Want to read Slashdot from your mobile device? Point it at m.slashdot.org and keep reading!

 


Forgot your password?
Close
typodupeerror
×
Announcements Entertainment Games Technology

Tickets For The World's Biggest Computer Party 196

Posted by timothy from the pronounced-pah-tee dept.
vvizard writes "For Norwegian geeks in particular, easter is preferable spent at the worlds biggest computer-party [The Gathering]. That is, for those lucky enough to get tickets at least. Tickets for the scandinavian people where released through Partyticket last night, and got sold out as fast as the system managed (which due to extreme traffic, isn't very fast). However, there are still tickets left. Foreigners, demosceners and professional gamers have their own pool of tickets, which started selling tonight. So if you fit in one of the previous mentioned categories, and would like to experience the biggest computer-party in the world, now is the time to check out www.gathering.org for information, and www.partyticket.net for ticket-booking."
This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.

Tickets For The World's Biggest Computer Party More

Tickets For The World's Biggest Computer Party

Comments Filter:

  • how (Score:4, Funny)

    by NoGuffCheck ( 746638 ) on Wednesday February 04, 2004 @06:42AM (#8178381)
    how is this supposed to help me pick up chicks??... yeah yeah, I can get tickets to anything you want baby... im a foreigner!do they sell porn at this event?

    • Re:how (Score:2, Funny)

      by noselasd ( 594905 )
      I'm very sorry, but I cannot help you pick up chicks. You have to
      do that your on your own. That said, there are usually _lots_ of good looking girls at The Gathering.

      • Re:how (Score:1)

        by Anonymous Coward
        > That said, there are usually _lots_ of good looking girls at The Gathering.

        That's because it's held in Europe. Just imagine if it were being held in the US *shudder*. I guess some US girls are ok, but you get fewer for any given weight.
    • Well, a lot of the chicks that do go are in the "jailbait" category.

      If I remember correctly, they had to hire guards the past few years, to make sure the 40-somethings (WTF are they doing at TG?) don't hassle the teenie-boppers.

      • Re:how (Score:3, Insightful)

        by BenEnglishAtHome ( 449670 )
        "...the 40-somethings (WTF are they doing at TG?)"

        Uh...playing games?

        I don't know what the focus of The Gathering is, but a number of other posters are saying that it has a lot to do with games. So I'm prompted to ask: Was I supposed to automatically lose my desire to play any games other than Monopoly and Whist when I turned 40?

        • Re:how (Score:2, Informative)

          by Felinoid ( 16872 )
          Not games: Demos.
          Demos are basicly those programs that have ultra high quality graphics but no game. It's the art of improving the art by develuping new graphic tricks.
          Eventually those tricks are used in video games but first they are done in demo form...

          Demos are pure eyecandy with no pretence of entertainment via gameplay.
          It all started on the Commodore 64.

      • Re:how (Score:4, Informative)

        by jedrek ( 79264 ) on Wednesday February 04, 2004 @09:07AM (#8178830) Homepage
        Today's 40 year olds were in their 20s when the demo scene was in full gear.
        • I'm in my late 30's and the Demo scene brings back memorys memorys from my teens....

          I won a demo contest in the 15 or less catagory.. (Not lines.. age.. well lines too but not the point).
    • Chicks? At The Gathering? As if. I can just see it now..

      'A big shout to all the laydeez in the house! Gimme an A! Gimme an S! Gimme an L!'

      • This dance group [wymenfan.com] apparently used to dance at TG. I never was there, I met them through another organisation, but they are good dancers, and I can imagine it's pretty entertaining to the geeks.

        Apparently they weren't paid last year though, so I don't know if they will show up this year. Probably not, unless TG has managed to clean up it's economic mess.

  • Here's how it looks (Score:5, Funny)

    by nnnneedles ( 216864 ) on Wednesday February 04, 2004 @06:42AM (#8178382)
    Pretty big, eh?

    http://fun.from.hell.pl/2003-06-09/male-copy-par ty .jpg

  • Computerparty? (Score:1, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Whyis itthat theNorwegians liketo squishwords together?

    • Re:Computerparty? (Score:5, Informative)

      by dillkvast ( 657246 ) * on Wednesday February 04, 2004 @07:11AM (#8178468)
      Whyis itthat theNorwegians liketo squishwords together?

