Joey: I started working at Family Computing when it was being conceived back
in late 1982.  At the time I was a recording engineer and worked part
time teaching Basic programming at a place called the Creative Computer
Learning Center in San Marino, California.  I used to make fun programs
for my classes and translate them for Commodore Pet 2001, Apple II,
Atari 800, TRS-80 and IBM.  We published these programs in a small
publication we made called Creative Creations.  One day the phone rang
and it was Claudia Cohl from Scholastic, who was referred to us because
she was trying to find somebody who could make cool programs and
translate them to several formats.  She asked if I could make some
samples and get them to her within two weeks. I had just finished
several programs for my classes and said "I'll have them to you in two
days!" She loved the programs and that was the beginning of the
Programmer section of Family Computing.

Working for Family Computing was great because Scholastic let me live
in the mountains of Southern California (Idyllwild) and hire people here
to help me.  We had what was called the "West Coast Lab," which was filled
with computers of every type.  We sent our programs to New York via
modem, which often took a few days because of the slow speeds.

Most months the Programmer section was between 20 and 30 pages long,
which is a lot to be responsible for in a monthly magazine.  I made
utilities that automatically translated some of the subroutines, such
as music and graphics between the machines, which included
Apple II, Macintosh, Coleco Adam, Atari 400 and 800, Commodore 64 and
VIC 20, TRS-80 and Coco, Timex, TI 99-4/A, and IBM PC.  Some of the
other people who worked in the Technical Department with me and
processed the programs in New York were Lance Paavla, John Jainschigg,
and Steven C. M. Chen.

I came up with many of the ideas for the programs while either floating
in a boat out on Lake Hemet with my yellow pad, or climbing up on some
of the local rock formations.  Besides the yellow pads I used to carry
around about a dozen kinds of graph paper which represented the screens
on the various computers.  On the graph paper I would design
backgrounds and characters (sprites, etc.) then take them back to the lab and have
my helper, Lee Miracle, translate them into data tables (my least
favorite part of the work.)
 
Paul: What was your best memory of computers in the
1980s?

Joey: What was great about computers in the 80's was that there were many
different systems available and each had its strong and weak points.
At that time we thought the IBM PC was a dog because it didn't have the
bells and whistles of a Commodore 64 or Atari 800.  We never thought
the IBM PC would become the standard.  If Apple would have come out with a
color version of the Mac right off (before the Atari ST and Commodore
Amiga) they would have owned the world. I really miss now that we don't
have many diverse, well-developed operating systems to choose from.
Think how great it would be for artists, musicians, and gamers if Atari
ST, Amiga, and color Macs were competing against each other all the way
up until now.  They would make the current PC's look like dull business
machines.

Paul: How did you master the SID chip in your music programs?

Joey: As you may or may not recall, I had the first computer music column in
a magazine in Scholastic's KPOWER and it was called Microtones.  Later
this column was moved into the Programmer section of Family Computing.
Every month I would write and translate music subroutines that could
easily be inserted into programs and explained how to do that.

The way I learned about the SID chip (and all the other sound chips)
was to experiment with the parameters of each feature the chip provided.
The best way to do that was to create utility programs that would let
me "sweep" through each of the parameters of the chip and I would listen
to the results.  The only way to really learn a sound chip is by extensive
experimentation and careful listening.

With the SID chip I simply tried everything I could possibly conceive
of the chip doing and applied the results to practical uses, such as sound
effects and music.  It helped that I was a recording engineer at a
24-track studio, working with some of the greatest producers and
artists of the time-not to mention the latest professional synthesizers.  This
is part of the reason that I was very vocal about creating a standard
that would allow synthesizers to communicate with computers.  I
actively met with representatives of the computer companies and instrument
companies and suggested that they have dialogue regarding this.  The
eventual result was the MIDI standard and I was one of the first to
write about MIDI, demonstrate it, and reviewed the first MIDI products
in Family Computing and Compute!  Amazingly, I had a falling out with
my Editor, Claudia Cohl, over this. She thought that I was going too far
out on a tangent and that MIDI wouldn't be very important to "families
and computing."

Paul: Finally, what was the most important lesson that
you've learned thus far?

Joey: I ended up working at Family Computing simply because I was following
what I liked to do.  I never contacted them. They found me.  While I had
to exert a lot of energy every month to meet the tough deadlines we
had, I had a blast doing it and so I was very happy.  So, I would quote
Joseph Campbell who said, "Follow your bliss and unexpected doors will
open for you."

I have original copies of all the magazines I wrote programs and articles
in over the past 20 years. I may be the only person who has a complete set
of Family Computing. The programs could easily be OCR scanned back into
computers and saved as text files for those who are interested.