Back in the day — way way back in the day — personal computers were diverse and came with communities of fellow users of whatever brand you had. And of course you would tease those other folks by making fun of their brand. If you had a TRS-80, you’d call Commodore systems “commode-doors.” Commodore users (I was in that camp) responded with “trash-80.” Apples were “cripples.” I’m sure there was a label for Ataris, but I don’t recall it. At least in the area where I lived, Atari systems were a bit rare.
Anyway, I was reminded of those days, and the fun I had with my Commodore 64, by this: the Commodore brand is back, and this time it’s attached to a mobile phone. But not an iPhone clone or an Android unit; it’s a flip phone!
They claim it’s not exactly a “dumb phone,” but it does lack most “smart phone” features. Their very sales-y site calls it the “not dumb dumb phone.”
It’s not just flip phones that carry the old logo; they’ve issued a version of the old Commodore 64 computer too. You can make some choices about color and case, and one of them looks to me exactly like the system from 40+ years ago. And it should; they found the original injection molds to reuse!
I’m not 100% convinced that nostalgia is a strong selling point for a computer. It isn’t for me, but then nostalgia has never been my thing. Maybe someday I’ll look back wistfully and sigh “oh, for the old days when I wasn’t nostalgic for the old old days...” but we’ll have to wait and see. Which is also what we’ll have to do about these new Commodore products. All you can do for now is preorder. Except for the t-shirts and mugs, of course. You can get the merch right away.
