^General Information ~What is MS all about? The |mekka & symposium is a demo-scene party that is organized annually at Easter. Here, about 1000 young Multimedia artists gather for four days to meet similar-minded people, exchange ideas and participate in competitions in which individual people and groups show off their talent with regards to a traditional form of electronic art called |Demos. Although it might seem so art first glance, the |MS is no LAN party where network game playing would be the primary occupation. People playing Quake or Half-Life on our events are considered non-creative, if not destructive, by most of our "serious" visitors. If you "just" want to play games, think about going to our Planet Insomnia (www.planet-insomnia.de) parties instead, you'll have much more fun since you'll also be finding much more enemies to play against... ~Location, Date, Entrance Fee The party place is located in Fallingbostel (www.fallingbostel.de). Situated between Hamburg and Hannover, this is the only town in Northern Germany that offers a hall suitable for at least 1000 visitors, while not being too expensive. At this place the |MS parties have been taking place since 1997, so we really know its infrastructure and limits quite well, too. The party starts on |Good Friday (21st April, 2000) at 12:00 CET and ends on |Easter Monday (24th April, 2000) at 12:00 CET. The address is: Heidmarkhalle \ An der Heidmarkhalle 1 \ D-29683 Fallingbostel \ GERMANY \ The entrance fee amounts to |70 DM (35 Euro). We don't accept currencies other than DM. We don't have single-day visitor tickets. Girls and Mat/Ozone get in for free. There is no table reservation, and no possibility of paying in advance. Money which is left is spent on the repair of damages to the hall and on competition prizes (in this very order, so please behave :D). If you bring your own computer equipment (this does not cost extra, of course), bring your own power connectors! ~Travel Information If you're going to come by car, you can reach Fallingbostel through the highway A7 - watch out for the "Fallingbostel" announcement. We have a map (in english or german, included in the .ZIP file) which guides you from the highway exit to the party place. When coming by train, you have to use some major train to either Hamburg or Hannover (whichever is nearer to you), and change for Fallingbostel there (train schedules are available from the Deutsche Bahn info page, bahn.hafas.de). Once you've arrived in Fallingbostel, you can make use of the free |24h bus shuttle service we will set up just like last year. But you |must contact us (see contacts section) in advance, so that you will be picked up (please tell about number of people and time of arrival). If you're coming without equipment, you can also take the walk (half an hour); watch out for the "Bahnhof" / "Railroad Station" in the center of our map. This year there are again some guys organizing bus trips from various countries to the |MS; some of them may have a free place left for you! If you are interested in information about those bus trips, please take a look at the MS2000 homepage (see Contacts section), we do not print it here because of likely updates. ~Features |1. Lots of competitions for Amiga, PC and C64 - and some platform-independent ones such as a Graphics competition and various music competitions. We don't have competitions for Atari and Acorn systems; feel free to participate in the Wild compo with productions for these and even other machines. |2. Competitions presented on a big screen sized 6x4 sqm, including powerful sound equipment - yes, the sound will be loud if you are sitting in the first table row. No, we will not turn the volume down. Choose your fate in advance by sitting down at the front of the hall if you want loud sound (note that you don't need your own stereo to make even more noise), or by taking place at the remote side of the hall if you are in need of a quiet place (note that some guy next to you will be pissed if you turn up your own stereo too much). Also, some wax to put into your ears when you want to sleep will really come in handy. |3. Place for about 1200 visitors plus equipment; enough power for everyone - but: please do not bring equipment you don't really need. This has two advantages: You can't lose it, and it can't bring the power down (see below for more words on the subject of electricity) |4. A warm sleeping hall - Just like on |ms2k-1, comfortably small and warm. Of course you can sleep in the main hall as well. If you want to, you can also stay at the local youth hostel, which is located about half a kilometer from the party place (note that you probably need a member card): Jugendherberge Fallingbostel \ DJH Landesverband Hannover e.V. \ Liethweg 1 \ 29683 Fallingbostel \ Phone: +49 5162 2274 \ If you really can afford it: A listing of hotels is on the Fallingbostel homepage (www.fallingbostel.de). |5. A stable party network! - the |MS2000 is a |party, not an ISP :-) Some kind of Internet connection will be there, but it is not our primary concern. A local network will be setup with 100MBit switches on the tables (Twisted Pair only). You will also be able to vote and contribute via network (paper voting will still be possible, of course). You can bring your own hub or switch if you want to use your own hardware. Quake, Half-Life, Unreal and other network game packets will be filtered by the backbone hardware. For more questions, mail our network master MoM (as usual, refer to the Contacts section). |6. Food supply - there's a city nearby, with shops and bars; and we have inexpensive drinks and snacks available on the party 24 hours a day. Of course you may and should also bring your own food and drinks, as it will be less expensive this way. A nice snack-bar providing fries, hamburgers etc. will be situated next to the main hall almost 24 hours a day. |7. Clean toilets and showers. Showers are not