Sometimes the point of a poll is to confirm what was already suspected, which is why, in “36 Years and 1800 Issues of TidBITS” (20 April 2026), I asked when you started reading TidBITS. Anecdotally, people tell me that they’ve been reading TidBITS for many years, and now we have the data to back that up. Of the 668 respondents, 64% have been reading for over 30 years, 87% for more than 20 years, and 94% for at least 10 years.
Even though 668 feels like a large number, it’s a small percentage of our overall readership, and I suspect that those who have been reading longer have more incentive to respond to the poll. It’s more interesting to say that you’ve been reading for 30 years than 3 years.
Nonetheless, I’m heartened that so many people have stuck with us for so long. As much as I sometimes wonder if I’m choosing the best article topics to write, the fact that people are still reading suggests I must be doing OK.
If you haven’t already, you might enjoy reading the stories people posted about when they started reading and what TidBITS has meant to them. Here’s hoping that the Apple world remains interesting enough for all of us to stay engaged with one another for many more years!
I expect I have been reading Tidbits since it began, certainly from when I first heard of it. I have used Apple products since the first Apple II Plus came out. I was thrilled when Jobs took over and the Mac switched to Unix. I first met Unix while visiting UC Berkeley in 1980 and subsequently used Sun workstations for many years. And now I have your Ioniq 5 to read about. My lease ends in December and I need to make a decision. I’m happy the 2026 overcomes many of the problems of the 2024. How are the electronics? I have had a number of issues and the door locks are always problematic. The fob always works, but the automatic unlock fails perhaps 30% of the time.
I am a long time reader and subscriber and thank you Adam and your community for the diverse range of interesting articles and comments; often material about the Apple universe and its technologies not found elsewhere. I have sought and received advice and help from the TidBits community that helped me though some problems and issues with my set up.
Hey Adam, I would like to participate in the surveys as they are published, however, how do I become aware of the publication? I have subscribed to your weekly newsletter and only become aware after the fact.
I didn’t respond to the poll regarding how long I’ve been reading TidBITS because I didn’t remember and could only find the issues going back to January 1999. While looking for something else, I just found older issues on an external drive. I have the setext issues back to January 1992 and selected HyperCard stack versions (which I can’t read of course) from 1990 and 1991. The oldest seems to be dated June 11, 1990.
I’ve been reading TidBits emails since 1999. I was working in the IT department of a magazine publisher as a Mac support technician (there were three of us specialists) and a colleague who had been hired to manage the Y2K project recommended you to me. [I had to convince him that Quark XPress was a mission-critical application (at that time) for a magazine publisher, which must continue to work after the new year.]
My oldest memory is when you and your wife had just had a baby, and were relocating back to upstate New York for the family environment. I’m sure he’s all grown up by now.
Or, even better: get HyperCardPreview.app to render those stacks in OSX, no need for emulation (other than Rosetta 2 emulation on Apple Silicon Macs…).
I’m afraid I did not catch the original anniversary post with the poll, but I have been reading TidBITS at least since 1992, and maybe even 1991! I got my first Mac, a Mac Classic 2/40, in September 1990, and got my first modem (a US Robotics 28800) in 1991, but did not start connecting regularly until Servicom (using the FirstClass graphical BBS software) allowed connections through a special lane created in Spain called Infovía (Infoway), which brought phone calls for internet services to province-level prices, which were much cheaper than inter-provincial ones, opening internet access up for Spaniards not living in Madrid or Barcelona. I also used TeleFinder for software sharing with that Mac Classic, which by the time had been upgraded to 4MB and a 68030 via a Classic II upgrade kit…
I also remember browsing Usenet sites, and the Info-Mac shareware repositories on my universities’ Unix workstations, so apart from many shareware titles many of the TidBITS stacks were actually filed on a diskette rather than downloaded at home… I learned so much English from reading TidBITS! (And also about binhex conversion, and the need for Apple’s PC Exchange!)
For some time, there was a TidBITS-ES official translation of TidBITS issues into Spanish, and was a member of the translation team… but we were already working on text files, not anymore on HyperCard stacks… The team managed to translate 174 out of the 323 issues published from February 1996 to July 2002. We had a couple of hiatuses when there were major changes in the group, as we were all volunteers… still, it was a very nice experience, including learning when you were overcommitting! And I kept learning English in the most fun and informative way possible…
I too am late to this dance but I have followed TidBITS for decades. I have always appreciated the relevance of the topics, the quality of Adam’s leadership and the excellence of the participants. This is the first place I come to when I am looking for solutions to problems and insightful analysis of all things Apple. Much appreciated!! Thank you all.
I started reading (and occasionally posting a note or a package to) the Info-Mac mailing list almost at the beginning in the 1980s, so I probably started reading TidBITS at the beginning, too. It’s been a long ride!
