Is this hobby more popular in the UK and other places that are not the US?

[javeryh]

Seems like it.  Most of the new posts and stuff are always while I'm sleeping!  It's pretty awesome that it's a worldwide thing - so many different experiences to draw on.

 

[Fozzy The Bear]

Seems like it.  Most of the new posts and stuff are always while I'm sleeping!  It's pretty awesome that it's a worldwide thing - so many different experiences to draw on.

There are more US members here than UK or European ones, simply because you have a much larger population. But I'd say that it's just as popular a hobby over here as it is in the US on a per head basis. Don't forget we also have the guys from Australia and NZ on the board and a few from the far east as well.

Best Regards,
Julian (Fozzy The Bear)

[Avrus]

Seems like it.  Most of the new posts and stuff are always while I'm sleeping!  It's pretty awesome that it's a worldwide thing - so many different experiences to draw on.

There are more US members here than UK or European ones, simply because you have a much larger population. But I'd say that it's just as popular a hobby over here as it is in the US on a per head basis. Don't forget we also have the guys from Australia and NZ on the board and a few from the far east as well.

Best Regards,
Julian (Fozzy The Bear)

Even exotic locales like Canada.   

[waveryder]

Us Brits are just awake before you Yanks 

Theres a lot of good stuff coming out of the UK specially at the moment. But there are so many great resources avaliable in the states. Especially if you restore or transform cabs like I do. We dont get nearly as much choice in the UK and shipping from the states can result in feeling the wrath of HM customs and exise. The main thing I like about this forum now is there are so many people from all over the world creating some major works of art! Thats what a good cab is, a work of art and that is definetly a global thing.
My £0.02

[MaximRecoil]

This place is relatively dead at night (I'm on U.S. Eastern Time). It may appear that there are a lot of new posts while you were sleeping, but that's because they've had how many hours for posts to pile up without you checking them? I can pretty much guarantee that there are a lot more posts happening during U.S. daylight hours. Saint could probably say for sure when the bulk of the server load is around here.

I've visited a lot of forums over the years and without exception, they all die down significantly at night (I'm often on a schedule where I'm up all night).

[lanman31337]

Us Brits are just awake before you Yanks 

Theres a lot of good stuff coming out of the UK specially at the moment. But there are so many great resources avaliable in the states. Especially if you restore or transform cabs like I do. We dont get nearly as much choice in the UK and shipping from the states can result in feeling the wrath of HM customs and exise. The main thing I like about this forum now is there are so many people from all over the world creating some major works of art! Thats what a good cab is, a work of art and that is definetly a global thing.
My £0.02

2 pence?  That's like 5 US cents!!!! 

[Fozzy The Bear]

2 pence?  That's like 5 US cents!!!! 

No that's like 4 US cents.... Your currency sank again.... LOL  Which is great for us in the UK right now because all your wonderful arcade products are cheaper! 

Best Regards,
Julian (Fozzy The Bear)

[waveryder]

Yeah Im spending like $100 at groovey and getting it for £50. Now to hit EBAY before the currency stabilizes. 

[Level42]

Well, I feel pretty alone about this hobby around here. There's a number of collectors/mame-builders here but most seem to be pretty quite (probably language thing).

Almost all my parts and stuff come from the US. It is indeed great that the rate is so low now
But this also shows that the US market is a lot bigger for this stuff. F.I. try to find a real (CGA) arcade CRT monitor here. Good luck, and be sure to have a big wallet of money ready. (F.I. Suzo is not selling them.)

They also indicate videogame parts are not a very big business for them anymore. From the look of the Dutch equivalent of Craig's list, there's a lot more  pinball fans than (classic) videogame fans around here.

I reckon that the fact that we live in a small country and that the average home is smaller (or at least, doesn't have a basement !) over here is also playing a role.

Most people around me (family, friends, colleagues) are really surprised when I talk about my hobby. First thing they say: does your wife allow you this ?..........

[SithMaster]

Yeah Im spending like $100 at groovey and getting it for £50. Now to hit EBAY before the currency stabilizes. 

That wont happen for a while so you still have time.

[Anubis_au]

2 pence?  That's like 5 US cents!!!! 

No that's like 4 US cents....

