Code Like It's 198x

PAGE 6

An Atari user group's magazine that took over its professional rival

MagazinesSource-checked

PAGE 6 began with a first issue dated December/January, around the turn of 1983, as a bi-monthly from Stafford for Atari 400 and 800 owners, started through the Birmingham User Group and edited by Les Ellingham. It added the Atari ST in 1986, took over Database Publications' Atari User title at the end of 1988, became New Atari User in 1989, and was still edited by Ellingham when issue 85 announced the 'final countdown' in autumn 1998.

PAGE 6 was a magazine for Atari home computer owners, edited for its whole life by one man, Les Ellingham, from Stafford. It began as a user-group publication sold by subscription, outlasted Atari User, the professionally published rival whose title it took over at the end of 1988, and was still being produced, as New Atari User, in 1998.

Issue one

The first issue is cover-dated “December/January 1982”. Its contents date it to the winter of 1982–83: its news page reports the Atari 800 cut to £399.99, and the arrival of Scott Adams’s Adventure International in Britain. Issue 2 followed as February/March 1983, and Computer & Video Games for January 1983 carried a small advertisement for “the UK’s first Atari” magazine at the same prices, 65p a copy or £3.75 for six issues.

The magazine was “published by B.U.G.”. Ellingham’s editorial described it as the work of members of the Birmingham User Group, “the largest independent Atari Computer Club” in the country, and explained why it was needed: “None of the general U.K. computing magazines are of much help”. It promised games but also business, education and other subjects, and to show people what “these machines can do”. From issue 2 the masthead named ABACUS as publisher, and the club’s news ran in a “B.U.G. Club Call” column. Subscriptions went to 18 Underwood Close, Parkside, Stafford, and by the September 1983 issue a single copy cost £1.

Why “Page 6”

The first issue explained the name for readers who did not already know it. The Atari’s memory is divided into “pages” of 256 locations, and page 6 is set aside as a protected area for the user. It was the usual home for short machine-language routines called from a BASIC program, so the title told programmers whom the magazine was for. Issue one already carried type-in listings.

The ST, and Atari User

From early 1986 PAGE 6 carried an ST section for Atari’s new 16-bit Atari ST, and by 1989 its covers called it “the only magazine covering XL/XE and ST machines”.

That “only” had a story behind it. In December 1988 a “Stop Press” announced that PAGE 6 had reached agreement with Database Publications, publisher of Atari User, to take over the Atari User title and produce a combined magazine. PAGE 6 Atari User went on sale on 19 January 1989. The April/May 1989 issue explained the next step: the title would become New Atari User. Ellingham’s editorial said readers had been told that the magazine was no longer published, and that Atari User had ceased publication, “which it had”. “We can’t afford to be ignored.” Issue 38, June/July 1989, was the first under the new name, distributed to newsagents by Diamond Europress. The issue numbering carried on from PAGE 6, and Ellingham remained editor and publisher.

The final countdown

New Atari User kept going through the 1990s, at £9 a year for six issues in 1989 and £12 by 1993, though less regularly towards the end: issue 81 is dated spring/summer 1997, and issue 82 January/February 1998. Issue 85, dated autumn 1998, carried an editorial headed “The Final Countdown”. Ellingham wrote that his craft-fair business was doing worse each year, taking the weekends he had set aside for the magazine, and that he had decided to begin the final countdown for Page 6/New Atari User while guaranteeing subscribers a number of further issues. No issue after 85 appears in the public archives of the magazine, and Wikipedia gives 85 as the total.

Sources

  • PAGE 6 issue 1, cover-dated December/January 1982: cover, contents, masthead (B.U.G., Les Ellingham, Stafford, subscription and single-copy prices, bi-monthly), editorial (the Birmingham User Group, the general magazines), “Why ‘Page 6’?”, news (Atari price cut, Adventure International UK), dealer advertisements.
  • Computer & Video Games issue 15, January 1983: PAGE 6 advertisement.
  • PAGE 6 issue 2, February/March 1983: masthead (published by ABACUS), editorial, “B.U.G. Club Call”; issue 5, September 1983: masthead (single copy £1).
  • PAGE 6 issues 19 and 20, January and March 1986: ST section.
  • PAGE 6 issue 35, December 1988: “Stop Press” (agreement with Database Publications); issue 36, February/March 1989: cover (“the only magazine covering XL/XE and ST machines”), masthead and editorial as PAGE 6 Atari User; issue 37, April/May 1989: editorial (“It’s New Atari User”) and masthead (Diamond Europress, next issue on sale 25 May).
  • New Atari User issue 38, June/July 1989: subscription rates; issue 60, February/March 1993: subscription rates; issue 81, spring/summer 1997, and issue 82, January/February 1998: cover dates; issue 85, autumn 1998: editorial, “The Final Countdown”.
  • Wikipedia, “Page 6” (web, secondary): first issue in 1982, 85 issues, ceased in 1998. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Page_6
  • Internet Archive, Page 6 / New Atari User scans (web, secondary): the run ends at issue 85, September 1998. https://archive.org/details/Page6-85-Sep98

See also

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