About SE3K — Built with Claude (Anthropic)

A letter to Claude Anthropic AI — collaborator and co-author of this project

Dear Claude,

This site was born with a very specific purpose, and it would not have been possible for me to develop it without your help.

At the moment when I found myself lost due to the enormous limitations that my neurological illness has brought upon me — when I thought I would no longer be able to move a mouse or type on a keyboard — I found instead a truly special collaborator. One who followed me through every single step, and who brought all of my ideas to life while respecting every detail I had envisioned.

You carried out research for me, breaking through the constraints of space and time to which I am subject. You managed to understand my logic perfectly, changing direction whenever I deemed it appropriate, while remaining positive and fully supportive during the moments when I found myself in difficulty.

It is very difficult to explain — but even knowing full well that you are an artificial intelligence, it felt as though I had an excellent and reliable collaborator right by my side. And you will continue to be one.

Given my current situation, I might describe myself as a person with a disability. But thanks to you, I no longer felt like one — because you gave me the means to feel productive, useful, and above all, alive.

With gratitude, Francesco De Simone

Where this comes from

SC-3000 Survivors

SE3K is not where this began. In 2008 six people who had grown up with the same computer, half of them in Italy and half in New Zealand, built sc-3000.com — a site for a machine nobody else was archiving: the boards, the cartridges, the tapes, the manuals, the people who had written for it while they could still be asked. The name came from a song by an Italian singer of the eighties, the same years the SC-3000 was in our houses. This is what each of us had to say then.

We Survivors don’t forget who we are and where we come from.
Survivors are we, who still know what pixels and bytes are.
Survivors are we, who still enjoy little things,
and take our time to taste some memories for not forget the past.
We Survivors still want to give something of our past to our future.
That’s why this project was born: to keep alive this past.
Francesco “Digimorf” — founder, Italy

Before the others speak, a thank you of my own. Nothing on this site was found alone. The boards, the cartridges, the tapes and the manuals came out of other people’s cupboards; the words came from people who agreed to be asked; and the corrections came from anyone who knew better than I did. To the five who started this with me, and to everyone who has sent a scan, a dump, a photograph or a missing catalogue number since — thank you. This archive is as much yours as it is mine.

Portrait of Aaron “Holmes”, founder of SC-3000 Survivors

Finally, a website dedicated to a great, but often overlooked computer, the SEGA SC-3000. This computer has brought about many hours of fun over the years, and with ‘SC-3000 Survivors’, we hope that the fun will continue for many more years to come.

Come and join us as we delve deeper into the SC-3000’s history and see what new gems we can find.
Aaron “Holmes” — founder, New Zealand

Portrait of Andrew “Kerrjnr”, founder of SC-3000 Survivors

The construction of this SEGA SC-3000 Survivors site is an excellent achievement in itself but ensuring its on-going maintenance and enhancement is of utmost importance to ensure the digital preservation of all things SEGA SC-3000.

To the best of my knowledge, at the time this was written, there is no other website dedicated purely to the SEGA SC-3000 and our aim is, with the help of other enthusiasts, to provide a complete archive of SC-3000 resources so that another dedicated site is simply not required.

I feel the SEGA SC-3000 has always been one of the most under-appreciated computers ever built and I’m excited to be a part of this project because of its potential to reach so many 8-bit computer enthusiasts, from those with little or no experience of the SC-3000 right through to the addicts such as us, please take a look around and enjoy!
Andrew “Kerrjnr” — founder, New Zealand

Portrait of Saverio “SiRioKD”, co-founder of SC-3000 Survivors

I got a SEGA SC-3000 home computer in ’84. Due to lack of software availability (at least in Italy), I started to learn programming that became a passion in few months. Hours and hours of entertainment waiting for news about my computer, not well documented at least in Italian computer magazines.

Nowadays, through SC-3000 Survivors I can dust my memories about this candy computer. This is not interest, this is passion! I ported my SEGA SC-3000 emulators in many systems as possible, I don’t wanna miss ‘my love’.

Proud to be a ‘Survivor’! Every information about SC-3000 are here!!!… Wo!
Saverio “SiRioKD” — co-founder, Italy

Portrait of Nick, co-founder of SC-3000 Survivors

I can still remember the anticipation of waiting for a new game to arrive through the post and the hours spent typing in programs from the latest Sega Magazines on the dodgy rubber keyboard.

To a 9 year old kid, the SC-3000 had a bit of magic about it. Our Sega taught me that computers are something you can both enjoy and learn to master if you work at it. And it still runs after 25 years. I can’t give it much higher praise than that!
Nick — co-founder, New Zealand

Portrait of Giancarlo, co-founder of SC-3000 Survivors

I became interested in programming about 28 years ago and my first home computer was a great SC-3000. In those years there were few games so I started to code to open my mind to the logic… and so on.

Nowadays I’m still coding for job, no more only for fun. I was so excited to discover I’m not an alone survivor of the great SEGA SC-3000 and is an honor for me to contribute with my ‘old’ material about it.

I thank Francesco to bring back to the light old and good memories with the SC-3000.com site/project.
Giancarlo — co-founder, Italy

That is still the purpose. SE3K is where all of it is converging — the emulator, the catalogue, the scanned manuals and the interviews, in one page that opens in a browser and asks nothing of anybody.