Documentary on Hungary's Videogames Behind the Iron Curtain Crowdfunds Expanded Disks

A documentary series by Moleman Films reached its 5th episode, a 144-minute film about "the golden age of Hungarian video gaming and the formation of the Hungarian demoscene in the 80s and 90s." You can watch this episode on YouTube (and English subtitles can be selected). From Commodore 64s smuggled across the Iron Curtain to cracked games on cassette tapes sold at flea markets, floppy disk swapping via postal mail, hacked phone booths connected to U.S. BBSes, and copy parties packed to capacity, Stamps Back tells the story of how teenagers in Hungary ignited a computing revolution in the 1980s with illegally copied video games from the West, and began the Hungarian demoscene.
But the filmmakers say "We received a lot of feedback that you would like to see the full-length interviews...in a physical special edition." So they've launched a campaign on Crowdfundr: More than 76 hours of interviews [with 59 people] were conducted for the film, which is a true document of the Hungarian home computer life in the 1980s and 1990s. You can now get this 76-hour material with English subtitles together with the film in a special Blu-Ray edition + downloadable image file format...

If we reach the stretch goal, a 4th disc will be added to the edition, which will contain a selection of the best Hungarian intros and demos of the past 40 years in video format.
The film's web site includes links to (and information on) their four previous documentaries:

• The Truth Lies Down Under, about the alternative subcultures Budapest
• Demoscene: The Art of the Algorithms. A 2012 look at "a digital subculture where artists don't use always the latest technology" but "bring out the best from 30 year-old computer technics."
• Journey to the Surface. How the internet and digital technology reshaped the music industry for outside-the-mainstream genres including beatbox, turntablism, DJing, live improvisation, and bedroom producers.
• Longplay — the story of Hungarian video game development behind the Iron Curtain, and how dedicated developers "outfoxed Nintendo, tricked SEGA," and "dodged the limelight and led the world from behind the Iron Curtain."

Thanks to Slashdot reader lameron for sharing the story.

Sneakernet

[Luckyo]

Sneakernet was a thing pretty much everywhere behind Iron Curtain, including in Cuba in its most recent iteration. The idea is that with centralized control over communications, the easiest way to ship things in is on hard drives and similar high density storage media, hook it up to a hidden server that also functions as a private BBS, distribute from that to a few known end points who then copy to another set of high density media and pass it on to end users.

There are really good stories on how Cubans operated such things until very recently, since Cubans keep flowing to US and US intelligence keeps supplying hardware and software to keep those distribution systems up as they have things used by intelligence agents in addition to entertainment media and other similar things.

If you want a completely unironic and clear cut "US intelligence is a force for good at least in some spheres", this support would be one of the better examples.

Re:

[AmiMoJo]

I don't know about former Soviet states, but in the UK we used to use the postal system to trade floppy disks.

Being kids with no money we abused the hell out of it too. One trick was to place tape over the stamps, so that the franking would go on the tape and could be wiped off by the recipient, and the same padded envelope and stamps re-used almost endlessly. Eventually you ended up with a jiffy bag that was 90% parcel tape.

You used to be able to send stuff to fake Freepost addresses, with the intended rec

Re:

[arglebargle_xiv]

It wasn't just the iron curtain but other countries with limited access to hardware and software. Some time in the late 80s a friend of mine asked for a box of disks he'd lent me back. I told him they were in Pietermaritzburg, but would be back at some point. He's got no-one else to blame but himself, he never specified that I couldn't post them to South Africa when he lent them to me.

Re:

[UPi]

I hope you will never experience takeover of your country by a criminal gang who use your country's resources to enrich themselves, buy up most of what used to be free media, manipulate the public discourse to their benefit, use your tax money to fund research into ways to entrench their power, modify the electoral and judicial system to make it next to impossible to have a fair election in your lifetime, and that's just the tip of an iceberg.

Sucking Putin's dick is just the tiny part that you see, excus

Re:

[nightflameauto]

I hope you will never experience takeover of your country by a criminal gang who use your country's resources to enrich themselves, buy up most of what used to be free media, manipulate the public discourse to their benefit, use your tax money to fund research into ways to entrench their power, modify the electoral and judicial system to make it next to impossible to have a fair election in your lifetime, and that's just the tip of an iceberg.

But enough about American politics.

Re:

[Fuck_this_place]

Yeah you're such a poor victim. You deserve a medal. Just like ruSSia. Such poor little victims. Can't do anything. Just fucking useless eaters.

Cry more bitch. Remember what Canada did in WW2? Hitler was afraid of us for a good reason. No one fucks with us even with our joke military.

Hungary?

[backslashdot]

Interesting, I was familiar with the demoscene back in the 80s and early 90s .. up until and a little after it culminated with Second Reality .. I never really thought of Hungary as being a powerhouse .. seemed like Scandinavia and Northern Europe were the lead and had the best demos.