Dark Bit Factory & Gravity

GENERAL => General chat => Topic started by: Shockwave on November 26, 2007

Title: Average age survey.
Post by: Shockwave on November 26, 2007: This subject came up tonight when I was talking to a friend about the age of demosceners, we were looking at some pictures on Slengpung and people at parties seemed to be quite old compared to when we used to go to parties in the past.

Also something that Taj posted last week about the scene getting older and no fresh talent coming along to replace it because games are where it's at..

Thought it would be interesting to see the ages of people.
Title: Re: Average age survey.
Post by: Pixel_Outlaw on November 27, 2007: 20 here soon to be 21. :cheers:

I want to detach myself from teenagers and their tom-foolery. My theroy is every 10 years you look back and think you have discovered who you are howeve that is not a constant but rather a variable.
Title: Re: Average age survey.
Post by: benny! on November 27, 2007: 33. Looks like I am nearly of the average age of a demoscene. Damned. The
scene is really too old ::)

Father, father ... what is the demoscene?

Father, father ... look I have found this executable on your HD. But I cannot inter-
act with it. What is this good for?

Is it really a dying art?
Title: Re: Average age survey.
Post by: Positron on November 27, 2007: 34 and I thought I'm to old to come back to the scene. ;)

Today they mostly go to Lan-Parties to play Counter Strike or something like that, I think.
Title: Re: Average age survey.
Post by: energy on November 27, 2007: 34 :||

And im going on... mostly like C64 coding... since 20 years... :carrot:

Cheers eNeRGy
Title: Re: Average age survey.
Post by: slippy on November 27, 2007: also 34 ... used to be a computer addict since 1983 (my first computer back then was a Commodore VIC-20 with a huge amount of 3.5kb RAM and a cool datasette (press play on tape *gg*)) ... wow ... Now I really think I'm old :)

Anyway - seems to be that I'm within the average age here ;)
Title: Re: Average age survey.
Post by: benny! on November 27, 2007: /me with 33 years feeling young now :D
Title: Re: Average age survey.
Post by: ninogenio on November 27, 2007: 24 and dare i say it.

*i prefer playing games* although when i say playing them i actually mean finding out how they work ie all the clever little algos that make them tick, i must say though i think they come hand in hand to an extent as most games now a days youse a lot of demo scene effects.
Title: Re: Average age survey.
Post by: combatking0 on November 27, 2007: 27 - do I need a fake ID?
Title: Re: Average age survey.
Post by: rain_storm on November 28, 2007: 27 here too but Im not really a hardcore scener I only bought my first and only PC about a year and a half ago. But I did do a bit a Yabasic on the PS2 in my spare time before that. I'm kinda like nino I like to rip things apart and see how they work. I dont really mind if the effects I produce are not on a grand scale cos lets face it todays high quality is tomarrows retro. Its a steep learning curve in todays scene.
Title: Re: Average age survey.
Post by: Shockwave on November 28, 2007: I don't know how many people here would describe themselves as hardcore sceners.. There are a few people who do have very strong scene connections, releasing things into the demo scene, but this forum attracts a wide range, including those who have an interest in the productions but just want to release things to show to thier friends..

Then again, there are a lot of people who go to places like scene.org and pouet who contribute nothing to the scene but like to watch demos..

The results so far are about what I expected to be honest.

It's a little bit depressing, but at the same time it makes it a little more exclusive.
Title: Re: Average age survey.
Post by: rain_storm on November 28, 2007: Looks like you guys are the last of the old stock. I think its good that the scene is constantly changing thats what has gotten the scene to where it is today
Title: Re: Average age survey.
Post by: Shockwave on November 28, 2007: It would be cool if we could convert more young people into demo coders Rain Storm :)
Title: Re: Average age survey.
Post by: Pixel_Outlaw on November 28, 2007: I was just told about the site from Adigun Polack. d= ;D=b
I know he and Relsoft both are members here but i have yet to spot either.

Both are members of Shmup-Dev where I serve as an admin with the current owner Motorherp.

There are a few things perhaps you could clear up.
a. What does the title of the site refer to?
b. Please define the "Demo Scene". Perhaps I have a misconception but don't want to embarrass myself.
Title: Re: Average age survey.
Post by: rain_storm on November 29, 2007: Check out what the wiki has to say about the scene and follow the links its worth a read

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demoscene

Just noticed that its been updated since I last looked through that so Im gonna reread the articles myself
Title: Re: Average age survey.
Post by: taj on November 29, 2007: Quote from: rain_storm on November 28, 2007
Looks like you guys are the last of the old stock. I think its good that the scene is constantly changing thats what has gotten the scene to where it is today

I dont think thats entirely true Rain, I think fewer and fewer newcomers are arriving so its not that its the old guard here, its that that is representative of the scene today.