public, though. Instead, we will have designated shower hours a couple of times. |And last not least... Live music performances, traditional entertainment provided by Steeler, cool party t-shirts... and the unique Mekka & Symposium party feeling! ~Rules We are not responsible for stolen computer equipment or other items you bring with you. We aren't responsible for personal injuries either. Take care of yourself, your friends and your luggage. We've never had much trouble with theft on our parties, but it might be better to think twice about taking a certain valuable thing with you onto the party. The use of alcohol is hereby explicitly forbidden. After facing severe damages and personal attacks on previous parties due to heavily drunken individuals, we chose to put up this rule from 1998 on. Drunken guys won't be let inside, disturbing guys (this also includes Quake players, by the way :D) will be put outside. Don't consume Vodka in front of the stage. Don't |vomit onto the floor. In case we discover that you are destroying things, either intellectual property (hacking the network system), or physically damaging the building or people, you can be sure that we will take very special care of you. This year we will try again to supply you with enough electric power. We invest in new cables and fuse-racks, just to serve your equipment more than well. To make this event as pleasurable as possible and to avoid last year's power failures, we would be pleased if you did |not bring all that stuff like: toasters, fridges, heaters or cheap extension sockets with you. These things were / are responsible for those failures, because they violate the FI protection. We can not remove this protection, because it's legally required, for your safety. So please leave them at home (mummy and daddy will keep an eye on them). Let's also stress that we are not responsible for any damage of your equipment (of course we won't refund half-written CD-Rs after a power failure), just keep this in mind. Please respect German law. Illegal actions, especially regarding software piracy, can not be approved of. Dutch visitors should be aware of the fact that weed consumption is illegal over here. Last but not least, have fun! And if you have ideas of what might be fun on the party, don't hesitate to contact us, even on the party. |You're part of the party. ~Time Table The time table was not ready at the time of writing this invitro ;) ^Competitions ~Competitions on MS2000 Competitions are the core feature of any decent scene party. They are the ultimate tool to present one's work to a large audience and compare one's creativity directly to that of others. Consequently, in competitions on major parties, new milestones are set for demo technology because people keep constantly improving their skills in their quest for fame in the scene. Each year again it's hard to determine which competitions to hold. You hold too many, people get bored (and the time table gets overflowed) -- you hold too few or too restrictive ones, some people get upset because they feel that they can't use their whole creativity. There's also always the aspect of tradition. Many guys (including us, the organizers) have been in the scene business for over ten years; sometimes it's not easy to make major changes to rules which had been established for a long time. We hope that this year's selection of competitions suits your taste. If not, you may of course contact the coordinator of the respective competition by E-Mail for further discussion. |Some more notes Everyone intending to participate in one of our competitions has to be present at the party. We don't accept contributions via mail. The sole exception to this rule are the Demo competitions; here we welcome external entries as well. Contact Raw Style for further discussion. (See contacts section...) |Cross-platform competitions ~Alternative Music Competition \ (including ambient, chillout, demostyle, etc.) -MT2, IT, XM, S3M, and MOD allowed -maximum filesize 1.8MB (no compressed files) -4 minutes playtime -all modules will be played with the latest versions of their respective trackers -max. one entry per competitor -contact Sierra (->Contacts) if you want to use another format ~Progressive Music Competition \ (including d'n'b, house, trance, techno, etc.) -(see Alternative Music Competition) ~MP3 Music Competition -enter your tracks as MP3 in 128kbps or higher or on Audio CD -4 minutes playtime -one entry per competitor ~32k Game Competition \ (for Amiga, PC and C-64) -Size of all files: 32K -Competition machines are the same as in the platform-specific competitions (see below) -The game will be played on the bigscreen by the coder. -If you are planning networked games, contact us in advance. We will do a quality preselection on this competition. -|For PC only: Mega-Em will be started to support GUS Midi music. Game must be playable with keyboard only. However if you have support for some special device (joystick or whatever) be sure to bring it along. ~Pixel Graphics Competition \ (hand-pixelled images only) Maximum resolution is 800x600 in 24 Bits TrueColor. Raytraced pictures do not belong into this category, only hand-pixelled graphics are to be handed in for this competition. The entries must be handed in in IFF, PNG or TGA format. All entries will be shown at least twice, at different daytimes. ~Alternative Graphics Competition \ (ray-traced, composed etc.) Maximum resolution is 800x600 in 24 Bits TrueColor. The entries must be handed in in IFF, PNG or TGA format. All entries will be shown at least twice, at different daytimes. |C-64 platform competitions ~C-64 Demo Competition -Maximum size is a standard 5.25" DD disk (both sides). -The demos may require user (keyboard/joystick) interaction. ~C-64 4k Intro Competition -Maximum size is 4096 ($1000) bytes (=16.12 blocks). ~C-64 Graphics Competition All formats/modes are allowed. The entry must be handed in as an executable file