Express your inner Geek
- 13 Aug 08, 17:49 GMT
Graham Linehan, writer of the peerless geek sitcom, the IT Crowd in providing props for the third series of the comedy programme, which he's just finished writing.
The IT Crowd has always been spot on in using authentic props on the show, with great bits of hardware and general tech/geek references.
(where else?) he's asked the audience to contact the production firm behind the show to suggest items.
I fancy volunteering the following from my own personal stock of IT and geekiness:
A Dragon 32 computer
The first issue of Amiga Format
A Sony Trinitron from the early 1970s
A 7inch single of Jean-Michel Jarre's Oxygene IV
Anyone else fancy offering up some suggestions?
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Comment number 1.
At 13th Aug 2008, Jary316 wrote:I love this sitcom!
I'd like to see a Doctor Who's T-Shirt, or at least a reference to Doctor Who.
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Comment number 2.
At 13th Aug 2008, Paul Freeman-Powell wrote:an old 大象传媒 computer would be awesome, and a shot of Moss playing "tea shop" would just be the icing on the cake for me!
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Comment number 3.
At 13th Aug 2008, smallnumbers wrote:Re. Paul Freeman-Powell
Or an old 大象传媒 computer with a big Prestel modem. The type that drops connection if you run down the stairs outside!
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Comment number 4.
At 13th Aug 2008, James wrote:A photo of a 1980s Alan Sugar complete with massive perm.
A copy of Unix in a Nutshell.
A PlayStation 2 (yes, 2) running Linux
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Comment number 5.
At 14th Aug 2008, Digital Elysium wrote:Last time I was in the States I saw someone wearing a T-shirt that said:
c:\dos
c:\dos\run
run\dos\run!
I laughed, wife didn't get it. Sign of a good geek joke.
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Comment number 6.
At 14th Aug 2008, odysseus wrote:Any t-shirt from www.thinkgeek.com, or anything from them really, try the usb powered missle launcher, or the powerball (imagine Moss trying that!), or ...
Screensavers, how about the classic flying toasters or fish tank, or hook up an Amiga to show the juggling balls demo?
Nothing says Geek more than a pc case mod with liquid cooling and neon lights, get someone like Ben Dorn to hack you one up.
On the bookshelf the complete set of O'Reilly books, a box of Windows 3.11 for Workgroups, and a boxed copy of openSuse Linux lying around :-)
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Comment number 7.
At 14th Aug 2008, Quinnone wrote:A Sinclair Spectrum, any Star Trek/Stargate/Dr Who/Matrix stuff, boards from ancient computers, O'Reilly books. A Tux penguin? PacMan/Tetris etc games. Look forward to seeing the new series!
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Comment number 8.
At 14th Aug 2008, MikeygIOM wrote:I think it would be ace if they had a copy of ms office 2008 on like a hundred floppy discs.
Origional gameboy with Tetris would be hilarious.
The new series is going to be amazing!
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Comment number 9.
At 14th Aug 2008, darrenwaters wrote:They could also have my Daring Fireball.com T-shirt. Totally geek!
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Comment number 10.
At 14th Aug 2008, solex16 wrote:Surely the book Neuromancer by William Gibson
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Comment number 11.
At 14th Aug 2008, Barry wrote:Ditto the "O'Reilly" books.
Also, Wrox books, too.
Couple of Quickshot joysticks lying around.
Some sort of "All your base are belong to us" reference.
A modded Xbox (v1) running XBMC streaming music/DiVX.
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Comment number 12.
At 14th Aug 2008, Barry wrote:Oh, and a PS3 displaying the Folding@home software!
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Comment number 13.
At 14th Aug 2008, Barry wrote:Moss should also take a piece of rack-mounted server equipment, place it on his desk, and power it up - thus drowning out all conversation in the office.
This happens all the time at my place, when people need to "perform testing", and don't want to rack the equipment in the server room.
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Comment number 14.
