MetaFilter posts tagged with history and computers

BBS documentary author tries to raise funds work full-time on computer history

Monday, stony Monday — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 23:51:07 -0800

Mefi's own Jason Scott (jscott) wants to raise $25,000 using waxy's Kickstarter to work full-time on computer history. He made BBS documentary (previously), founded the Archive Team, and owns textfiles.com (previously) and, yes, sockington. So far, 237 people have pledged $20,340. On Nov. 4, Jason did a 5-hours, non-stop Scottathon. Apparently, fundraising ain't easy. Texfiles.com is quite a resource, with a wide range of topics: sex (mefi), drugs (mefi), the Vietnam War (mefi), koalas (mefi), Applesoft BASIC (mefi), and, obviously, the "Golden Ages" of BBSes (mefi). Jason has already written quite a bit on computer history, including IBM manuals, retrocomputing, the DAK catalog and Computer Shopper. He's also given many talks: nostalgics don't want to miss Apple II Pirate Lore; youger nostalgics may enjoy the Super Jason Scott Presentation 64. He's working on a documentary about Text Adventures, GET LAMP.

A Geek Itinerary

netbros — Fri, 28 Aug 2009 06:58:14 -0800

Technology innovation will be a large part of late 20th century American history. Now the gearheads can explore the roots of all that geekdom. The Geek's Guide to Seattle is a virtual tour of some of the region’s most interesting and notable technology locations. A Geek's Tour of Silicon Valley hits hotspots there. Don't forget The Tech Museum and the Computer History Museum. Back east, there's Research Triangle Park (pdf) in North Carolina, and The Computing Revolution at the Museum of Science in Boston.

1965 - Kemeny and Kurtz go to 1964

Artw — Fri, 08 May 2009 15:21:53 -0800

A Brief, Incomplete, and Mostly Wrong History of Programming Languages

Click click victorious, buzz buzz glorious, Long to reign over us, buzz buzz click click.

Artw — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 10:49:44 -0800

The first known recording of a digital computer playing music, recorded by the BBC in 1951. The music played on a Ferantti Mark 1, one of the first commercial general-use computers, and was entered via punchtape and played on a speaker usually used for making clicks and tones to indicate program progress.

640K ought to be enough for anybody

netbros — Fri, 09 May 2008 15:11:05 -0800

The History of Computing Project is a collaborative effort to record and publish the history of the computer and its roots. The site includes a chronological timeline, biographies of computing pioneers, a look at computing hardware through the years, as well as software and games. Having a 30-year career in the field, I am partial to mainframe computing. I started my career in 1973 working on this machine, and ended it on this one, with many in between. Other mainframe timelines: IBM mainframes Viking Waters Computer history: IBM 360/370/3090/390

The thirtieth birthday of online communities

SteveInMaine — Sat, 16 Feb 2008 02:30:50 -0800

During a January blizzard thirty years ago in Chicago, Ward Christensen and Randy Seuss came up with the idea for a computerized bulletin board system. One month later on February 16, 1978, the first public online community was officially established, and it was named CBBS. As you might expect for the time, discussion on CBBS was mostly about computer stuff. You can get a taste of what the messages looked like in all their textual glory.

"The problem with Microsoft is they just have no taste. They have no taste and I don't mean that in a small way, I mean that in a big way."

amyms — Sat, 29 Sep 2007 02:35:56 -0800

Triumph of the Nerds is a 1996 three-part documentary recounting the rise of the personal computer, including interviews with Gates, Wozniak and Jobs, among others. It was originally produced for British television, and aired on PBS in the USA. Part One: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. Part Two: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. Part Three: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. Transcripts here. After you watch, you can play the "Guess the Computer" game.

CRAYON!

divabat — Wed, 28 Mar 2007 03:28:07 -0800

Before RSS and personalized aggregators such as Personalized Google and NetVibes, there was CRAYON, a service that allowed you to "CReAte Your Own Newspaper" by providing a page with links to chosen sources. [mi]

The Red Hill Guide to Computer Hardware

loquacious — Sat, 06 Jan 2007 23:01:36 -0800

The Red Hill Guide is an amazingly detailed and well-written compendium of desktop hardware old and new, with a focus on PC and x86 compatibles. Look for your first CPU, hard drive or mainboard.

When 1,000 words were enough

bigbigdog — Mon, 01 Jan 2007 18:36:17 -0800

Interviews with some early computer people at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory.

In the olden days, before 1984, not very many people used computers....

anastasiav — Wed, 26 Apr 2006 08:49:19 -0800

Apple Computer 1984 Newsweek Advertising Insert :: a complete scan of Apple's 16-page advertising insert in Newsweek magazine, introducing the new and revolutionary Macintosh computer.

ARPAnet

loquacious — Sun, 19 Mar 2006 01:23:36 -0800

Computer Networks: The Heralds of Resource Sharing (Google video) A fascinating 30 minute documentary about ARPAnet - the precursor to today's Internet. (Can you spot the real ubernerd mover and shaker at BBN? Hint: He wears no tie!) (via: all over the place)

What the Dormouse Said

gleenyc — Sat, 07 May 2005 13:40:51 -0800

California Dreaming: A True Story of Computers, Drugs and Rock 'n' Roll (Reg. req'd) Engineers can be so cute. In the early 1960's, Myron Stolaroff, an employee of the tape recorder manufacturer Ampex, decided to prove the value of consuming LSD. So he set up the International Foundation for Advanced Study and went about his project in classic methodical fashion.

