Atari Coin Connection

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games as a poor use of time and money.
New ATARI Distributor in Ohio
Atari Can Help
Shaffer Distributing Company of Colum-
bus, Ohio recently became an authorized
distributor of ATAR I products. "Shaffer is
an outstanding organization, ready to pro-
vide excellent servicing and promotional
support to operators in the Columbus
area, " stated Don Osborne, Vice-Pres-
ident of Sales and Marketing.
Shaffer Distributing may be contacted
at 1100 West 3rd Avenue, P.O. Box 12417,
Columbus, Ohio 43212 or by phoning
(614) 224-6800.
Youth and Leisure
should be approached to volunteer their
time toward a solution to this problem. A
privately funded youth-serving organiza-
tion could be established in each com-
munity to coordinate this effort so that as
public funding continues to decline, the
responsibility for providing youth services
will not be eliminated. Young people need
constructive activities in a supervised
environment in order for them to become
contributing members of society as they
reach adulthood.
Video Coin-Op Industry Responsibility
Large corporations (such as Atari) are
continued
working on this problem on a national
level, especially corporations seeking
youth consumers. Distributors and opera-
tors should become involved at the local
level.
The negative publicity regarding coin
video games results from citizens' need
to "blame" someone other than them-
selves as the cause of negative social
behavior by youth . Since young people
are responsible for making their own
choices as to what they do during their
leisure time and how they spend their
pocket money, adults view coin video
Atari is taking some positive steps in ad-
dressing the situation by implementing
several special programs to aid the coin
video game operators. One example is
the Community Awareness Program. A
video tape and background information
on the positive aspects of coin video
games are available from Atari distribu-
tors. These materials can be presented to
citizen groups by local operators or dis-
tributors to help educate them about the
benefits of coin video games.
Also, Atari is becoming more involved
in supporting local and national youth
public service programs (such as cospon-
sorship of the Special Olympics this year,
and the promotion of a traveling van for
the Atari 800™ Computer Educational
Prog ram.)
Distributors and Operators Can Help
In a review of recent news articles, the
general feeling is that community leaders
are not going to approach the video
game industry to help-they are going to
eliminate the problem through legislation.
Being a part of the solution to the pro-
blem of decreasing negative use of un-
supervised leisure time by young people
will help coin video game distributors and
operators become recognized as a pos-
itive and welcome member of their com-
mun ity.
Brenda Wells Flexer is a Graduate Research
student from San Jose State University who is
in the process of gathering data for completion
of her Doctorate on the topic of Youth Life-
styles In The Next Decade. fvfrs. Flexer worked
for 28 years in the public sector developing
recreational services for youth and adults.
The Next
Tempest Champ?
This booklet is a sample of the materials available from Atari distributors to support the
Community Awareness Program.
Bob Harvey, Regional Sales Manager,
couldn 't resist this snapshot, taken du ring
his recent visit to Lieberman Music Com-
pany, Minneapolis. The young player,
Danielle Stolquist, is the 5-year-old daugh-
ter of Dan Stolquist, owner of Wisconsin
Amusement.