Code Nation. Michael J. Halvorson
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food, carpooling, protesting, and other activities. Users were not required to register or share their names to use the system. For many Berkeley residents, it was their first opportunity to see or use a computer.
As Community Memory gained momentum, Felsenstein developed a related project that he designed in the fall of 1974, the Tom Swift Terminal. Steven Levy introduced Felsenstein’s project to the general public in his book Hackers: Heroes of the Computer Revolution.45 For historians interested in the plan, the best source is Felsenstein’s short vision document, which provides a high-level explanation of the circuitry and the components required to build the system.46 I am fascinated with Felsenstein’s hand-written prototype, because I see it as a forerunner of the learn-to-program movement, with its socially-based call to action and step-by-step instructions that taught computational thinking. Through the specification, Felsenstein and his colleagues argued for the democratization of computers; they made an appeal for ordinary citizens to program and use computers. It was a fascinating echo of the emphasis that Kemeny, John John Kemeny and Kurtz, Thomas Thomas Kurtz had put on Computing mythologiescomputers for people bringing “computing to the people” during the development of time-sharing BASIC at Dartmouth College in 1963–1964.47
The Tom Swift Terminal Tom Swift Terminal was designed to be sturdier and easier to use than the Community Memory system, which was essentially a cardboard prototype showing how a community-centered technology might develop. The “Tom Swift” was named to honor America’s “everyman” from literature who was fond of tinkering and experimenting far from the centers of corporate and government power. The terminal consisted of a box containing a bus, a power supply, and connections for printed circuit boards. When the owner hooked up a keyboard, a modem, and a television set, he or she had their very own functioning computer. (The schematic also allowed for a dialup modem connection that could connect to a time-sharing system.) After the connection was made, interactive “personal computing” could be accomplished through the remote computer’s operating system and software. The user would experience the terminal session as lines scrolling on their home television set.
Lee Felsenstein wrote up the following goals for the system:
(a)to provide an inexpensive computer terminal useable in public-access information systems which is;
1.capable of using the home TV set as a character display. With hard copy as an add-on option.
2.easily useable by untrained people in a non-professional environment.
3.readily expandable by field modifications to higher levels of “intelligence” and off-line readability.
In an advertisement to publicize the concept, Felsenstein offered interested parties a 25-page booklet describing the proposed device for 50 cents. The advertisement made specific reference to Illich’s Tools for Conviviality, describing a new approach to computing that would be non-industrial, fun, and playful. People would learn, understand, and repair this tool with little formal training, just like the tools humans used before the advent of industrial systems.48
2.8Computing mythologiespersonal computing Personal computing Personal Computing
In the end, the Tom Swift Terminal would not become a commercial product. A few months after it was proposed, the Altair 8800 microcomputer Altair 8800 microcomputerkit kit was released Computing mythologiespersonal computing by MITS in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Lee Felsenstein, Gordon French, and Fred Moore organized the first meeting of the Homebrew Computer Club to examine the device, and they attracted a cross-section of electronics enthusiasts from the region to discuss the Altair and other projects.
The next part of the story is better known, and the subject of popular books, television programs, and films. After the Altair, the microcomputing era took shape at a fast pace. In mid-1975, Bob Marsh, Lee Felsenstein, and Gordon French designed a new microcomputer around the Intel 8080 microprocessor called the Sol-20 Sol-20. The Sol was ready for commercial sale in December 1976. Their device created major excitement—it appeared as if the potential for low-cost computing was finally being realized.
Wozniak, SteveSteve Wozniak and Jobs, Steve Steve Jobs also demonstrated a new microcomputer at the Homebrew Computer Club in July 1976—a homemade prototype later known as the Apple ComputerApple I computer Apple I. (See Figure 2.9.) About a year later, the Apple ComputerApple II computer Apple II microcomputer debuted. This machine was a more mature product with a custom plastic case, a printed circuit board, and slick modular components. Moving beyond the Silicon Valley circle of hobbyists, the Apple II became a catalyst for personal computing hardware and the nascent PC software industry across the country. In a cultural sense, the Apple II also reflected the aspirations and designs of Lee Felsenstein, Stewart Brand, Ted Nelson, and other prominent voices from the counterculture movement. Steve Wozniak summed up the connection to Ivan Illich’s work in a special Byte magazine Byte article to commemorate the launch, “To me, a personal computer should be small, reliable, convenient to use and inexpensive.”49 Notice that Wozniak, too, used the emerging term, Personal computers (PCs) personal computer. In this early phase of personal computing, a PC was defined as a small, multi-purpose device that was relatively inexpensive to purchase (compared to minicomputers and workstations), and it was designed to be used by individuals.
In rapid succession, there came a series of PCs from different manufacturers: the Apple II (June 1977), the Tandy TRS-80 microcomputer Tandy TRS-80 (August 1977), and the Commodore PET 2001 Commodore PET 2001 (October 1977). These three devices definitively launched what pundits later called the PC Revolution “PC Revolution,” a new social order that fulfilled the promise of earlier microcomputer experiments with mass market products and opportunities.
What began as a push to provide simple computing tools to ordinary people culminated in a new sector of the computer industry. Behind the devices was a mythological belief that the tools would enrich the experience of average Americans, elevate their consciousness, and promote political change. This “revolution” produced unexpected results when the world’s largest computer manufacturerComputing mythologiespersonal computing chose to enter the nascent sector as well, releasing the IBM Personal Computer in August of 1981. This device was intentionally assembled from off-the-shelf products and did not have its own operating system, software, or programming tools.50 However, IBM PCs and compatibles would soon carve out a lucrative niche in the PC industry as well. It took years for PCs to compete with mainframe and minicomputers in terms of revenue, but the PC industry had launched and soon there was a need for PC programmers and learning tools for both developers, business users, and hobbyists. Between 1981 and 1983, the receipts of PC software publishers grew from $70 million to $486 million.51
Figure 2.9Steve Wozniak (left) and Steve Jobs with the Apple I Computer (1976). A repeating message on the displays reads, “Computer… available at BYTE Shop.” (Photo: Joe Melena. Image courtesy of the Computer History Museum and used with permission of Apple Computer)
The stage was set for the rapid democratization of programming culture in the U.S. Computer literacy programs U.S. Computer literacy programs developed in the wake of widespread exposureComputing mythologiespersonal computing to computers, as new users sat in front of PCs and wondered what to do with them. Computer programming, once considered the domain of corporate specialists, became a popular way to learn about computers and benefit from them. In the next chapter, we will learn more about this new skill, and how learning to program gained momentum as a popular movement in America.
1.Cited in David Lorge Parnas, “Education for computing professionals,” Computer 23, no. 1 (Jan. 1990), 17–22.
2.Margaret S. Elliott and Kenneth L. Kraemer, “Computerization movements and the diffusion of technological innovations,” in Computerization Movements and Technology Diffusion: From Mainframes to Ubiquitous Computing, edited by Margaret S. Elliott and Kenneth L. Kraemer (Medford, NJ: Information Today, Inc., 2008), 6.
3.For