It's still like $3.80 aussie 

[protokatie]

This place is relatively dead at night (I'm on U.S. Eastern Time).

Im in US ET as well, and it seems most active at night.. Of course for me, night is from like 8 pm to 3 am...

Also, I was wondering about how many Britons there are on this forum as well.. I wouldnt have figured that arcade stuff was very popular in the UK until I came here... For a bit I thought another british invasion was happening: 1 if by land, 2 if by sea and 3 if by intertoobs apparently...


The Fozzies are coming, the Fozzies are coming!!!!

[MaximRecoil]

Im in US ET as well, and it seems most active at night.. Of course for me, night is from like 8 pm to 3 am...

I am talking about overnight, i.e. about midnight to 9 AM.

[jlfreund]

I've always wondered -- how big is this hobby (including cabinet restoration, MAME software development, and new cabinet building)?

It seems like there are about 1000 listings in the projects database on this site.  So how many people are actively reading about, building, playing, or have recently built a classic arcade game?

Saint?

Jason

[Fozzy The Bear]

It seems like there are about 1000 listings in the projects database on this site.  So how many people are actively reading about, building, playing, or have recently built a classic arcade game?

Probably fewer active ones than it seems.... lots of people only build one cab and then never do anything else. However that also wouldn't be counting all the people who don't frequent this forum.

Best Regards,
Julian (Fozzy The Bear)

[Turnarcades]

It's a difficult call.

Most people I know grew up on video games and although the general releases and brand poularity varied on their way across the pond, the same spirit existed from kids born in the 70's and 80's.

We all had home computers like Spectrums, Amstrads and C64's while you guys were already on NES's and Master Systems, but we all aspired to own and generally favoured real arcade games that were just universal in their popularity.

It's been very quiet on BYOAC since about the middle of December, but I think the community remains the same size. Not only the active home builders so prolific on this site, but I know dozens of people who aren't members on here who would like to buy or are planning to build their own in the near future.

I concur with others on here who say UK popularity is as high, if not higher than the US. Although on average UK kids had less disposable income and dedicated arcades were few and far between back in the day, there was sod all else to do with our suck-ass weather - No street hockey, basketball courts or road trips to the beach like a lot of teenage kids in the US!

[saint]

Seems like it.  Most of the new posts and stuff are always while I'm sleeping!  It's pretty awesome that it's a worldwide thing - so many different experiences to draw on.

 

Interesting question - here are the country visits for February so far.

[saint]

January 2008 stats (this and previous post are forum only - they do not include the main site and the wiki)

[protokatie]

Saint, what exactly are those stats showing? They seem to be based off of the domain more than anything. Is this the domain of members Email addresses? I use a .com email. Also, .US doesnt seem to fair very well on the list.... Do you have a list based on IP#s?

[saint]

No, it's based on the domain (it's the awstats package). So, the .edu's, the .org's, several others that are broken out separately are quite likely US addresses, as are many if not most of the .com addresses. Best data I've got

[saint]

All kinds of interesting (to me at least?) stats.

[protokatie]

Wow, I was expecting more linux viewers than Mac OS viewers... Then again, many people here talk about using linux for their MAME cabs, but instead use another (win or MacOS) for their everyday computers...

[MaximRecoil]

January 2008 stats (this and previous post are forum only - they do not include the main site and the wiki)

Yeah, midnight through 9 AM is the valley, just like pretty much everywhere else on the internet (well, every place I go to at least). 

[saint]

Alright, now you did it. You've got me looking at stats. Yearly stats now -- 2007:

(Don't ask me why "free porn" was one of the highest search phrases to direct people to BYOAC....)

[TPB]

Of the visits from country specific domains, Poland is "way out there" in first place.

They're blazing a trail with 3.6 GB of bandwidth, more than 5 times the volume of their nearest country specific competitor.

I never knew that arcade gaming was so popular in Poland ...

Any Poles care to add their opinion ?

[ark_ader]

Probably one of the reasons for more UK visitors, was due to the huge influence arcades were to us thirtysomethings.  I grew up in Blackpool, where they had tons of arcade machines on the piers, the Pleasure Beach and the many arcades on the golden mile.

Most of these cabinets were scrapped, but we still remember those games.  Now with the earning power a lot higher and the advent of MAME the reality of owning a machine is within reach.

