                             Artists News
                         - -------------- -


   Mo'Soul was declared as dead by leader Mark Ryder. The reasons was Mark
    Ryders economy and his will to 'take a vecation from the scene'.
    He clearly stated this in 'M's-Bye!.Txt' where he also wrote;
    "Mo'Soul is dead. No one can say they are a member of Mo'Soul. The
    Mo'Soul` name and M's tag is (c)opyright Mark Ryder. Sunday the 18th
    1997 mo'soul closes down." He sold his amiga but has now recently joined
    up with Arclite again which ought to be his return.

   Aluence Design was founded by Phreak Klass. Squish, Mso and War Child
    joined up pretty fast.

   U-Man of Arclite told me in an mail that the long wait for 'uMn'-art should
    soon be over, when "The Rebirth of Agony" soon will be released. Also an
    sequel to "Back in Time - Army of Darkness" will be released in a not too
    distant future together with Mark Ryder (who just has retuned to the 
    scene).

   H2o said the following some mounths ago; "Just doing a collection and the
    Ascii Attack will be released soon, first issue at 1'st of June 1997 on
    Internet and as an Textfile for Boards. Thats all!"
    Now lots of time has passed and the Ascii Attack homepage still is up, but
    there is absolutely NO sight of this ascii-magazine, nor H2o's collection.

   Grand Royal died some days before the last Gazette was released (8'th of
    May). All according to the leader Exile of ex-Grand Royal, no further info
    though.

   Punk of Head said in a collection that the reason for that 'Art & Style'
    charts are missing is lack of insperation. He sais that some issue some
    time might show up anyhow. Then the issues came, with the old '100 most
    respected' -list and a new 'review' -part where Punk carefully reviews
    some choosen of the latest collections. And lets hope that this project
    lives on. It most probably will, since Punk recently have produced quite
    some new ascii and shown that he wasn't dead at all, as it seemed in late
    1996. 'Art & Style' number three was released at the 16'th of september.

   Ultimo Imperio was declared as dead by the leader Booth. The reasons was
    the little war with Low Profile (which Lp! pretty massive won) and that
    none of the 'so called' ascii-members released anything. Ultimo Imperio
    never gained any new members either, and Booth was really tired of the
    scene.

   Pioneer Design was closen down. The mainreason to this was because lack
    of activity and the decision were taken by leaders Crl, Kidnix and Xtc
    on the fourth of August 1997.

   Stezotehic with e-mail adresses as stz@xgw.fi and stz@hangup.nullnet.fi was
    for some time (during his time away - as rumours said like quite an serious
    drunk?) uncontactable, now he could be emailed through Repe's adress,
    which you'll have to achive yourself. An hint is the #amielite channel at
    IRC.

   Retardo, known as 'rtd' renamed to Dezibel 'dZ' and joined Arcade Ascii.

   Junk, known as '-jnk-' renamed to Yellow Water '[yW]'.

   Neurodancer of 1oo% liked to see his group in the Gazette since 1oo% is
    'almost' an real ascii-group, and he commented it with those words;
    "I know we're not the "typical" Ascii group as we're not releasing our
    stuff as plain .txt collections. Normally, we bundle up the shit we made
    since the last pack into an archive and thats it. No big design of a
    collection and such.
    Anyway, we have the most sucess with our IBM-Gfx Ansi stuff, also we
    can't compete with the abilities of those PC groups - but on the other
    hand, once I requested an Ansi from "iCE" and all they sent me back
    was their pricing list for requests. So I think we don't even want to
    be like them. Art is fun, and each request is a challenge, not a way
    to make profit, or?"
    Guess I cant do much more than agree with You, Neurodancer.

   I've heard of quite some new 'so called' ascii-only groups when you read
    the preface of an unknown new artists collection and he declares the birth
    of his new ascii-clan. Since most of those attempts seems to be 'one-day-
    ascii-projects' have I decided not to include them until they show art
    from other members or anyway productivity in a larger scale.
    The ones noticed are;

    Basic Ascii    - BSC/B - Blindman, Midnight Judge
    Kwest          - KW!   - Cain, Biogenesis
    Phunk Ascii    - PNK/P - Volatile
    Prospect       - PST   - Alcatraz
    Quad-P         - QP    - Hiro Protagonist, Mithrandir, Windrider, Jaz, O7,
                             Bubblegum mask, Shamen, Sagramore, Zerohour,
                             Enigmatic, Cain, Phreak Klass, The Abstract Poet
    Rings of Style - RS!   - Alcatraz
    Serial         - SER   - Sargon, Tk, Insight, Meatpod, Tango, Tzeentch,
                             Arrogance, Arlequin, Axb, Computer Man, Drax,
                             Druid, Firestorm, Frgnfruz, Gravedancer, Haji,
                             Hennifer, Kresile, Mass Murderer, Metal Militia,
                             Phreak Klass, The Prodigy, Purify, Seraphim,
                             Serial Toon, Spud, Squish, Terrato, Tum, Trooper,
                             Volatile, Wish Bringer

    Where Basic Ascii, Quad-P and Serial is Pc-Ascii/Ansi groups. But I'm
    unsertain if they have got more duties than only art. This is why I havn't
    included any of them here - if You know anything about this, please
    contact me. Recently I also heard that Basic Ascii died.

   Midnight Judge, known with the tag 'mjay?!' renamed to Shiveem and 'sh'.

   Zeus told me that the reason for him to leave Low Profile and join up with
    the Style fellows was that he'd always been a friend of Boheme, Stezotehic,
    Repe and the other mostly finnsih dudes in the group so he felt more at
    home in this group.

   Arclite is reforming. Green Eyed Monster, Shapechanger and Hijack had to
    go due to inactivity and Mark Ryder joined up as a new member.
    Personally I think this was an act that placed Arclite among the other
    ascii-groups and that took away the old-school prestige that they earlier
    have had together with legendary UpperClass and Art.

   Cybergod joined up with the pc-group Sect, which also is an group that
    could be among Basic Ascii, Quad-P and Serial, since it has got ascii-
    interests but really aint an ascii-only-group.

   Two 'ancient' ascii-groups that earlier had been forgotten was discovered;
    Sushi Arts with mainstar Count Zero (later Stylez) and Warriors of Art
    where Gravedancer earlier was in charge.
