Dear Ubuntu User Reader,

I have always been an avid magazine reader. I have always wanted to write for magazines, too. When I was 17, or thereabouts, I submitted an article alongside the code for my Rubik's Cube simulator to the Spanish edition of Commodore Magazine . They paid me 8,000 pesetas, which was a lot for a teen back then. It was at least enough to buy a double-deck boombox, some Depeche Mode and Kraftwerk LPs, and a bunch of video games, which is what I did.

I also bought a Pascal compiler for my C64, wrote a program, the Game of Life (on a 10x10 grid), got published again, and earned some more money. This was the beginning of a trend.

[...]