With Digital Arcade disappearing, Arcade Controls is the logical solution.  So with those who want cocktails, cabarets, and full sized monster cabs, this is the best resource.

Besides it is well known that the UK and Europe as a whole has more gamers than the US and Australia combined.  Heck, we (Brits)  had more home computers per household than anyone in the world in the 80s.   

Go Figure!

[TPB]

Heck, we (Brits)  had more home computers per household than anyone in the world in the 80s.   

Go Figure!

Does that also explain why the Brits have dropped off the international sporting radar ?  Soccer being the only exception - but even there, I believe the last time England won the World Cup, was way back in the 60's ?

Good old Tim Henman tried his hardest at the great old British tradition of Wimbledon, but alas, he's now gone to pasture.

Computer games are great fun ... heck, that's the passion we all have, especially for the arcade games, fueled by fond memories from our childhood ... but they can lead towards a tendency of sedentary indoor lifestyles.

How are the preparations going for London 2012 ?

[MaximRecoil]

That's interesting that Saturday is the slowest day of the week here by a significant margin.

And what's up with the Polish folks? Is there even a single forum member here from Poland?

[protokatie]

Besides it is well known that the UK and Europe as a whole has more gamers than the US and Australia combined.

Care to quote a source?

Plus, just so you know, the typical pairing for the US is with Canada.  We often see things like "Free domestic calling plan (USA and Canada)" or, "shipping is available for anyone in the United States (including Canada)"..

(Never understood how they could say "including canada" as being part of the US, but meh it is simply semantics)

[TPB]

That's interesting that Saturday is the slowest day of the week here by a significant margin.

That's probably because Saturday (in the U.S.) is the only day of the week that is "truly on the weekend" throughout the whole world.

Conversely, Sunday night (in the U.S.) is a Monday working day, in some parts of the world (Australia, New Zealand, Hong Kong, Singapore, etc.)

There must be a lot of members using this site from their workplace, or place of study ... BYOAC must be a boss' worst nightmare for worker productivity.

And what's up with the Polish folks? Is there even a single forum member here from Poland?

Agreed ... it's baffling.

I thought Poland was a communist country until the mid 80's ... wouldn't arcade games have been banned in Poland, under the former communist rulers ?

Where is their fan base coming from ?

[Fozzy The Bear]

it's based on the domain (it's the awstats package).

Sorry to tell you this Saint..... But it's entirely missleading. There are some glaring deficiencies in the data.

For a start off, as you know, I'm in the UK but my ISP is British Telecom. Their domain is NOT a .co.uk one but a .com domain. So those figures that you are showing as .com include me and a lot of others and are not related to just USA Traffic.

What you actually need is a package that records IP numbers directly and translates those based on a lookup table of the actual location of the server.

Best Regards,
Julian (Fozzy The Bear)

[protokatie]

What you actually need is a package that records IP numbers directly and translates those based on a lookup table of the actual location of the server.

I already asked for that, and saint said the data he showed was the best he had... I dont think it really matters, the only thing I think saint would really care about would be GB* traffic (IE to prevent going over the limit)...


*gigabyte, not Great britain

[saint]

Yeah, I know all .com is not from the US. I would expect a good majority of it is though. Dunno that it really matters

[Fozzy The Bear]

Yeah, I know all .com is not from the US. I would expect a good majority of it is though. Dunno that it really matters

True.... But it would be nice to know where your traffic is coming from. It would give a better idea of the interest in building arcade machines and how that is spread per head of population in different countries. Which I think was the original point of the question about the data.

Best Regards,
Julian (Fozzy The Bear)

[Avrus]

I'm stunned how far Canada is down the list.  Given how wired the households are I would have naturally assumed Canada would be #2 or #3 (behind the UK) for page counts and such.

[Anubis_au]

(Don't ask me why "free porn" was one of the highest search phrases to direct people to BYOAC....)

Well, maybe to some members, some of the pics of finished cabs, are equivalent?...

[Anubis_au]

There must be a lot of members using this site from their workplace, or place of study ...

BYOAC was my Jan 07 - April 07 at work.

Matter of fact, I've been glancing at it all throughout today (currently 4:45pm here, piss off from work time!)

