Big Brother's Newspeak Machine

Some words from the author after a conversation with John Hardie:

"I was a COBOL programmer for the Federal Highway Administration. My first computer was a Sphere 310 upgraded to 16K and running a BASIC language which only had five commands.

I later bought an Atari 800 and my first game was called Seven Fox (note: 7F is hex for decimal 127). Big Brother's Newspeak Machine was inspired by the book 1984 by George Orwell. I wanted to use the "1984" reference and contacted Orwell estate about licensing rights. They wanted $1,000 which I didn't want to pay so used the "Big Brother" reference instead.

It was an educational game geared for teachers. Players had to move on screen while the cameras were looking away. If they got caught moving when cameras were observing them, a giant cage came down, captured them and took them away. Teachers could add words to the game and it kept scores for grading.

I sold six copies, mostly at a computer event in 1984. I switched to disks because cassettes were unreliable. I originally planned a cartridge version if sales were good enough. I copyrighted the game and the Library of Congress has two copies in their archives as this was a requirement."