The Off Topic Topic

[CountDeMoney]

I just randomly ran across a story about a Phillies baseball player dying of brain cancer, being the sixth player to die of brain cancer from that team.  That sparked my curiosity, as brain cancer is fairly rare.  Turns out all six players died in their late fifties. 

I know that statistical flukes happen, and they seem to happen more often than they really do because the non-flukes don't get our attention.  That said, that still seems like an awfully improbable cluster of events.  I know that PEDs were a think in baseball for a long time before it caught the public attention, could some of those be causing brain cancer later in life?

Interesting how you mention that--actually, that's been a theory in Philadelphia for years regarding the old Veterans Stadium, where so many of these guys played during their era.

Interesting piece from yesterday with links to the issue regarding AstroTurf back in the day--

https://thatballsouttahere.com/2022/05/14/phillies-veterans-stadium-cancer-david-west/

Other notable baseball players, like Curt Schilling, played at the Vet, got cancer and recovered.  Some long-time players, like Gary Carter, didn't play for Philly, but spent a lot of time on that carpet as well as others throughout the National League and passed away from cancer.

Tidbit from 2013--

In 2013, when Daulton was originally diagnosed, The Philadelphia Inquirer analyzed 533 Phillies players who played within 33 seasons at Veterans Field. It was found that the incidence of brain cancer among Daulton, McGraw, Vukovich and Oates was three times higher than the rate of the general male population.

However, the Times noted, the 2013 study had a number of limitations. The researchers that the Times interviewed also said that because glioblastomas are not necessarily identical among the players, it is still possible that other variables beyond baseball caused the tumors.

[Syt]

The BBC in 1985 singing the praises of the Commodore Amiga. graphical interface! Multitasking! Musical capabilities!

The video mentions that the Amiga has a 32 bit processor, which is true, but IIRC the internal architecture of the machine was entirely 16 bit, hence the computer being part of the 16 bit era. As for the music, I think Amigas were used for professional electronic music well into the late 90s/early 00s (though at that point later versions with more RAM)? And I think the SFX for Babylon 5 were done of Amiga hardware.

(One Google search later)

Yes, found a link: http://www.generationamiga.com/2020/08/30/how-24-commodore-amiga-2000s-created-babylon-5/

[Barrister]

Yeah the Amiga was quite the thing back in the day.  Compare it to a PC which would be running DOS in 1985, or even the Mac.

[Syt]

Amiga was absolutely huge in Germany, and several friends had one. The main competitor was Atari at the time, with their ST series. The Amiga/Atari wars in the letter sections of computer mags were giving a taste of what the console wars (Nintendo/Sega, Sony/Microsoft) would be later on.

[Barrister]

I remember having extensive PC/Mac/Amiga debates with my rather nerdy friends back in the mid to late 80s.

Naturally of course I took the Mac side of the argument.

[Josquius]

I've always wanted an amiga right up till very recently but never did get one. A bit naff now, it'd just take space and never be used. There was something special about them.

Maybe someday ill get an amiga mini or home make one.

[Syt]

The game that blew me away - incidentally also the first Amiga game I played - was Ports of Call after seeing it at a friend's:

https://www.mobygames.com/game/amiga/ports-of-call/screenshots

I picked it up a few years ago when it came to Steam. It has not aged very well in the gameplay department.

[CountDeMoney]

I remember having extensive PC/Mac/Amiga debates with my rather nerdy friends back in the mid to late 80s.

LOL, I used to sell them at Electronics Boutique. It really was quite the machine for its day. 

[Grey Fox]

This week, I should find out if my son plays A or B little league baseball.

I've been refreshing my emails obsessively.

He made the A team.

[Razgovory]

I remember having extensive PC/Mac/Amiga debates with my rather nerdy friends back in the mid to late 80s.

Naturally of course I took the Mac side of the argument.

So you lost?

[viper37]

This week, I should find out if my son plays A or B little league baseball.

I've been refreshing my emails obsessively.

He made the A team.

That's pretty cool!

[Threviel]

The game that blew me away - incidentally also the first Amiga game I played - was Ports of Call after seeing it at a friend's:

https://www.mobygames.com/game/amiga/ports-of-call/screenshots

I picked it up a few years ago when it came to Steam. It has not aged very well in the gameplay department.

I've spent so many hours on that game. It came out for the iphone also, but haven't been updated to 64 bits. That, Centurion, Detroit, UFO, Civilization, Dune II and Settlers were the gold standard in the early-mid 90's.

I've had one Amiga 1200 and one Amiga 500. A few years ago I got bored and built a virtual A4000, played around with hard drives and so on.

They had 32 bit processors wit a 16 bit data bus IIRC. Ahead of its time in many ways, but a technological dead end.

[Josquius]

Ah Britain. Some things never change.

https://www.chroniclelive.co.uk/news/north-east-news/sunderland-travel-wembley-flights-cheaper-23975490

Guy travels from Sunderland to London via Spain as its cheaper than the train.

[Syt]

[Syt]

Just heard from a PR professional on a conference call: "If you have kids, dogs, or other animals ..." (it was not intended as a joke.)