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| Curmudgeon .S t e v e W e l s h
Omug
President Oregon
MUG: Steve has been an active MUG leader for more than 2 decades. He was selected by the Apple Users Group Program and the Apple Users Group Advisory Board as one of the original Apple UG Regional Liaisons (Northwest region, 6 states) for MUGs in the United States. He served 2 terms. Steve has also been recruited by Apple for other ventures, such as for online education pioneering when he co-taught 2 international, online digital photography courses targeted to teachers worldwide via Apple's Apple Classrooms Of Tomorrow (ACOT) program. He has also been president, webmaster and Board Member of CMUG (Corvallis, Oregon), and had contributed to CMUG in other capacities as well for 16 years. He counts it good fortune to be involved with the many good and helpful people that are a trademark of Macintosh User Groups, including an "apprenticeship" under a MUG legend, Phil Russell (who started CMUG and its news magazine "Mouse Droppings"). Steve's first Macintosh was the 128k original, and he has been a Mac consultant/specialist, writer, artist, designer, teacher and enthusiast ever since. In the mid-1980s Steve and fellow CMUGer Ron
Courtney would occasionally drive
north 90 miles for PMUG (Portland)
meetings to take advantage of programs
that PMUG, Oregon's largest MUG,
attracted. It was just this type of "MUG
community" that motivated Steve to create
the first statewide user group event (possibly in the country) in 1988 with an event called MUGshot
'88 in Corvallis (attended by Apple, Aldus and other major industry companies). Also that year, Steve created what was probably the first digital sound effects computer system in the country -- on a Mac, of course -- to pioneer creative in-house stadium and park atmosphere via those effects for minor league baseball clubs. In 1999, Steve felt it was time to celebrate the spirit of user groups and Oregon MUGs in particular once again. This time it would come in the form of an ongoing, annual statewide event, the You Don't Know Mac! (YDKM) trivia battle and MUG celebration, launched in Corvallis. YDKM Event Day is hosted by a different Oregon MUG in its community each year. "Our family traveled a lot during my childhood, and we lived in several states," Steve said. "In a way, I guess that planted the seed of diversity and appreciation for the uniqueness of different regions in our country... much like the diverse makeup of a community Apple Users Group." He loves the beauty of the Great Northwest, and is active in outdoor journeys and activities whenever possible. He is blessed to be a proud father (of a Mac-loving son). Oregon MUG:
Oregon
MUG: Charles reminisces: In
1988 Janet and I purchased our first Mac SE with two floppy drives and a 30mb hard drive. Thought I was in heaven, no more floppy swaps for applications and large files. Then I discovered if I wanted to use the Mac I had to pry my wife from it in front of the keyboard -- so 5 months after the SE came Janet's Mac Plus. From then on it was all downhill... "we haven't met a Mac we didn't like." It was in July 1988 that Janet and I joined the Portland Macintosh User Group. That fall we went to our first MacCamp; must have asked every dumb question in the book. However, people kept answering and we kept learning. As time passed, we found ourselves answering the questions rather than asking. In
PMUG, I've been Officer-at-Large for 6 years, Vice-President for 3 years, and President for 3 years. I am currently MacCamp Co-ordinator for PMUG's twice yearly MacCamp. I have also represented PMUG at several Macworld Expo User Group meetings during the past 8 years. For the last 14 years I've been a Mac consultant and owner of Cdev
Solutions
<www.cdevsol.com>. I only work
on Macs, they are the only reason I love
computers. I write a column called
Winds of Change and some review
articles for Mouse Tracks, PMUG's
award-winning monthly magazine. For fun I play 3D Klondike or Marathon I, II, III. For those who wonder what computer I own and use, here's the list: an LC, LC 475, Classic II, PowerBook 3400, PowerMac 7500, two 7600s, Blue & White G3, a G4 tower and PowerBook G4. |
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