celebrated its 15th anniversary, overtook Softdisk (1981–1995) as the longest-running Apple II periodical. It now has a quarterly schedule and back issues are available in annual ‘volumes’.” Juiced.GS celebrated its longest-running record less than two months ago, and the screen shot of our Web site that accompanies the writeup also reflects the site’s current status (though I’m unsure why they didn’t use blowup of the most recent issue’s cover — seems like that would’ve been a more attractive and representative image than a picture of the Web site).

Although it’s not unusual for the Apple II to be mentioned in the mainstream press, such usually occurs in a historical context and only in passing. Rarely does our favorite computer receive the attention it deserves, and rarer still does that publicity acknowledge that its community is alive and well. Our thanks and appreciation to Retro Gamer and Mr. Grannell for preserving our past and present, and for letting Juiced.GS be a part of it.

Like Juiced.GS, Retro Gamer is available in hardcopy only. Issue #76 can be bought at your local newsstand for $9.99 USD or online for £5.