Music by Programmers - Launch Party

Jason Gorman and five of his programming chums have put together an album of original electronic music to raise money for educational programmes at Bletchley Park and The National Museum Of Computing. The charities get every penny of the profits, split 50/50 between them.

The album goes on sale in late April, and Jason's target is to sell 2,000 downloads and raise £10,000. The music industry isn't what it was, and selling music is much harder than it used to be - even for a good cause. Between now and the release date, they're going to need as much help as they can get to spread the word.

• They have a web site - http://www.musicbyprogrammers.com/
• They have a Twitter handle: http://twitter.com/ProgrammerMusic
• They have a Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/MusicByProgrammers
• They have a YouTube channel with a sneak preview: http://www.youtube.com/user/MusicByProgrammers

Please feel free to publicise their efforts by any means at your disposal.

A special listening party to launch the album on 23rd April is not to be missed. It's going to be small and intimate at a "jolly spiffy pub" near Holborn. Every penny of the £20 ticket price goes directly to Bletchley Park for maths workshops and a programming club at The National Museum Of Computing. And every ticket holder will get a very limited edition CD with bonus tracks!!! Only 100 of these special edition CDs will be produced, so it promises to be a veritable collector's item.

So long then, Ken Olsen

Ken Olsen, founder of DEC, passed away aged 84 on Sunday 7th February. Read a short obituary here. I used to consider DEC as the nimble young upstart snapping at IBM's heels and making computing affordable. My first real computing experience was on the undergraduate DEC-10 system (running TOPS10) at Leeds - and it shaped my subsequent career, though various PDP-8 and PDP-11 minis featured even before that. RIP Ken.

Save Bletchley Park with Boffoonery!

The title says it all really.

Jason Gorman has managed to get some amazing events off the ground in the past couple of years and this one should be absolutely excellent. It's called Boffoonery! ("buffoonery for boffins") - a once-only comedy benefit gig to raise money for the extremely important wartime heritage site (Station X) and unique computing museum that is Bletchley Park near Milton Keynes.

Jason's partners in crime are comedy writer James Cary, whose credits include hit TV comedies like My Hero and My Family and who also writes the cult BBC Radio 4 sitcom Hut 33, which is set at Bletchley Park, and veteran TV and radio comedy producer David Tyler.

The show is still taking shape, but Jason is delighted to be able to confirm that Robert Llewellyn (Red Dwarf), Richard Herring (Fist Of Fun, This Morning With Richard Not Judy) and cerebral stand-up Robin Ince are on the bill. More big name comedians and comedy writers are TBA, so keep en eye out for updates.

The best way we can support Bletchley Park is to send a message to government and funding bodies about how much we care. If the show were to sell out, and sell out quickly, that would send a very clear message indeed.

And since you ask - yes, you can help. Tickets go on sale on Wednesday Aug 12th at 9am. Please help to spread the word and create a splash on Wednesday. Here are some of the ways you can help:

• Buy your tickets on Aug 12th
• Tell your friends and colleagues about Boffoonery!, and encourage them to buy their tickets on Aug 12th
• Print off copies of the show's A4 poster, which you can download from www.boffoonery.com, and stick them up on your noticeboards at work
• Blog about Boffoonery, and pass on these suggestions about how people can help save Bletchley Park
• If you're a Twitter user, on the morning of Aug 12th send a tweet about #boffoonery and www.boffoonery.com, and RT any #boffoonery tweets that cross your path

It's going to be brilliant evening, and your kindness and generosity will ensure that generations to come will be able to see and experience the achievements of those brilliant boffins whose ingenuity saved 22 million lives and ushered in the information age.

You can find out more by visiting www.boffoonery.com, or following #boffoonery on Twitter or "boffoonery" on Facebook.

A pity there isn't a theatre big enough in Bletchley Park itself to host this event! That said, the Bloomsbury Theatre is easier for me to get to...

Don't forget: tickets go on sale on 12th August 2009 at 9am and the show takes place on Tuesday Nov 3rd.

PS other efforts to support the National Museum of Computing at Bletchley Park include this amazing URL Shortener called Station X. Keep up the good work, guys!