[Level42]

heheh, we're not doing bad either


I am disappointed by the OS stats of course.....but those are the facts of life. I bet that Safari stat is a good deal caused by me

[Fozzy The Bear]

I am disappointed by the OS stats of course.....but those are the facts of life. I bet that Safari stat is a good deal caused by me

It's interesting how close FireFox and IE are in terms of numbers..... I'm guessing that's because of how badly Microstuffed have screwed up the latest versions of IE. People just seem to like FireFox more. Having looked at both I'll stick with my current version IE and latest FireFox.

I absolutely detest the new incarnation of Internet Explorer. It just wasn't intuitive at all. It took me forever to find stuff and some things I wanted to do I just couldn't find to get it to do.

Best Regards,
Julian (Fozzy The Bear)

[Hoopz]

And what's up with the Polish folks? Is there even a single forum member here from Poland?

Agreed ... it's baffling.

I thought Poland was a communist country until the mid 80's ... wouldn't arcade games have been banned in Poland, under the former communist rulers ?

Where is their fan base coming from ?

Kowal
Profile:  http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php?action=profile;u=9751
Website: http://www.kowal.itcom.pl/

[danny_galaga]

Of the visits from country specific domains, Poland is "way out there" in first place.

They're blazing a trail with 3.6 GB of bandwidth, more than 5 times the volume of their nearest country specific competitor.

I never knew that arcade gaming was so popular in Poland ...

Any Poles care to add their opinion ?

yeah, this isnt a very good indication. to me it was pretty obvious that this would be (more or less) the order of the most members:

USA
CANADA
UK
AUSTRALIA
NZ/NETHERLANDS

there's just something about certain cultures that combines both access to those games back in the day and ALSO our nostalgia for it. Holland has a much smaller population than france or germany, but there seems to be more dutch here than any other european country. part of that i guess is that germans and french prefer their own language forums whereas the dutch arent fussed.

a notable french connection is youki. he created the awesome atomic FE (",)

[divemaster127]

I ship parts all over the world my ship ranking would be:
US
CANADA
UK
SPAIN
FRANCE
GERMANY
AUSTRIALIA
BELGUIM
DENMARK
Something I cannot figure out, is I ship a lot of parts to Spain, but only maybe 2 or 3 orders a year south of the border of the US.  I do not know if the economy of the latin american countries or just no interest.  I speak Spanish so its not a langage problem.  I was stationed for many years with the air force in Alamogordo & my wife is Spanish.  That's one reason I sell so much to spain since I speak the langauge.
dm

[Level42]

Of the visits from country specific domains, Poland is "way out there" in first place.

They're blazing a trail with 3.6 GB of bandwidth, more than 5 times the volume of their nearest country specific competitor.

I never knew that arcade gaming was so popular in Poland ...

Any Poles care to add their opinion ?

yeah, this isnt a very good indication. to me it was pretty obvious that this would be (more or less) the order of the most members:

USA
CANADA
UK
AUSTRALIA
NZ/NETHERLANDS

there's just something about certain cultures that combines both access to those games back in the day and ALSO our nostalgia for it. Holland has a much smaller population than france or germany, but there seems to be more dutch here than any other european country. part of that i guess is that germans and french prefer their own language forums whereas the dutch arent fussed.

Yep, I agree. France, Germany both have own forums (And don't forget about Italy !!!Mame was born there !). I visit the German site once in a while. My French is really poor, so I don't visit that one very often.
Since English is no problem for me (or at least I pretend ) AND the US is still _the_ place for our hobby both in knowledge and available parts and other stuff, it was only natural to find this forum and f.i. the KLOV forum.  I guess there's a good amount of reading Dutchies that never or rarely post. Reading English is easier than writing....

Also, there just is no Dutch alternative to this forum. There are too few of collectors and Mame builders here I guess to keep such a forum alive.

[patrickl]

I'm surprised that there are so few dutch folk here actually. I guess it's around 10 or so? Indeed we really have no dutch alternative and, (at least where I lived) arcades were pretty popular.

BTW talking about eastern block arcades: Soviet Arcade Games Museum

[ark_ader]

Heck, we (Brits)  had more home computers per household than anyone in the world in the 80s.   

Go Figure!