Taj
Title: Re: Average age survey.
Post by: Shockwave on November 29, 2007: Quote from: Pixel_Outlaw on November 28, 2007
There are a few things perhaps you could clear up.
a. What does the title of the site refer to?
b. Please define the "Demo Scene". Perhaps I have a misconception but don't want to embarrass myself.

This is going to be a long winded answer! But I'll try to answer as best I can, we'll do your second question first. (a potted history of demoscene).

B:- Demo Scene evolved from the early home computers when games makers would put some rudimentary copy protection on thier software to prevent people from pirating it and spreading to thier friends.

Some people started to de-protect these games so that they were freely copyable, protection became more advanced and crackers had to learn more code to be able to de-protect games.

Some of the crackers formed organised groups.

The first crack intros were simple, with just some text to say who cracked the game, as the crackers became more competant at code these messages evolved more and more into crack intros bearing the logo of the group, music and effects that were often better to look at than the game.

As these crack intros became more elaborate and spectacular some people started demo groups, often dedicated to demo programming and the demos became more and more advanced, multi part demos became common place and a real rivalry developed between demo scene groups with organised parties and competitions.

Crack intros are still produced, demos have moved on to become somnetimes beautiful masterpieces with many many disciplines, for example, 1kb intros, 256 byte intros, 64kb intros etc etc...

The scene lives on, as do the parties and demos. There are some very big parties such as Evoke, Function and Breakpoint, but there are dozens and dozens more.

Quite a lot of people on this forum are part of one or more scene groups.

A: - DBF+GVY demo code forum.

DBF is short for Dark Bit Factory.
GVY is short for Gravity.

Both are groups, Dark Bit Factory was started by me and a good friend called Franck Chevassu (Parabellum). Dark bit factory forum was originally for members of DBF only, but it became a popular place for programmers of demos to hang around.

It's by no means a scene community, there are other places for that like bitfellas, intro-inferno and pouet, but nevertheless so very well known sceners are contributing members here.

The group DBF died but in fact it would be fair to say that it evolved into this forum.

The group Gravity was started by Clyde Radcliffe and Rbraz, Rbraz is now a member of Ravebusters but the group Gravity lives on with other members, Clyde is still around, he has a new musician called Jojo, I am not sure if Ghost is still in as an artist :)

Gravity was added to the title of the forum because Clyde, Rbraz and Ghost helped me and Franck and the other DBF members get the board off the ground.

Hope that answers your questions :)
Title: Re: Average age survey.
Post by: relsoft on November 29, 2007: 31. ;)
Title: Re: Average age survey.
Post by: Jim on November 29, 2007: Pretty solid spike in our graph there from the C64/Spectrum era, though I would say 'Demo Scene' was originally more C= Amiga.

Jim
Title: Re: Average age survey.
Post by: Hotshot on November 30, 2007: I am 32 here :)
Title: Re: Average age survey.
Post by: DrewPee on December 03, 2007: Well I am 37 and still going strong! lol!
Seriously though folks I am doing more programming now than ever!

Drew
Title: Re: Average age survey.
Post by: slinks on December 05, 2007: I think the lack of under 15's really shows that our hobby is aging, I mean just a few years ago there were quite of few of us, but now we've grown up and no-one's taken our place. That's sad.
Title: Re: Average age survey.
Post by: Pixel_Outlaw on December 05, 2007: Quote from: slinks on December 05, 2007
I think the lack of under 15's really shows that our hobby is aging, I mean just a few years ago there were quite of few of us, but now we've grown up and no-one's taken our place. That's sad.

On the flip side it does mean a more mature atmosphere here. You don't see "STFU n00B!1" every three seconds. Or people insisting that they are professional programmers at age 15 after three drag and drop designed Game Maker programs. I'm not disrespecting Game Maker just the uninformed user. I'll admit I use Blitzmax but only because I know it is powerful enough and extendable enough to get most jobs done. It is funny to see people looking at a C++ compiler for the first time when moving from Game Maker. "Uhhh this looks like notepad","Where do I click to add a blank object?". I was the same way, actually Blitzmax stopped my learning of C++ just after I learned to make "Cat" and "Pen" classes with "meow" output and different colored ink respectively.
Title: Re: Average age survey.
Post by: slinks on December 05, 2007: Quote from: Pixel_Outlaw on December 05, 2007
On the flip side it does mean a more mature atmosphere here. You don't see "STFU n00B!1" every three seconds.

True, but concidering the average IQ and patience levels required to get to grips with programming, you wouldn't see too much of this anyway, thank god.

Quote from: Pixel_Outlaw on December 05, 2007
Or people insisting that they are professional programmers at age 15 after three drag and drop designed Game Maker programs.