At 14th Aug 2008, Neil Hoskins wrote:Sorry, but they're not having my 'BOFH' mug.
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Comment number 15.
At 14th Aug 2008, simonesw wrote:I think Roy should have a 'RTFM' sign on his desk...
Oh and a 'Jesus is coming, look busy' mug.
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Comment number 16.
At 14th Aug 2008, goalie_up_front wrote:I had a few ideas that were based on a retro mobile handset I saw for sale. The product I saw was an old bakelite black telephone handset with coiled flex and a standard Nokia mobile phone connector. The kind of "modern retro" products I would like to see are:
Electric window buttons in a car replaced by electric winders.
An Ipod with big plastic play, rewind, fastforward and Stop buttons.
A widescreen LCD monitor that only displays in old IBM orange monitor text.
A Large 1970s SLR camera that is also a Telephone.
etc. etc. etc.
G_U_F
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Comment number 17.
At 14th Aug 2008, quinnylovesmanu wrote:Moss should have a pencil case
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Comment number 18.
At 14th Aug 2008, opmrcrab wrote:As a mid-twenties geek I find the use of legacy technology some what low-brow, similar in ilk to "put a man in a silly hat and let the audience applaud" american comedy effect as seen in the likes of Friends, Everybody loves raymond (I'm yet to find some one who can actualy testify to this!!), or Will and Grace. Im more of the mind that a few round of yelling gibberish such as "DO A BARREL ROLL" or "If it exists, there is porn of it" might do more for the modern (younger) geek demographic.
Sure throw in a 大象传媒 micro, a ZX81 specy (spacky), or even a Epsom dot-matrix printer to help show the love-of-legacy thing us geeks suffer from oh-too-much.
But really, filling a room with tech stuff a geek does not make.
Personaly I still think Nathan Barley was a far better hit on modern tech-savy culture, but then again maybe i just like Charlie Brooker and Chris Morris WAY too much :)
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Comment number 19.
At 14th Aug 2008, chall5 wrote:All the episodes should be named after Jet Set Willy rooms and the storyline should be dictated by the title of each episode
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Comment number 20.
At 14th Aug 2008, opmrcrab wrote:The the spirit, or maybe a character who wont go into the dark which is explained as a fear of Grue.
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Comment number 21.
At 14th Aug 2008, in the dark wrote:Start voting for your favourite mousemat...
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Comment number 22.
At 14th Aug 2008, fireyAncientGeek wrote:I had a friend that knew all the words to Tales from Topographic Oceans by Yes ...... but did he understand them.
I think the relative merits of the card punch versus the paper tape punch needs retrospective examination.
7bit versus 8bit bytes ... discuss
Universal Turing Machines were always useful in the 60/70's as a theoretical framework within which to discuss such issues as "Can a Program prove itself correct".
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Comment number 23.
At 14th Aug 2008, ElvisBishop wrote:They should have id cards on cords around their necks preferably with IBM or UNIX logos denoting that they've attended some seminar... all the ultra geeks in my office wear them like battle honours.
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Comment number 24.
At 14th Aug 2008, mysticpiglet wrote:He definitely needs a stylophone to compose techno music on in his break.
don't forget the stress ball in the form of a miniature ounch bag and other desk accoutrements such as a miniature nelson's cradle or one of those things you have to move really carefully to get balls in holes.
Every time he opens his drawer you need to see a small area of a Rubik's Cube, a guilty secret.
They should use one of those huge tapes you always see on computers in old films and TV programmes as a tea tray.
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Comment number 25.
At 14th Aug 2008, smallnumbers wrote:Re. Nathan Barley
Double Bluetooth!
(Still gets me everytime)
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Comment number 26.
At 14th Aug 2008, Guitar_Tom wrote:Oh please, please, please, let there be an old 大象传媒 b with the opening screen of Elite forever rotating in the background....
Or possibly you could have them trying to write midi tracks on an Atari 1040ST.
