Did you ever get thrown out of a computer store?

[MrMaddog]

No but I've walked out of a couple stores when the owners acted like complete dicks as well as sell Pentium PC's at higher thasn premium prices. They end up closing shop because there was, in the 90's, a glut of computer stores that sold PC's cheaper and have better customer service. One of them got busted for selling pirated copies of Windows 98 and M$ shut them down hard...

[butterburp]

Similar to Soulblazer, I've been given the ol' "time's up" at a department store. In my case though, my parents actually worked at the store and I came with them every Saturday, so the guys working the computer department knew I would pop up somewhere along the line to play on the C64 (usually Little Computer People or a trivia game). They more or less tolerated me until they had to show the merchandise off to an actual paying customer. At that point they'd say "Ok kid, out" and I'd go do something else, like try and find books with dirty pictures in them.

 

Their generous policy paid off in spades; my parents eventually bought me a C64, and I ended up buying both of those games and many others.

[+CXK]

I never got kicked out, but I had the manager talk to me about "correcting" her employees. In the mid nineties, I decided to "test" one of the employees and asked if software that listed a Pentium processor in its system requirements would work on a computer with a Celeron chip. He said "No" but I could probably find a patch that would allow it to run. I loudly laughed at him and (being a teenager and a bit of a jerk) called him a moron and told him it would work. The exchange alerted the attention of the manager who was near by. She quickly came by and defended her employee basically saying I was just a kid and had no idea what I was talking about. My parents collected me and we left the store shortly after.

 

That was at CompUSA, where I would also sit in on their free "web design" class and correct the person "teaching" the class, and jump in on their Quake 2 (and then 3) "tournaments" and mop the floor with everyone that sat down.

 

Fun times!

[Keatah]

Gosh. I sometimes felt sorry for the CompUSA name. They had such sleazy managers. Some had body odour, others looked unkempt. And one time I interviewed there their the manager was constantly swearing and late for the interview, how about that? It was such a lame meeting I got up and left. So in effect I threw myself out. Some 5 years later they were still in business, but the end was near.

[+Gemintronic]

Not exactly thrown out. I've been laid off twice from computer stores.

 

Needless to say I avoid them on principle now.

[+CXK]

 

You mean like nearly every_single_person_in_retail today?

 

My girlfriends grandfather decided that his computer wasn't working (nevermind that I could have fixed it for him... but I won't go into all the problems he has just using a computer in the first place.) Anyhow, he decided to get a new laptop. Went to the glory that is Wal-mart ( ) Found a cheap Chromebook and asked the associate if it was a Windows 10 computer.. to which she replied "Yes." (According to him anyway) Two days later I was at his house working on the original computer, when h came to me about his "brand new laptop" that had WIndows 10 and it wasn't working right. I had to break to the poor guy, that the moron at Walmart had no idea what they were talking and that Chromebooks suck.

[Keatah]

I remember another time I ran out of a store. It was back in the halcyon days, naturally. I was copying or getting ready to copy something for the Apple II. And this big burly guy came out from around back to see what we were doing. I had all my stuff sprawled out with no hope of cleaning it up in time. So I just ran out at top speed in fear of getting caught. There was no way this fat guy was going to catch me. Nor even make it to the phone in time to call the police. Then I'm like ohhh shit because I had my name and classroom number and school name written on the box of disks I was using. I'm a gonner for sure!

 

Some odd days later I got called to office at school and they had my box of disks sitting on receptionist's or principal's desk. With a note saying I left it at the store. There were additional labels with names of games, some of which I think I was try'in-a copy.

 

I thought that was so fucking cool I make it a point to preferentially buy things from there.

 

Too bad these kinds of things just don't happen in this day and age anymore, especially with retail. And if they *do* I sure as hell don't hear about them.

[Gentlegamer]

Keatah the Computer Punk

[NE146]

No.. but I got thrown out of an arcade once. Does that count?

 

I was just a kid and literally the only one in this hotel arcade run by a single chinese lady. I started up Mr. Do in a cocktail, and immediately did the 255 lives trick. She saw this and said the game is malfunctioning, unplugged it and threw me out! I was probably about 11 or something..