But John Markoff, a senior writer for The New York Times who covers technology, makes a convincing case that for the swarming ubergeeks assembling in the San Francisco Bay Area in the 1960's, approaching drugs as they might any other potentially helpful tool or device - from a soldering iron to a computer chip - was only natural. The goals were broad in the 60's: the world would be remade, the natural order of things reconfigured, human potential amplified to infinity. Anything that could help was to be cherished, studied and improved.

Judging by the record presented in What the Dormouse Said, it is indisputable that many of the engineers and programmers who contributed to the birth of personal computing were fans of LSD, draft resisters, commune sympathizers and, to put it bluntly, long-haired hippie freaks.

The Bushy Tree

carter — Wed, 02 Mar 2005 08:28:40 -0800

A clickable genealogy charting the lineage of visual interactive computing systems and user interfaces, by Bruce Damer. Some quirky/broken links, but plenty of interesting stuff there, too.

Man, those things are OLD!

monju_bosatsu — Tue, 01 Mar 2005 15:25:04 -0800

"Puntate. Clic." 1000Bit archives images of vintage computer adverts, magazines, manuals, and brochures, many in Italian. Also of interest: old-computers.com, the Obselete Technology Web, Rune's PC-Museum, and Dave's Old Computers. [via]

VAX 11/780 - The Future Is Now

tss — Wed, 15 Dec 2004 19:40:01 -0800

Geek History through T-Shirts. Shamelessly cribbed from memepool, who spotted a good one...

Silicon Valley strikes again

starscream — Tue, 07 Oct 2003 13:59:18 -0800

The Computer History Museum is hosting this years Vintage Computer Festival in Mountain View, California. Featuring live demonstatrions of a Xerox Alto as well as an auction for a Commodore 64 prototype, this year promises to be fun for geeks of all ages. (via Wired)

Ahhh ... memory lane

MintSauce — Fri, 22 Aug 2003 04:28:14 -0800

Obsolete computers 1975-89. There's my first baby.

History and culture of computing

carter — Sun, 22 Jun 2003 08:26:57 -0800

While there are a number of sites devoted to the history of computer and information technologies, their invention, design and manufacture is also a human story. So I'm glad that there are sites devoted to computing history and culture that also look at the lives of those involved. The Charles Babbage Institute and Center for the History of Information Technology, includes oral histories of engineers and 500 photographs of the Burroughs Corporation form the 1890s on. The Smithsonian Museum Division of Information Technology and Society is a gateway to a large number of 'real life' and online Smithsonian exhibitions related to the history of science and technology, including more oral histories and PDFs of the original DoD press releases for ENIAC. The Oxford University Virtual Museum of Computing includes tributes to information science pioneers, as well as much other stuff. Finally, the Silicon Valley Cultures Project is using anthropology to document the lives of many of those in the Valley.

Newly Digital

jeremias — Mon, 02 Jun 2003 10:04:13 -0800

Newly Digital is an electronic anthology of sorts. Due to the technological advancement of these things we call "computers", it's a subject ripe for nostalgia. As seen here by bloggers writing about their first . . .

condour75 — Fri, 08 Nov 2002 23:57:55 -0800

The Computer Photography of Arthur Lavine. Got a reel-to-reel fetish? Does the phrase "hand assembled ferrite core memory" make you swoon? Take a look at some old-school nerds at work for Chase Manhattan, back in the days when computers were big and expensive, and a Macintosh was a raincoat. It's an exhibit at San Diego's Computer Museum of America, which is chock full of goodies. Check out the slide show exhibit too.

stuporJIX — Fri, 15 Feb 2002 04:43:59 -0800

www.computerhistory.org is the virtual incarnation of computer historian and collector Michael Williams' phat-ass computer museum. My favourite, BTW, is the timeline, searchable by year or topic. What technological milestones occured in the year of your birth?

rschram — Wed, 13 Jun 2001 17:22:08 -0800

NYT celebrates 40 (or so) years of FORTRAN
The computer language that started it all is remembered in this breezy Times article (reg. req.'d.). [I think it has to do with some recent reunion of original team-members, but any contemporary event to rationalize printing this is buried in the copy.] Do something high-level with your computer today to commemorate. Here's an ibiblio.org text with more information.

mutagen — Sun, 22 Apr 2001 22:42:18 -0800

Soviet Computer Technology circa 1988 (Google Cache).

SpecialK — Sat, 07 Apr 2001 22:30:07 -0800

The Story of Mel - Almost everyone's seen the Story of Mel on USENET or via email... the story of the guy who wrote programs for a particular ancient drum computer by using the characteristics of the drum to handle memory allocation and time delays. In a footnote on the Jargon File, it seems that his last name is known... An interesting footnote to an interesting and probably true story.