Ahh those halcyon days when 8Mhz seemed fast!
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Comment number 27.
At 15th Aug 2008, BigBadDaveB wrote:Remember the fun you could have with the 大象传媒 Micro's speech synthesyser, trying to make poor old Kenneth Kendal say rude words?
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Comment number 28.
At 15th Aug 2008, BethN wrote:I think there should be Doctor Who's hand in that container before it 'grew' on a shelf somewhere and definitely one of the limited edition Dark Knight hologram posters given out at the Preview screenings. The 'Marry me Lara' T-shirt is also a good one.
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Comment number 29.
At 15th Aug 2008, guy cross wrote:I think "all your base are belong to us" needs to be written or displayed during an episode of the IT CROWD
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Comment number 30.
At 16th Aug 2008, thegregdyke wrote:A Nascom 1, unfortunately mine is long and the first 10 years of Byte magazine my wife persuaded me to through in the bin!!
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Comment number 31.
At 16th Aug 2008, ironballz wrote:Oh I do love to see a modded PC case, with liquid cooling tubes all going everywhere. And a keyboard with worn off keys, that is teh geek!
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Comment number 32.
At 17th Aug 2008, dine909 wrote:There's no place like 127.0.0.1
Theres 10 types of people in this world, those who understand binary and those who dont.
;) gEEx
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Comment number 33.
At 18th Aug 2008, Simon_Ward wrote:#6: Roy has worn a couple of ThinkGeek T-shirts, but most of his wardrobe appears to come from jinx.com (their designs are better, IMO)
I don't recall ever seeing a coffee machine - no self-respecting geeks would go without some kind of caffeine-delivery system. For added spice, it should be some clapped out old thing which has had network connectivity hacked onto it by Moss :-) Said coffee machine should be standing on an old PDP-11 or VAX mainbox.
#31: I like the idea of Moss having some kind of uber-modded PC on his desk - he also needs a copy of 'The Camel Book' to go with the Perl camel he has on the wall behind him (and will offset the shame of the C# book plainly visible in some eps :-) ). Also, real geeks use IBM Model-M keyboards!
A couple of old 'dumb' terminals would look cool too - either DEC VT220s or old VIPs. Definitely need more Star Trek/Buffy/Firefly ephemera too, as well as an opte.org style map of the internet to go with their 802.11 protocol map.
Last, but by no means least, they need a couple of Tux or BSD daemon plushies lying around :-)
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Comment number 34.
At 18th Aug 2008, DiamondDave944 wrote:Nothing says geek like a USB Lava lamp!
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Comment number 35.
At 18th Aug 2008, Russ wrote:Pweh - we had USB lightup Christmas trees last year!
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Comment number 36.
At 18th Aug 2008, Tog wrote:A 57Mb multi-disk platter.
A stack of mag tape reels.
A box of fan-fold paper tape.
A mag core memory unit.
Showing my age or what?
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Comment number 37.
At 19th Aug 2008, CommonSenseNeeded wrote:A still sealed copy of Empire Strikes Back for 大象传媒 Model B on tape!
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Comment number 38.
At 19th Aug 2008, Davidjohn8088 wrote:A ZX Microdrive.
A magnavox
An ASCII drawing of the Mona-Lisa.
Any reference to a 'beige-box'.
Any IBM Redbook.
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Comment number 39.
At 20th Aug 2008, Simon_Ward wrote:"An ASCII drawing of the Mona-Lisa."
Surely you mean a 132-column ASCII 'Snoopy' calendar for 1969? ;-)
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Comment number 40.
At 21st Aug 2008, smsm1000 wrote:Just after the 9/11 attacks an American colleague of mine came to work wearing a t-shirt with the following text on the front:
rm -rf /bin/laden
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Comment number 41.
At 27th Aug 2008, Davidjohn8088 wrote:Simon_Ward - hows about the enterprise c:1976??
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