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Amiga User International

Using the Amiga beyond games

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A British Amiga magazine combining games with programming, graphics, hardware and practical advice. Antony Jacobson defended that mixture as a way to serve readers with different interests and levels of experience.

Amiga User International, usually shortened to AUI, was a British magazine covering the Amiga as a machine for programming, graphics, work and games. Its roots precede the familiar title: in November 1986, Commodore Computing International’s publisher Antony Jacobson told readers that its included Commodore Business and AMIGA User section was also being sold separately.1

A deliberately mixed magazine

By March 1988, AUI’s contents put modems, business software, graphics and beginner instruction alongside reviews of games such as Xenon and Jinxter. The masthead named Jacobson as managing editor and publisher, with Croftward Limited publishing from Bowling Green Lane in London and Comag distributing the magazine.2

Jacobson explained the editorial approach in February 1991. Some readers complained that AUI had too many games for a serious magazine; others wanted more games and less serious material. He defended a balance between entertainment and instruction, beginners and experienced programmers, and Amiga-specific subjects and wider technology news. This was an explicit editorial policy, not simply a magazine that happened to have fewer game reviews.3

Changing publishers, continuing subjects

Croftward was one publisher in a longer history. The February 1991 masthead names Maxwell Specialist Magazines; March 1993 names Headway, Home and Law; and April 1996 names AUI Limited. Jacobson remains credited in those issues. The magazine’s description of itself as independent meant that it was not connected to the computer manufacturer, rather than that it never belonged to a larger publishing business.345

The April 1996 contents still show that breadth: OctaMED music software, hard-drive expansion, C programming, ARexx advice, computer graphics, online books and game reviews. The accompanying SuperDisks supplied utilities and other software. Its publisher’s address had moved to Chalcot Road, away from the earlier Clerkenwell office.5

Retrospective records place the end of the print run in 1997, with May identified as the final issue. That end date comes from later cataloguing, rather than from treating the last issue in a partial collection as the magazine’s last publication.6

See also

Sources

Footnotes

  1. Antony H. Jacobson, publisher’s editorial, Commodore Computing International, November 1986, p. 5. The separately sold predecessor is named Commodore Business and AMIGA User. ↩

  2. Amiga User International, volume 2, number 3, March 1988, p. 3, contents, editorial and masthead. ↩

  3. Antony Jacobson, “The Amiga Dimension”, and masthead, Amiga User International, February 1991, p. 5. The editorial heading identifies February 1991; the page’s January 1990 footer is a printing error. ↩ ↩2

  4. Amiga User International, March 1993, p. 4, masthead and contents. ↩

  5. Amiga User International, April 1996, pp. 4–5, contents and masthead. ↩ ↩2

  6. Wikipedia’s retrospective entry gives May 1997 as the final issue; Sega Retro’s catalogue also records a May 1997 issue and a 1997 end year. These are secondary sources; a surviving final editorial has not been established here. ↩

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