      I realize that you are only trying to be funny, but it might not be coincidental that norwegians does this.
      That's because that's the way it's done in the Norwegian language. Most expressions of that kind is concatenated to a new word in norwegian. This of course causes some problems using the Word spell checker (which in norwegian is one word ;-P) on norwegian texts.

      Norwegianelectronicsstudent
      • This of course causes some problems using the Word spell checker (which in norwegian is one word ;-P) on norwegian texts.
        It does? The Dutch version of Word has no problems with compound words like 'arbeidsvoorwaardenbeleidsmedewerker' (Policy maker for working conditions & benefits). Of course, it gets some of the rules for making compound words wrong, but it is designed to deal with them.

        • This of course causes some problems using the Word spell checker (which in norwegian is one word ;-P) on norwegian texts.

          It does? The Dutch version of Word has no problems with compound words like 'arbeidsvoorwaardenbeleidsmedewerker' (Policy maker for working conditions & benefits). Of course, it gets some of the rules for making compound words wrong, but it is designed to deal with them.

          The current spell checker (Word XP/2003) is quite good and is quite able to deal with the norwegian gramma

          • Define Norwegian? I understood there are 2 Norwegian languages. And one of them doesn't have a very strcitly defined spelling, or so I heard.

            • Define Norwegian? I understood there are 2 Norwegian languages. And one of them doesn't have a very strcitly defined spelling, or so I heard.

              Yes, there are two languages, bokmaal (norwegian) and nynorsk (new norse). The languages are very similar and both has strict grammar rules and a defined spelling. However, as nynorsk is based on rural dialects many get the impression that the language that is less strictly than bokmaal. Word's spell checker supports both as far as I know, although you may need a

            • They call them languages or language forms. Actually they are spelling convensions, one based on western dialects and one on eastern/southern ones.

              No one actually speaks either, we use dialects shamelessly. The only ones confused enough to actually speak a spelling convention are some TV people...
            • Interesting. What are the differences between both languages?
              I've been on holiday in Norway last year. I understand some spoken Swedish but I couldn't even make out individual words in Norwegian. Funny thing, we met a woman who suddenly spoke Norwegian that I *could* understand. It appeared she was Dutch (like me) and she has a Norwegian husband, so she learned Norwegian.
        • Hope it's better than the t9 in my mobile. It keeps inventing vaguely racistic words such as jodedo (jew toilet) when it guesses what my keypresses mean...
      • Although I'm not a linguist, it's my understanding that all Germanic languages have this aspect. I remember being in Frankfurt and seeing a word with I think 29 characters in it because they put baggage check and taxes together (might be off a bit, it was a few years ago).

        English was like this at one point too, but we stopped before getting to the level of what other modern day Germanic languages are at. My guess would be it's because of the Norman invasion of England, but I wouldn't put any money behind

    • Re:Computerparty? (Score:5, Interesting)

      by Tore S B ( 711705 ) on Wednesday February 04, 2004 @07:16AM (#8178490) Homepage
      Because Norwegian grammar dictates it.

      A computer party in Norwegian translates to dataparty, which in two words is an adjective describing noun (data party would of course be nonsensical, because data is not an adjective)

      We are in fact seeing quite the direct opposite happening here in Norway, much to the chagrin of Norwegian grammar fetishists (Being the geek I am, I am the English grammar fetishist ;))

      One amusing example of this causing trouble is a sign maker's logo reading "Skilt Mann a/s" (a/s = inc.) - 'Skilt' can mean two different things - divorced (adjective), and sign(noun). Therefore, most of the Nordea banks have signs reading "Divorced Man inc." at the bottom ;)

      For y'all Norwegianpeople [folk.uio.no]
      • I am the English grammar fetishist
        Actually, it's spelled fetischist ;-)

        Therefore, most of the Nordea banks have signs reading "Divorced Man inc." at the bottom
        You can't trust a swede doing anything right, can you?
      • (data party would of course be nonsensical, because data is not an adjective)

        Cocktail party anyone?

        In english, we do the same as most of Germanic languages, only we don't run the words together. So data party and cocktail party are fine. In French, you can't use this construction and have to say 'party of cocktails" or "party of data".
    • Same in Danish. Combined nouns are concatenated. Lots and lots of Danes seperate these nouns, partly (I'm sure) because spell checkers can't know all the words as you can form an almost infinite amount of nouns this way.

