The collapse of the communist economy left Eastern Europe in technological chaos. While we in Norway were doing well when the Amiga 1000 was launched in 1985, Amiga machines were only introduced when the Iron Curtain fell in Eastern Europe. This meant that even though Commodore went bankrupt in 1994, the Amiga in its prime still lived there.
In this article, which is translated from the one at amigano.com, I will look at how Eastern Europe saved the Amiga. It is a story that almost no one has written about, something that I have been thinking about correcting for a long time.
The Revolution in 1989
It all started with the revolution that spread democracy in Eastern Europe in 1989, the epitome of the collapse of the Berlin Wall, which was caused by a combination of economic crisis and popular discontent.
What gave this movement real strength and unity across half a continent and in seven different countries was the interest in people’s courage to have a better future. My grandfather in Poland was one of the first in Swinoujscie to acquire a satellite dish and a new TV as soon as communism ended.
The video above shows the Amiga history. Eastern Europe did not get to see the launch of the Amiga 1000, Amiga 2000 or Amiga 500. In this article, I focus on Poland, since that is where I am from. But there were seven different countries that got Amiga fever and saved the Amiga. Thank you!
Technology takes over Eastern Europe
Western technology came in with its information technology for TV and radio, telephone lines and fax machines, personal computers and desktop publishing that one could previously only dream of seeing or owning.
This made it difficult for dictatorial communist governments to control events and thus the communist states collapsed like dominoes.
A PC at that time cost a lot in Eastern Europe. And thus the Amiga 500 and Amiga 1200 gained a foothold that would be precarious if the Amiga did not collapse in 1994 (when Commodore went bankrupt), as it did in many other countries in Western Europe and North America.
Media uses Amiga
Not only was the Amiga popular at home, but almost all of Poland’s media was powered by Amiga machines. Just take a look at the Polsat television ident from 1994:
Or how about using Amiga music in commercials and vignettes, like here in the Morze channel that was broadcast in the area where I’m from in Poland:
You can see that the Amiga was used outside the home in the two videos above.
The PC market was too expensive
It would take many years before ordinary people could afford a PC, with the same qualities as the Amiga got. This started to happen from about 1997 until today. By then, the Amiga had managed to keep its popularity from 1989 in Poland via demo parties, events and launches.
Several Amiga magazines were also launched in Poland, including Amiga Magazyn and Komoda Amiga Plus which I read every summer. The difference in reading it compared to the English Amiga magazines was miles away.
Amiga Magazyn was so serious that even Computer World or Amiga World magazines were seen as ridiculous by me, while Komoda Amiga Plus made the Amiga more exciting to have.
If you really wanted to become good at programming something, all you had to do was use Amiga Magazyn to become good at it. Probably one of the reasons why Poles are so good at developing software for the Amiga, I think.
In addition, every city in Poland had Amiga shops on almost every street corner and several Amiga user groups were created in several areas of the country. These managed to give the Amiga a voice which has had a great impact on why so many Amiga-related productions still come from Poland even in 2025.
Here are some useful links to Amiga shops in Poland today:
