SOUTH WEST AMIGA GROUP

Please be aware that there is a price increase to £10. This is to cover Covid related supplies and any venue / food and drink prices increases. The booking system is limited to book a maximum of four people, as we get closer to the meet, we will be following current government and council guidelines regarding the use of the venue.

Please be aware that there is filming that does go on at our meets, we have been part of DVD documentaries, YouTube and Twitch channels which helps increase our exposure. Please let a SWAG team member know if you have a problem with this.

If you are bringing anything that might be of interest, unique or new, then please contact the SWAG team please let them know, we do enjoy seeing the Amiga’s being used in different ways.

A SWAG meeting is for YOU, this is a meet that is purposely for showing off your Amiga warez, it is not for traders.  If you wish to sell with us, then you need to contact us and talk to us about our more exclusive trader event ‘Workbench 2022’ which we are hoping to reschedule around May.

Please remember Children ARE FREE, use a SEAT booking to reserve them, when booking please write their names in the Notes section of the booking and any information we might need to know

For anyone booking a hotel, we are currently looking around for somewhere to sleep, we will follow up on that ASAP and post about it on social media/website.

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SWAG 12

The Last meet in September was a fantastic success of getting us back on the road, we had about 90% of the turnout and was thankful for everyone coming out.  Now, we had been preparing a lot to get ready for the next installment of Workbench but sadly we had to put that on hold and we are now going to try and repeat what we did in September.  

We also did ask on social media about pricing increases and also tried to encourage people to bring their own tables to help us get more into the hall.  We will announce tomorrow at 8PM what is happening with pricing and the booking page will go live.  

If you have missed the meet last time due to illness, then we are sorry that you couldn’t make it and the ticket was unfortunately non-refundable (we have to book food etc), however as a gesture of goodwill, we will attempt to contact you tonight or Saturday and I will reserve your previous position until Monday and ask for a payment.

Ticket prices are currently being discussed, we will be ready tomorrow at 8pm.  We are looking forward to another meeting depending on how the pandemic conditions unfold, if we are forced to cancel then you will all be refunded.  Let’s keep our fingers crossed it goes ahead and hopefully in the summer we can have the planned Workbench 2022 too.

The Booking Page will open on Saturday the 8th of Jan 20:00 .

SWAG #11 – Preview of the Meet

We cannot wait, we are only one short-week away from the weekend and it has been a while since we have set foot inside Doddington Parish Hall which is just outside of Bristol. We have been nervous and WE ARE GOING FOR GREEN LIGHT!

Former Commodore UK managing director David Pleasance will be joining us, he will be bringing his NEW Book that he has done in collaboration with Trevor Dickinson, which is hot off the Press and we will have the first sneak-peek of Vultures to Vampires.

After the success of his first book ‘Commodore: Inside Story’, they realised that not everything had been spoken about, like the aftermath of the Amiga and who owned it, who had the right’s to name and what happened next? David will be here to allow you to pick-up your copy of the book for those who pre-ordered and may have a few fresh copies floating around his table.

At the last Workbench event, which happened just before the virus locked us down, we had a very successful event, we invited Stephen Fletcher to include us in the forthcoming Amiga 2020 documentary, he was present and recorded plenty of footage to use for his successful Kickstarter, as events have unfolded throughout 2020, he had to re-think the documentary content and title as he didn’t want the documentary to be about the virus, he wanted to focus on why are people returning to it or never left in the first place.  Barry Morse (with Stuart Miles) from the Retro Shed YouTube channel will be joining us as they will be filming on behalf of Stephen, they will be conducting interviews, asking questions and filming you at the meet, if any reason you do not wish to be in documentary please let them (or SWAG know) on the day.

We will just be keeping this meet as simple as possible, to see how it goes and will be listening to your thoughts before we do the bigger ‘Workbench’ event.  This is a ‘ticket-only’ event, when you arrive we will have a table with sanitizers on and we will be checking that you have paid and then give you a badge to wear.  At 10am we will appreciate any assistance in setting up the tables, a map will be ‘printed off’ and placed with your name upon it, there has been some changes to the layout over the last few weeks so please refer to the map or ask the SWAG team where you are sitting, would help to wear the badge as I sometimes forget who you are.

At this time, we want to thank Scott (former RetroBench) for previously sponsoring our meets, he has decided to not do any soldering this time but to relax and enjoy the day without any stressful recapping work.  Zeb will be in the corner doing some recapping work, he does not hold stock of caps but you are more then welcome to bring your own, the two Derek’s will also be on hand if any questions about inner workings of your Amiga system and advice given.

There is too much to list but we do ask for you to Declare your SWAG, the meets are about you, what you bring and share with the rest of us, that what they are about and I already seen some amazing kit mentioned in the Facebook group.

Stay Safe everyone, please let us know if you are not feeling well before you travel and don’t forget to bring your power blocks / leads. Let’s make it a great meet.

ROB EDIT: Please note that we will have bottles of hand sanitiser located around the hall and kitchen on Saturday. If you could make use of them it would be appreciated.

Note that there is NO requirement for you to wear a face mask at this event. Many of you will be at the meet for a good 12 hours. Wearing a face mask for that length of time will not be pleasant. We shall leave the decision of wearing face masks up to yourselves.

If you’re lucky enough to have a PCR test kit please do test yourself the night before. The greater number of us who can test before the event the less risk we have of something spreading. Also, if you have potential COVID symptoms then please do NOT attend.

Many thanks. See you Saturday