Does that also explain why the Brits have dropped off the international sporting radar ?  Soccer being the only exception - but even there, I believe the last time England won the World Cup, was way back in the 60's ?

Good old Tim Henman tried his hardest at the great old British tradition of Wimbledon, but alas, he's now gone to pasture.

Computer games are great fun ... heck, that's the passion we all have, especially for the arcade games, fueled by fond memories from our childhood ... but they can lead towards a tendency of sedentary indoor lifestyles.

How are the preparations going for London 2012 ?

Yes that could be the reason.

Also the British government do not invest in any Olympic sponsorships, do not build pools, or tennis courts or offer funding to do so.

Most of the time, the councils want the playing fields converted into Tesco supermarkets.  Kids in the UK have very little choice to occupy their time when out of school, thus the yob issue currently.

In the US its completely different, and shows as the number of Gold Medals Britain won or any medals were a lot less than in the 80s versus the US or any other country like Kenya.

Oh I'm sure glad to be back home in the USA. 

Living in Britain is depressing. 

[TPB]

BTW talking about eastern block arcades: Soviet Arcade Games Museum

Interesting ...

So the folks in communist countries (Russians, Poles, East Germans, etc), WERE playing arcade games back in that era.

I wonder if they were bootleg versions ... I can't imagine a U.S. company, such as Atari, in the era of Ronald Reagan, having a distribution agreement with Breshnev's U.S.S.R.

Ronald Reagan once famously described the U.S.S.R. as the "evil empire".

It appears the communist countries were "far more liberal" than we, in the western countries, were led to believe by all the cold war propaganda.

I even read in the news, that Germany is introducing naked plane flights, as apparently in communist East Germany, communal nudity was allowed, and indeed practiced and enjoyed :

http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,2144,3094108,00.html

http://www.dw-world.de/popups/popup_lupe/0,,3094108,00.html

[TPB]

ark_ader,

Are you an American who grew up living in England, or an Englishman who's now living in America ?

I had to laugh when I read this    ... although if this is happening, it's a sad situation indeed :

the councils want the playing fields converted into Tesco supermarkets.

... sometimes those councilors have their pockets greased by "donations" from property developers.   

BTW, my post was a bit tongue in cheek ... we like having a gentle jibe at the Poms when the opportunity presents itself, especially when it comes to sport.   

[ahofle]

So the folks in communist countries (Russians, Poles, East Germans, etc), WERE playing arcade games back in that era.

http://www.wired.com/gaming/hardware/news/2007/06/soviet_games

[patrickl]

In the US its completely different, and shows as the number of Gold Medals Britain won or any medals were a lot less than in the 80s versus the US or any other country like Kenya.

Let's check the number of gold medals of the US and GB won in the Olympics since the eighties:

	US	GB	Total
1984	83	5	689
1988	36	5	738
1992	37	5	815
1996	44	1	842
2000	40	11	927
2004	35	9	929

Funny how especially lately the US seems to be getting less gold medals while Great Brittain is getting more.

Since the US has 5 times the population of GB it's clear that, per capita, the GB is actually outperforming the US in the last 2 Olympics.

[danny_galaga]

In the US its completely different, and shows as the number of Gold Medals Britain won or any medals were a lot less than in the 80s versus the US or any other country like Kenya.

Let's check the number of gold medals of the US and GB won in the Olympics since the eighties:

	US	GB	Total
1984	83	5	689
1988	36	5	738
1992	37	5	815
1996	44	1	842
2000	40	11	927
2004	35	9	929

Funny how especially lately the US seems to be getting less gold medals while Great Brittain is getting more.

Since the US has 5 times the population of GB it's clear that, per capita, the GB is actually outperforming the US in the last 2 Olympics.

new zealand. they normally have the highest medal count per capita...

[protokatie]

The stats I see for 2008 are a bit different:

              US   GB    total
2008:   931     0      931

Way to really bring in the win in 2008, USA!   

[RetroBorg]

Updated the table to include the worlds number one sporting nation, Australia.

	US	Aus	GB	Total
1984	83	4	5	689
1988	36	3	5	738
1992	37	7	5	815
1996	44	9	1	842
2000	40	16	11	927
2004	35	17	9	929

Populations

USA - 303,332,000

Great Britain - 60,587,300

Australia - 21,200,000

The US has 14 times the population of Australia and GB has 3 times the population of Australia.