Heh, I remember those guys, they were funny. To be perfectly honest, game maker really seems like the easy way out. It may allow you to focus more on the images and sound, but it offers much less control and less of a personal touch that so many programs are missing now days.
Title: Re: Average age survey.
Post by: rain_storm on December 07, 2007: This is actually very reminiscent of the comic book culture of the nineties. you see in the early nineties there was a surge in interest in the comic book scene and I was one of those people. many of us just grew out of it after about 15 years old but later on things changed some of the older guys came back to the comic books and almost no teenagers were getting into it. I dont know what the situation is now but there was a definate gap there between the ages of 15 and 30. Comics are still going but the scene is now geared towards two markets spiderman and daredevil are targeting really young children whilst preacher and the like are definately adult orientated. I suspect that in a few years many of the guys that have left the demoscene will return and produce more demos than they ever did before
Title: Re: Average age survey.
Post by: Shockwave on December 08, 2007: The saddest thing of all Rain is that there are no people aged below 15. This means that young people are probably just not interested in learning to make demos.

Very interesting comparison with the comic scene by the way Rain Storm.
Title: Re: Average age survey.
Post by: gooner on July 14, 2008: Better post this before i hit the big 40. ;)
I am 39 and just starting out on the coding journey determined to make up for lost time.
Just browsing the forums for the last couple of months got me into it .
So your never too old to start.
:carrot: :|| :carrot: :|| :carrot:
Title: Re: Average age survey.
Post by: Clyde on July 14, 2008: I'll be 34 this August. Where does the time go, feels like only yesterday I was playing and watching stuff on a Commodore 64.
Title: Re: Average age survey.
Post by: mentor on July 15, 2008: 24 and I feel old :/
Title: Re: Average age survey.
Post by: Architect_414 on September 05, 2008: Quote from: Shockwave on December 08, 2007
The saddest thing of all Rain is that there are no people aged below 15. This means that young people are probably just not interested in learning to make demos.

Very interesting comparison with the comic scene by the way Rain Storm.

Well shocky, when i joined here i was half way through my 14th year, now im 15.
I found out about demo's when i was about 13, and decided to start coding at 14.

Sorry for ressurecting an old topic, i just thought i'd say this!
Title: Re: Average age survey.
Post by: Shockwave on September 05, 2008: It's ok, it's an interesting topic :)

Maybe people who hadnt voted before will vote now but there is still a huge lump of people in their 30's :)
Title: Re: Average age survey.
Post by: hellfire on September 05, 2008: Quote
Sorry for ressurecting an old topic
...meanwhile I dropped into the next category :(
Title: Re: Average age survey.
Post by: StatMat on September 05, 2008: I missed this one myself. Anyway, I'm 32, so no surprises there! :p

I also think it's a shame that a lot of younger guys are not getting as interested as we all have. IMHO, modern gaming consoles have a big part to play in this, which don't allow for programming "out of the box" as our old home computers did. It would be wrong to say that those younger guys not interested in what we do are less creative these days though. A lot of them play around making videos and such for You-tube and producing mods for games for example. I guess the creative focus has just shifted elsewhere. However, there's still plenty of life in the demoscene, as many of us still love it, regardless of our age. ;)
Title: Re: Average age survey.
Post by: Pixel_Outlaw on September 05, 2008: I also have moved one category. ;)
Title: Re: Average age survey.
Post by: Shockwave on September 05, 2008: Why does everyone have to move up a category..

Life is so short, it's not fair.. I'll never understand BSP trees properly :( Not enough time to learn!
Title: Re: Average age survey.
Post by: Praecor on September 05, 2008: 25.

26 on christmas. + Still cutting my hair with BSP splitplanes<3 (Oh wait too long hair, precalcing takes ages,
this is not gonna work)

I wrote code first time with my aquarius in 1987 I guess or so, before I had the wonderous commodore 64.

I remember C64 programmers manual was a gift from the heaven back then, so sweet memories.

I'm so very very happy they let me live in the eighties to witness how it all began with the computers, because
that's something money can't buy.

It is pretty sad to see the new people who had not this chance
will never know how it really was. (I mean seriously We loved playing "pong" in front of the tv all day long,
it beated all games they do today, by a mile! Especially in sound effects. And back then it wasn't nothing like "retro"!)

But one thing is sure! I'm never gonna stop coding in my damn life. They can perhaps try to erase my memory, but I won't forget.

No matter what happens or how automated machines get to generate code for us or how many libraries
they throw at us to make stuff for us, I won't stop!

for (;i-->0;) printf ("Never");

Damn it if doc says me I have only 2 months left, well it is 2 months enough
to code a demo for my own funerals. :crutches:
Title: Re: Average age survey.
Post by: Shockwave on September 05, 2008: What Praecor said.

Amen to that and K+ You said what I thought but couldn't put into words.