ScuzzBlog: Diaries November 2021
Entry 12th November 2021: Post 1: Amiga Public Domain - A lost cause.
Amiga Public Domain - A lost cause.
I am not taken to giving up on any challenge, but in the case of
Amiga Public Domain Disks I gave up tilting my windmill at that
particular challenge a long long time ago. It isn't that I didn't
try, it is just that with each expedition into PD uncharted lands
I discovered even more and more titles and PD houses. The lists
of disks are endless. This became a realisation as I gave up and
simply tracked down catalogue disks. Catalogue disks that were
being updated by the month with each promotion in Amiga mags.
I would suggest anyone trying to collect disks to simply track
down a few CD collections like the 17bit Software sets. They
have most of the more popular disks and you can explore at your
leisure the titles before turning into Amiga disks to use.
Sadly this endeavour is a lost cause. There is 'NO WAY' that
anyone could put together a complete list of PD disks, let alone
track down each and every disk. The numbers of disks are simply
too great, and sadly I fear a good number have been simply put
to dust. Such a shame. Had I thought about this earlier I would
have tried to contact a few of the houses and ask that they sell
me the disks before they threw them away.
Anyhoo... here are some of the headline PD houses. There were
also great quantities of demo disks for retail products, games
and software. There were all the FISH disks and Trainers. In
addition there were Modules, Samples, Clip-Art, Fonts disks. And
many of the disks were not numbered or catalogued, so no way of
knowing the full numbers in the lists.
If you do decide to start collecting then obtain as many catalogue
disks as you can find and use Amiga Magazines to define PD house
names. Also publications like the one provided by Amiga Shopper
was very useful.
Just to stick one last spanner in the floppy drive, do remember
that there was free stuff and 'Shareware' and the latter was very
often distributed by companies and even dedicated magazines and
did not find their way into PD houses. The reason was obtaining
revenue from distribution. Many PD houses were not trusted and
did fuel the piracy problems of the days.
And finally... demo disks and party disks and magazine disks.
Plus the BIGGY ... commercial magazine cover disks and that also
includes all the subscribers disks.
The list my friends is endless. So give up now, walk away, just
walk away. I have over 13700 disks and I have barely scratched
the surface of the PD lost vaults of DDs. Maybe you will have
better luck.
Amiga Public Domain - A lost cause.
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