  • Assembly (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Aggrajag ( 716041 ) on Wednesday February 04, 2004 @06:46AM (#8178396)
    I've never been to the Gathering but I try to attend Assembly [assembly.org], which is held in Finland every year. It's not quite the same as it used to be during the early nineties when Amiga still ruled the demoscene but the PC's were already coming. I still remember in Assembly '92 when a really cool (can't remember the name) PC demo got a standing ovation from the Amiga crowd.

    • Re:Assembly (Score:4, Informative)

      by triiiple ( 643933 ) on Wednesday February 04, 2004 @07:16AM (#8178489)
      That demo would be Unreal [pouet.net] by Future Crew [pouet.net]. One of the first megademos, and a real milestone in the PC demoscene. Another great PC demo from that era is Crystal Dreams [pouet.net] by Triton [pouet.net]. To watch them, just get your hands on a 386 and a Gravis UltraSound... and you're good to go!
    • Future Crew won 1st place in the PC Demo compo at Assembly '92. I'm not sure if that was the one you are speaking of, but it was killer for it's time. Also check out 'Second Reality' by the same group. It was probably the most mind blowing demo for it's time also. For more fun, watch Yodel's streaming station in WinAmp. If I'm not mistaken, Xine or MPlayer will play .nsv streams. Here's a link if your interested. Yodel TV [62.65.8.228]
    • I like Assembly better as it's demo-centric still, as opposed to the Gathering which is going the way of TheParty. Hoping to get a UK Demo Party up soon-ish.

  • Probably have a high police presence (Score:3, Funny)

    by Space cowboy ( 13680 ) on Wednesday February 04, 2004 @06:47AM (#8178399) Journal
    [sarcasm>] ... since we all now know that Linux users (especially in Norway) are all avid DVD-copiers...
    [/sarcasm]

    Simon

  • About these parties... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Albert Sandberg ( 315235 ) on Wednesday February 04, 2004 @06:52AM (#8178414) Homepage
    The gathering, along with dreamhack, is just gamers parties. Many people just goes there to play games nowadays. At Assembly it's about the same, but they try to keep the demoscene alive, by letting us access a seperate area away from the gamers, where we can sit and produce all nights...

    If you want to access a DEMO party (less gaming) I would recommend Breakpoint in germany which should be in april.

    State of the art in france is also very good, but is in january so we've past it already.

    As I said, Assembly is also good if you are in the "oldschool" area...

    I'm not saying The Gathering and Dreamhack aren't about demos at all, they are, but the gaming takes focus I think.
    • The gaming is indeed in focus, with Counterstrike, Quake 3 etc tournaments, and the prices are actually really cool. But IIRC there are also programming contests, flash design contests, and stuff like that.
      • Quote from the website:

        Competitions:
        We will host a multitude of demoscene and game-competitions, as well as several other surprise-compos. Much more information will of course be available as soon as the new website is in place, but for now these are the competitions which are going to be held at The Gathering 2004:

        Demoscene:
        * Combined demo (Amiga, PC, Mac)
        * Combined 64k intro (Amiga, PC, Mac)
        * Wild/animation
        * Tracked music
        * HiQuality music
        * Pixeled graphics
        * Rendered graphics
        * Fast intro
        * Fast music
        * Web
    • Anyone know of a good DEMO party in the midwest US, preferably the rustbelt? Travel funds aren't what they once were =(
    • just gamers parties ...

      Dude, if I could play at this party somehow, I would.

      By play, I mean: music.

      This would be a -great- gig for new and upcoming bands to play at - I see no reason why you have to be a 'gaming geek' to enjoy being there, and it could be a -really- good gig...
    • And please do not forget the Remedy [remedy.nu]. Going now fot the 10th year the focus now is to rejuvinate the demo scene.
      If you have attended the Remedy earlier years you know that the party is divided into 2 parties.
      First SceneZone for the demo scene and then GameZone for, yes you guessed it, the hardcode gamers out there.

  • Professionnal gamers (Score:4, Funny)

    by frs_rbl ( 615298 ) on Wednesday February 04, 2004 @06:56AM (#8178424) Journal
    ...and professional gamers have their own pool of tickets, which started selling tonight.

