I dream in 64kb

There they sit, the preschooler class encircling their mentor, the substitute teacher. "Now class, today we will talk about what you want to be when you grow up. Isn't that fun?" The teacher looks around and spots the child, silent, apart from the others and deep in thought.

"Johnny, why don't you start?" she encourages him. Johnny looks around, confused, his train of thought disrupted. He collects himself, and stares at the teacher with a steady eye.

"I want to code demos," he says. His words are becoming stronger and more confidant as he speaks. "I want to write something that will change people's perception of reality. I want them to walk away from the computer dazed, unsure of their footing and eyesight. I want to write something that will reach out of the screen and grab them, making heartbeats and breathing slow to almost a halt. I want to write something that, when it is finished, they are reluctant to leave, knowing that nothing they experience that day will be quite as real, as insightful, as good. I want to write demos."

Silence. The class and the teacher stare at Johnny, stunned. It is the teachers turn to be confused. Johnny blushes, feeling that something more is required. "Either that or I want to be a fireman."

- Grant Smith, a.k.a. Denthor of Asphyxia
14:32, 11/21/93

I've been saving this blog post as a draft for a while now, meaning to write a nice article about 64k demos, but instead it turned out as a link collection on the history about computer demos and how-to tutorials. I won't call myself a programmer before I can program a computer demo that only includes procedural content. It don't have to be 64kb in filesize nor does it have to be impressive, I just feel the urge to program something by myself. My sleeping habits recently has been rather out of order, with me being awake for one and a half day, then sleeping 18 hours. Also, I recently relized that it's near impossible to learn programming from lectures, so I've decided to restart, pick up my book in basics in C++ programming, read it through until I know the basics, then continoue to the next book.
Links
Pouet.net
Scene.org
Monostep.org
Nectarine
Scene Zine
Demoscene.info

Sceners
Haujobb
the mfx
Farb-rausch
Conspiracy

Tutorials / Articles
Making a 64k intro
How the Demos are so Small
Demo Music for 64 Kilobytes Intros
The Art of Demo Making, Parts 1-16
100 Years of the Computer Art Scene
Computer Demos, The Story So Far (pdf)
An Emerging Artform or Just Another Digital Craft? (pdf)

The Workings of fr-08's Sound System
Part 1: The Concept
Part 2: Why are SMF Files Smaller?
Part 3: The Basic System
Part 4: Let's Talk About Synthesizers

64k Demos
fr-08: .the .product
fr-30: Candytron
fr-34: Time Index
fr-37: The Code Inside
Heaven Seven
Beyond
Project Genesis
A Place Called Universe
Scene.org Awards 2004