While the company ceased to be an entity in its own right over twenty years ago, the legacy of Acorn Computers lives on. Not just with its most important technological innovation, the ARM chip, now being ubiquitous – but also because RISC OS, the computing platform it built around that chip, is still used, developed, and promoted, even though the dedicated community of followers and users is very small.
There are a number of people who worked at Acorn and its associated companies that longer term RISC OS users will remember, and Chris Cox is one of them. During his time at the company, which began with the role of Marketing Manager, he became one of its main public faces, particularly at shows, and headed up the Clan – the company’s ‘fan club’ – before later becoming manager of the Computer Business Unit at Acorn RISC Technologies (ART).
On Wednesday, 6th November, Chris will be paying the Wakefield RISC OS Computer Club (WROCC) a visit, where he will be talking about all of this and more – a personal insider’s perspective on the last few years at Acorn, including the launch of StrongARM, development of the network computer, all the way up to the eventual closure of Acorn’s computer business in 1998, with an insight into what was happening in that period from an insider’s personal perspective.
The meeting will start at 7:45pm at:
West Yorkshire Sports and Social Club,
Sandal Hall Close,
Off Walton Lane,
Wakefield,
WF2 6ER.
WROCC members can attend the meeting for free, but non-members who wish to attend must stump up £3.00 to do so – but given that the cost of annual membership is £15.00 (discounted to just £7.50 for the first year) it’s worth thinking about paying the extra little bit to join up and benefit from free entry into other meetings, and other benefits of membership, including a newsletter delivered by email in PDF format, and access to an online discussion forum and a members-only section of the Club website.
Looking ahead, the meeting on 4th December is listed as ‘An evening of Festive Fun with Quiz’ and the first meeting of 2020, on 8th January, is the Club’s AGM, which is for members only. Beyond that, details are yet to be announced – but if you look a little further ahead, the next annual Wakefield Show (the 25th one), organised by WROCC, is scheduled for Saturday, 18th April, 2020, and will take place at:
The Cedar Court Hotel,
Denby Dale Road,
Calder Grove,
Wakefield,
WF4 3QZ.
