No "announcements", no "save the date"! Just go for it: I am pleased to announce that booking is now open for the second in person ABUG NL. Please subscribe to this topic to stay informed about future updates.
Venue
The event will take place from Friday 4th to Sunday 6th October 2024 at Fletcher Hotel-Restaurant Veldenbos, Spoorlaan 42, 8071 BR Nunspeet. This hotel has 34 rooms and free WiFi. This is the same venue as last year.
The hotel has limited access for disabled people or wheelchair users and does not have an elevator. However, the meeting room is easily to access for people in a wheel chair for disabled people (this sounds so weird ... disabled ...., isn't there a better word or term?).
Travel
The venue is a short distance from A28 between Amersfoort and Zwolle. There is a reasonable amount of parking on site and a station to charge your electric car. It’s about a 5 minute walk from the train station (Utrecht – Zwolle).
How to book a place
Places will be subject to a charge of €12.50 per head per day (although I am not planning on taking any money until much closer to the time). There is a small discount if you sign up for all three days. Members of the Big Ben User Group in the Netherlands get one day free entrance as this event is sponsored by this user group. The charge covers the cost of the meeting room together tea, coffee and water. The venue offered price is for 30 persons but I might get more room space when we reach 50 attendees
If you wish to reserve a place, please post in the thread below or use this sign up form. If you sign up by replying to this post please also mention how many table space you'd like to reserve: a full table (about 180x80cm), a half table or no table at all.
If you do not take one of the above steps, you will not have a place.
Booking a hotel room
You can book a room at the hotel. At the moment you can cancel your booking until September 28. You can save money by sharing a room with someone else.If you make your reservation through their website you can become a "Fletcher Friend" and use the discount code ABUG24 you'll get a discount of 10%.
What happens at ABUG
Acorn & BBC Micro User Group (ABUG) events are open to enthusiasts of the BBC Micro, Acorn Electron, Atom and Archimedes/RISC OS machines. Attendees will typically stay for two if not all three days. The events are always very informal and can involve:
• attendees bringing their own hardware to set up and show off
• time spent working on hardware and programming/games projects
• exchange of ideas/knowledge
• upgrade and repair of poorly Acorn machines
• collaborative work on community projects, such as software preservation, preparation/planning for displays at other events etc.
• sale of items by members (not guaranteed, but there are often opportunities to buy bits)
• general socializing, food/drink and the odd hi-score competition!
• Important! Ensure that any hardware you bring that features the RIFA/paper-type capacitors with a tendency to go POP (e.g. Beebs) have had the caps changed! We can't risk setting any smoke alarms off as that may incur charges!
Rules
There are very few rules:
• no food is to be consumed at the venue other than that which is purchased from the bar/restaurant
• no alcoholic drinks are to be consumed at the venue other than that which is purchased from the bar/restaurant
• see below regarding children
• the hotel is a snake-free venue; please do not bring any snakes to the event. Also cats and dogs are not allowed. The venue does not mention cows and sheep in their house rules.
Children
ABUG meetings are not child friendly events because of the following:
• there is not often a lot to engage the interest of very young children
• people working with hot soldering stations
• people working with potentially toxic substances (lead, IPA)
• people working with exposed mains (and higher) voltages
• large amounts of electrical cabling representing potential trip hazards
• lots of fragile, expensive and sometimes rare equipment
Having said that, we do encourage well behaved/adequately supervised children who may be interested in an insight into computers (and, obviously, computer games) of days gone-by. In particular, there will almost certainly, be opportunities for gaming.
If, however, children become a risk to themselves or others, they will have to leave.
New members
We are particularly keen for new members of the forum and people who didn’t visit any TechSat meetings in the past to attend these events. You do not need to ‘join’ anything to come along. You do not need to have attended previously or being active on Stardot or BigBenClub. You do not need to be working on developing a Cray 1 second processor for the Beeb or porting Crysis to the Acorn Atom. You just need to be interested in vintage technology.
We are a friendly bunch and we will make sure you feel welcome. If you have any questions or uncertainty about the event, please feel free to PM or email me.
Partners
Many people bring their partners to these events. They are all very welcome. Those of you who are lucky enough to have a partner who is genuinely involved in the retro-computing scene, will have to secure and pay for a separate place for your partner. But those partners who just attend to socialize are welcome free of charging and without needing to take-up one of the places.
Confirmed
1. Roland L. (Fri - Sat - Sun)
2. TheDark (Tonny) (Fri - Sat - Sun)
3. Richard H. (Fri - Sat - Sun)
4. Multiwizard (Fri - Sat - Sun)
5. Rick W. (Fri - Sat)
6. 0xC0DE (Kelvin) (Sat)
7. Henri D. (Sat)
8. TimoHartong (Fri - Sat - Sun)
9. Marc van der M. (Fri - Sat - Sun)
10. Rik van W. (Fri - Sat - Sun)
11. Paul P. (Fri - Sat - Sun)
12. Igor ( (Sat - Sun)
13. Martijn van der M. (Fri - Sat - Sun)
14. Kees, oss033 (Fri - Sat - Sun)
15. Neil, -B- (Fri - Sat - Sun)
16. Erik Drent (Sat - Sun)
17. Kees G. (Sat)
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