The 1984 results are bit dodgy as 14 Eastern bloc countries boycotted the olympics.

If you look at the table, Australia has out performed both the US & GB on a per capita basis from 1988 onwards and dominated GB outright from 1992 onwards.

 

[psychotech]

What do you mean we're not in Kansas anymore?

How about ...FINLAND ..?

Member count:

1 ...

[protokatie]

Retroborg:

Either get me Au citizenship so I can live a new life, or farken sod off.

(seriously, get me Au citizenship...)

[ark_ader]

In the US its completely different, and shows as the number of Gold Medals Britain won or any medals were a lot less than in the 80s versus the US or any other country like Kenya.

Let's check the number of gold medals of the US and GB won in the Olympics since the eighties:

	US	GB	Total
1984	83	5	689
1988	36	5	738
1992	37	5	815
1996	44	1	842
2000	40	11	927
2004	35	9	929

Funny how especially lately the US seems to be getting less gold medals while Great Brittain is getting more.

Since the US has 5 times the population of GB it's clear that, per capita, the GB is actually outperforming the US in the last 2 Olympics.

If you read my post properly you will find that I was basically saying that the US was getting more Gold Medals than the UK, or Kenya was getting more than the UK etc.

As USA provides more funding to its Olympic hopefuls than does the UK government.

Nice to see you took an interest though.

ark_ader,

Are you an American who grew up living in England, or an Englishman who's now living in America ?

I had to laugh when I read this    ... although if this is happening, it's a sad situation indeed :

the councils want the playing fields converted into Tesco supermarkets.

... sometimes those councilors have their pockets greased by "donations" from property developers.   

BTW, my post was a bit tongue in cheek ... we like having a gentle jibe at the Poms when the opportunity presents itself, especially when it comes to sport.   

Both   

[patrickl]

If you read my post properly you will find that I was basically saying that the US was getting more Gold Medals than the UK, or Kenya was getting more than the UK etc.

As USA provides more funding to its Olympic hopefuls than does the UK government.

You said:

In the US its completely different, and shows as the number of Gold Medals Britain won or any medals were a lot less than in the 80s versus the US or any other country like Kenya.

So that says:
1) GB wins less gold medals now than in the 80s
2) Kenya wins more gold medals than GB
3) The US wins more gold medals than GB because of poor investments

(BTW it doesn't matter if you look at gold medals or all medals)

Ad 1) So you did compare the Great Britain gold medal tally to that of the eighties. Saying it was lower now, because of their poor investment in sports. This is incorrect. It's higher now than it has been for decades.

Oddly enough, the US gold medal tally is going down. Hitting the lowest points since the eighties in the last Olympics. Even though the number of available medals has increased substantially. So you're double incorrect on this one.

Ad 2) I forgot to add the gold medals for Kenya. They got 1 or 2 gold medals for most Olympic games and 5 gold medals for the 1988 games. So they sure didn't get more gold medals than GB. Not even close. Kenya has a population half that of the UK so that doesn't explain it either. Again incorrect.

Ad 3) You say the US gets more gold medals than the UK. This is true. Yet you connect to this statement that it means GB is doing something wrong. The US is a country 5 times the population than the UK. It's a bit silly to say that the US has more gold medals so the GB is doing something wrong. They would be doing something wrong if they got less than a fifth of the US gold medals. The US recently averages around 40 gold medals per Olympics and Great Britain around 10. That indicates the US is actually performing worse than Great Britain (either the US should win 50 or GB should get no more than 8 ). So your statement is incorrect. Even if the US spends more money on their Olympic hopefuls they are obviously wasting it.

What the US seem to be doing cleverly is invest heavily in track and field and swimming, which historically other countries didn't seem to show much interest in (and/or have better drug testing). Although with Australian and Dutch swimmers talking away swimming medals and the Chinese showing strong swimming performances recently, the US would be wise to diversify a bit.

2004 Olympics Weighted medal score per million population   1,2 and 3 go to Bahamas, Australia and Cuba. The UK is 31st, US 38th and Kenya 52nd. So indeed the UK aren't doing that great (they are slightly above average), but the US and Kenya do even worse and are hardly an example for Great Britain to follow.