    Does playing Solitaire at work count a professional gaming?

  • PRESS PLAY ON TAPE will be playing (Score:4, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday February 04, 2004 @06:58AM (#8178430)
    Note that The Gathering will feature a concert by danish Commodore64 band PRESS PLAY ON TAPE [pressplayontape.com] on saturday the 10th of april. Another reason for showing up!

  • Pictures from last year (Score:5, Informative)

    by neonstz ( 79215 ) * on Wednesday February 04, 2004 @07:01AM (#8178441) Homepage

    A lot of pictures [sesse.net] from The Gathering last year.

    • For Sesse: Most digital camras have a delete feature... Use it. Picture after picture of the same object untell you get it right is ok but now you have eaten the space for 5 pictures when you only have 1 good shot.

      For primadonn:
      Don't fear the camra embrace it.. take more pictures.

      In fact Prima talk with Ses about taking lots of photos...
    • Ah.. Nothing like Geek S&M pornshot [sesse.net] in the morning.
    • Hehe, speaking of images [slashdot.org]. I got my (quite big) picture-archieve from last years party slashdot'ed during the party. That wouldn't have been to bad, if it wasn't for: They where hosted on my own workstation (which I actually tried to get some work done on) from inside the party. To top it all, my archeive consisted purely of unscaled 5Megapixel images =] But honestly, it wen't real well. I didn't notice very much to the apache-load actually. It was a 2.55GHz P4 with 512MB RAM. Haven't got the webalizer logs
  • If there really is a group called 'pro gamers'.. oh PLEASE get them away, at least as far as possible from demo sceners..

    Or if you call gaming creative, please forgive me.. *sigh*

    • Re:Pro gamers? (Score:3, Informative)

      by morbuz ( 592480 )
      If there really is a group called 'pro gamers'.. oh PLEASE get them away, at least as far as possible from demo sceners..

      Calm down, sceneres have their own area with "Gamers not allowed" barricade tape around it.

      like this [geekstuff.no] :-)

  • as much as I'd like to go... (Score:4, Interesting)

    by tuxette ( 731067 ) * <(tuxette) (at) (gmail.com)> on Wednesday February 04, 2004 @07:46AM (#8178573) Homepage Journal
    ...they have an (unofficial) upper age limit of 20 ;-)

    Or was it that nobody over the age of 20 in their right mind would be caught dead there?

    • ..or maybe you miss the fact that everyone from earlier demoscene days is over 20..

      heck guess how old the old school guys who are (still)doing the c64/amiga demos are by now?

      if you're thinking of one of those newfangled lanparties then I'd stay the heck out :)

      though I'm sure that even the gathering hasn't been able to not pickup lan gamers..
      • heck guess how old the old school guys who are (still)doing the c64/amiga demos are by now?

        Well, not sure about that one, but if they do show up at TG, then it's only to chaperone their teenagers, while carrying a baseball bat just in case some pedo-creep gets too close...

  • Demoparties in the USA (Score:4, Informative)

    by radd0 ( 558899 ) <radman@NOspaM.acid.org> on Wednesday February 04, 2004 @07:59AM (#8178611) Homepage Journal

    Demoparties do take place in the USA, but not with the frequency nor large attendance that one would find at such spectacular events as Assembly [assembly.org] or The Gathering [gathering.org].

    The next North American Demoparty is going to be held in Salt Lake City, Utah on August 5-7. Refer to pilgrimage.scene.org [scene.org] for details.

    -- RaD Man / ACiD
    • Geez, I'm having flashbacks to the warez days and having those awesome tiny little demos for the groups included with the games and such. It's amazing what they could do with a 386 and a standard VGA card. The demo guys could've taught the game programmers a thing or two about efficient use of the graphics card I guess.
      • There's still a lot of creativity in demos nowadays, but I'm willing to go as far as saying that modern demo guys are lamers compared to guys who made demos back in the old days. It's so much easier nowadays. Hardware is doing all the tricks for the programmer.

        Take a _good_ look at this [pouet.net] demo and analyze it! It's a demo called Atom from a finnish group called Sorcerers. It was coded using IBM AT in 1990. It's size is 23552 _bytes_ and it has some nice features such as digitized voice. Think about the hardw

  • I can imagine it now... (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday February 04, 2004 @08:04AM (#8178619)
    I can just imagine a bunch of nerds sitting around a table discussing ways to improve their image.

