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Discover the fascinating untold story of cartoonist Ya'akov Kirschen's ambitious but ultimately unsuccessful venture into the computer software industry during the 1980s in this 46-minute conference talk. Learn about Kirschen's innovative educational games for the Apple II, including Jewish-themed adaptations of popular arcade games like "Pac-Man," "Donkey Kong," and "Space Invaders," as well as his historical role-playing game featuring migration themes with custom graphics and music. Explore his educational nature mystery game created for The Learning Company and his later ambitious projects for Atari ST and Commodore Amiga that incorporated groundbreaking concepts of "artificial personality" and "artificial creativity." Understand how these projects garnered significant media attention from major publications including the New York Times and San Francisco Chronicle, yet failed commercially and were largely forgotten until recent preservation efforts. Experience live demonstrations of Kirschen's unique software that has been rescued from obscurity, providing insight into an overlooked chapter of early computer gaming history and the challenges faced by creative pioneers in the emerging software industry.