or as Koala/Amica. Any sounds or extra info-screens included in the file will not be shown/played. It would be nice of you to forget about additional music or coded effects and give us something serious for the show. The inclusion of working stages of your picture is appreciated. ~SID Music Competition All formats allowed. The entry must be an executable file (if you need help with a program to play your tune, contact any of the Padua-organizers). The C-64 screen will not be shown during the competition. We will play up to 4:27 minutes of each tune. You may choose between a C-64 with a new or with an old SID-chip. There will be a preselection if too many entries are handed in. Preselected tunes will be only played for 30 seconds. The C-64 competition rules are maintained by Anonym, please mail him for further information or discussion. |Amiga Platform Competitions The competition machine, kindly provided by Infinity / Creative Minds, is equipped as follows: -A4000, MC68060 @50MHz -PPC 604e @233MHz -64MB RAM (Your entry must work on 16MB machines as well) -Cybervision PPC -WarpOS & PowerUP Assigns and installation scripts are forbidden (this means that unpacking the archive and running one program is all that is necessary to start the demo). Custom libraries may be used, but not installed outside of the contribution directory. ~Amiga Demo Competition -Maximum size is 6 MB uncompressed. ~Amiga 40K Intro Competition -The intro size is 40KB at most. The intro is a single executable file. ~Amiga 4K Intro Competition -Maximum size is 4096 bytes. -Booting AmigaOS without startup-sequence, running SetPatch and then simply running the 4K executable from a standard PAL screen must be everything that's necessary to start the intro. The Amiga competition rules are maintained by Raw Style, please mail him for further information or discussion. |IBM PC Platform Competitions The competition machine is equipped as follows: -Intel Celeron or Pentium2 400MHz Processor -128MB RAM -Riva TNT 2 -Creative Labs Sound Blaster 16 (ISA) -Gravis Ultrasound Classic 1MB (ISA) -Most recent DirectX, at least 7a -Latest Nvidia Detonator Drivers -Acceleration allowed in all PC competitions! -Operating Systems: Windows 98SE, SUSE Linux 6.x Full Install ~PC Demo Competition -File Size 10MB ~PC 64K Intro -File Size 64K ~PC 4k Intro -File Size 4K -Mega-Em will be started to support GUS Midi music. |Time Limit: We don't have a distinct time limit for the competitions. Just be creative and take the time you need. However, if an entry gets too boring it will be skipped! |Usage: All DOS/Win entries will be started from the Windows 98SE command line. Demos requiring EMS memory or special memory configurations will not be shown. We will not change anything in config.sys or autoexec.bat! Pure Animations are not accepted. Please read the following FMC (frequently mentioned complaints) before complaining about the rules: -Accel, Non-Accel topic: Now you know the rules and are free to write an accelerated production, if you think that this will give you an advantage. -Windows productions: It is a fact that Windows demos are far more compatible and easier to handle than DOS based productions. Anyway, in every compo you have the choice between a DOS, Win or Linux entry. -We suck, and don't know the roots of the scene: Actually most of us are part of the roots, but we realize that the scene is changing every day! If we wouldn't accept that, we would have the following compo machine: 386/33 with 4MB, Trident 8900 and a SB1. The PC competition rules are maintained by Doj, please mail him for further information or discussion. |Other Competitions ~PlayStation Demo Competition -max. 1 audio track and 1 data track are allowed. -the size of the data track must not exceed 6 MB. -the demo must be delivered on a SELF-BOOTING CDR (NO CDRWs). -before the demo starts there must be a possibility to choose between PAL/NTSC or at least an auto detection. -the competition will be held on a SCPH-7002. (to avoid probs like last year... hello Haujobb) -all demos will be spread. For updated information or any questions and comments about the PSX competition write to Gott/Elitegroup or try the Elitegroup homepage. (www.elitegroup.demo.org) ~Wild Competition Here you can deliver anything that doesn't fit into the other categories. We will not have separate Wild ("classic") and Video competitions, as the number of entries in the former would be too low. The most welcome contribution medium is a VHS or S-VHS tape recorded in PAL; you can optionally hand in a graphics file containing some information about the hardware used to create your entry. If you can't tape the thing yourself (if you are using really Wild hardware...) please contact us in advance. There aren't many restrictions on this competition. Your entry should be related to computers, though. People are not interested in watching yet another skateboard video. Please help keeping this competition interesting! ^Contact Information ~Main Organization These are the |ms2000 main organizers: -Hardball/Amable (hardball@ms.demo.org), General Organizing -Chaotic/Padua (chaotic@ms.demo.org), Staff, Beam, Misc -Raw Style/Lego (rawstyle@ms.demo.org), WWW, Scene PR, Compos -Gandalf/Phantasm (gandalf@ms.demo.org), Press, Sponsors, Power -Decca/Lego (decca@ms.demo.org), Power, Misc ~Competition Organization General competition organization is done by Raw Style. These guys are responsible for some particular competitions: -Sierra/Destiny (sierra@ms.demo.org), Music Competitions -Doj/Cubic (doj@ms.demo.org), IBM PC Competitions -Anonym/Padua (anonym@ms.demo.org), C-64 Competitions -Gott/Elitegroup (gott@ms.demo.org), PSX Competition -Raw Style/Lego (rawstyle@ms.demo.org), Amiga Competitions -Gandalf/Phantasm (gandalf@ms.demo.org), Wild Competition |For updated information, have a look at the ms2000 Homepage, ms.demo.org/2000. |For the credits/greetings, just experiment a bit with your mouse...