[vcf-midatlantic] Great vintage computer article.

[Dave McGuire]

On 04/14/2017 11:55 AM, Herb Johnson via vcf-midatlantic wrote:
>> A lot of people would like to see advanced forms of what we
>> used to call client-server technology do away with the
>> traditional idea of a stand alone personal computer.
>
> Funny for this old guy to read this. In MY generation, the "traditional"
> idea of computing, was mainframe. The company and the government, owned
> ALL the computers, all the data, all the programs. Most people were
> powerless and computer-illiterate, and could not control or access their
> own data.
>
> "A lot of people" - real people, not corporations - in that era, saw
> personal computing (even time-share terminals) as a way to gain economic
> and personal power, access to tools and knowledge, building of
> communities. MOst 1970's microcomputing was about empowering people and
> freeing information for personal and small business use. It started from
> the bottom-up; IBM was late to the game.
>
> Now, who benefits when all the data is "on the server"? And access is
> limited not just by person, but by content? Not you and I! I'm not
> ignorant of the power of big algorithms across big data. But I'm not
> ignorant of my own previous experience, when personal computers enabled
> so many people to do so many things, for themselves.
>
> And that's *another* reason to preserve 1970's vintage computing. To
> remember when that was true.

   Yes.  With people jumping in droves to put everything in/on "THE 
CLOUD!!", without a thought or a clue as to the consequences, I can't 
help but sit back and laugh.  It's the same centralized model, except 
that it's, as Matt Patoray so aptly puts it, SOMEONE ELSE'S COMPUTER.

   At least the company mainframe was owned by an entity whom you 
ostensibly had some sort of a connection to.

   Oh well.  People will learn when all their stuff just up and 
disappears.  And companies will figure out what happens when they store 
their customer lists and other business-proprietary data on computers 
owned by some of the world's largest data mining companies.  B-)

             -Dave

-- 
Dave McGuire, AK4HZ
New Kensington, PA