[high voltage]

In UK I had sex with a girl at Dixons, a UK electronics retailer. She worked there, and we had sex behind the shelves. We got caught, I got thrown out, and she was fired.......fun times

[zzip]

I got thrown out of Service Merchandise just for playing games on their videogames kiosks in the 80s, and watching other kids play. It wasn't even like I was there very long, maybe 10 minutes give or take. I think it was just that one of the employees didn't like kids congregating around the game section. It happened twice, same employee both times.

[Zap!]

No, but I got thrown out of Toys R' Us in 1987 for having a football game with my friends in the Nerf isle lol!

[atarian63]

No, but we had a timer setup in the console section that would power them all down every 15 min. Seems the local moms thought we would babysit for them, while they shopped elsewhere. Wasnt the kids fault and most kids were pretty nice for the most part a few were nice and polite enough we shut off the timer for them, a couple ended up working there years later. Guess being a little nice paid off.

Edited March 8, 2017 by atarian63

[+davidcalgary29]

Yes, for hogging a Mac in a computer store in Thornhill, Ontario (1984) with a group of friends to play Airborne! after school for days (before the salespeople lost patience with us). I recall it being something of a crap game, but the digitized music was top-notch.

[BillyHW]

Sometimes I would get kicked out of drug stores or bookstores for reading the video game and computer magazines without buying them.

 

One time an arcade manager berated a few of us in there for just watching and not playing a game.

[+save2600]

One time an arcade manager berated a few of us in there for just watching and not playing a game.

 

When I serviced machines/managed arcades and saw kids doing that, I'd either give them a few tokens or swipe the card reader so they could play. Besides the gratitude, those kids usually came back with money from their parents to purchase game cards.

 

I didn't/don't like kids loitering either, but would always rather see them *playing* something vs. obnoxiously going from game to game, looking for coins/cards/tix underneath and behind the machines. Some of the kids that truly had zero dollars, but insisted on hanging out in the arcade while their parents were doing who knows what in the hotel room... I'd put to work performing minor tasks like wiping down the games/picking up around the room but then rewarded with credits on their own swipe card. Never met a kid that ever turned that offer down.

[+FujiSkunk]

I didn't/don't like kids loitering either, but would always rather see them *playing* something vs. obnoxiously going from game to game, looking for coins/cards/tix underneath and behind the machines. Some of the kids that truly had zero dollars, but insisted on hanging out in the arcade while their parents were doing who knows what in the hotel room... I'd put to work performing minor tasks like wiping down the games/picking up around the room but then rewarded with credits on their own swipe card. Never met a kid that ever turned that offer down.

 

That was cool of you. I have a sort-of similar story about a trip to New Orleans where I ended up in a magic shop. The guy there was really good and wowed us all with card tricks and disappearing hankies and the like. Then, he asked me if I'd do him a favor and grab lunch for him since he was the only one in the store. Impressionable kid that I was with nothing else to do, I figured why not? In exchange he showed me how a lot of his tricks worked. In the end he still came on top because I was impressed enough with the trickery behind the tricks that I bought a couple of things from the store. Still, he was fun to talk to and listen to, and he seemed to like how some of us were taking an interest enough to know how to impress others.

 

As for the topic at hand, I've never been thrown out of a computer store, or even an arcade. I was thrown out of a music store once, but that guy was just an uptight salesman who I guess was getting tired of looking at some kid who wasn't buying anything. Granted, that wasn't too far from the truth, but that didn't stop me from getting along with everyone else in the store, including the manager, who seemed not to mind a kid who actually was interested in the electronic keyboards and how they worked, and even bought a songbook now and then. Then there was Wal-Mart and their selection of music keyboards. I'd be there every weekend playing on them. Sometimes the employees tolerated me and the rest of the kids that hung around. Sometimes they didn't. They never threw us out, though. They'd just yank the master power strip when us kids weren't looking and then claim the keyboards were taking too much power and had to "cool down a while." Funny guys. I got the last laugh, though, when one of the managers was impressed enough with my playing that I was "hired" to play one of the keyboards for a few hours one day during the holiday season. My fee was another batch of songbooks.

[BillyHW]

That's happened to me too. A repairman at a bowling alley arcade once left the SF2 machine with a bunch of credits after he was done.