    Nerd 1: I'm tired of people thinking we're a bunch of losers!
    Nerd 2: What people? Everyone here seems to get along just fine...
    Nerd 1: Not any of us. The people on the "outside."
    Nerd 2: Oh yeah. Forgot about them.
    Nerd 3: So what're we gonna do about it?
    Nerd 4: I know! We'll throw a party!
    Nerd 5: Yeah! A COMPUTER PARTY!
    Nerd 1: Great idea! Meeting adjourned.

    Better luck next time, nerds. :)
    • Why would geeks be trying to improve theri image.. Shit, I dont download the latest fifga so i'll be a hit with the girls. I do it coz i want to play it!

      Like wise back in the day when 10 friends or so would get together for a lan party, it wasnt with the aim of being cool, it was cause we enjoyed it.

      you have some serious self-image problem dude. Go see a fucking shrink or something.

      "oooh, i know, lets go take the piss out of people for doing what i would like to do. but if i did it all the people who ha
  • but can someone please explain wtf "The Gathering" is..... The link in the intro points to a blog, is there an official site or is this some kind of mass secrecy geek "you either know or you don't know" weener trip or what?

    • Re:Excuse my ignorance (Score:1, Informative)

      by Anonymous Coward
      What you describe as a blog is just the temporary webpage, it is there to show news and FAQ until the new design is ready, since they make a new design for every party. Expect new pages to be up in two-three days.
  • ..who pays the power bill for running all those computers?

    Rus
  • ...there will be more pr0n trading than gaming.
  • Just this: Campus Party [campus-party.org] is the biggest Computer Party I know in the world, with 4000 people. It is celebrated in Valencia, Spain.
    • The cathering has had more than 5000 people the last copuple years. And the main hall is gigantic, so there's probably room for many more.
    • Dream Hack (Sweden) and The Gathering is fighting for the title "biggest". AFAIK The Gathering is leading by a few hundered PC's .

      br> btw, I got my tickets. See you there :)

  • The Gathering and the people going (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Pingla ( 64700 ) on Wednesday February 04, 2004 @08:45AM (#8178735) Homepage
    I have been to this party twice, last time was three years ago. The first time was in 98, and I guess I was amongst the 1% with linux. Second time I was amazed over what kind of people actually went. The majority was below 18 IRC'ers who would sit and chat the entire time. The second largest group was gamers, but they were playing single player most of the time.

    During the Demo presentations several people were playing music loudly. There were restricitons on speaker size, but obviously that was not enough.

    Frankly, unless you are below 18 and have a need for chatting in the same big room as everyone else, don't bother to go.
  • biting moose that bites my sister while she is carving her name on the moose?
  • Wow, so we are all some level of geek here (or else why would we be using this site) yet constantly their are comments about geeks and body odour, lack of women, moroseness. Strikes me that the few making these comments gotta be the ones suffering these afflictions.

    you know you can actually try to change things by bathing or something and not trying to transfer your issues to others. Im a geek and i work with many others. All of use have good home lives, most have long term girlfriends, and NO body odo

  • Ah brings back memories (Score:3, Interesting)

    by mgt ( 138275 ) on Wednesday February 04, 2004 @09:17AM (#8178870)
    I was there in 1993, although it was in another place then (Lillestrom i belive). Back then it was pure geeks let me tell you :)

    2unlimited "no limit" playing loud 24h a day, as far as calling it LAN, well we had a NULL-modem cabel and played VROOM on 2 Amiga 500.

    Back in these days it was not all about playing CS and WC3 (yeah i know im a bit harsh now but...)

    Beeing perhaps the only computer geek in town, going to a place like this and meeting 2000 other computer geeks from all around Europe! WOW! ... And bringing them demos home for some easy credits on the BBS'es when you got home :)
  • Outside of scalping (Apparently it's almost a garrenty you will NOT get in if you buy a scalp) how much do they charge for tickets?

  • Call Guinness Book of World Records (Score:3, Funny)

    by dlb ( 17444 ) on Wednesday February 04, 2004 @01:42PM (#8180902)
    This will set the record for highest concentration of male virgins.

Slashdot Top Deals

He has not acquired a fortune; the fortune has acquired him. -- Bion

Close