https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/20/technology/randy-suess-dead.html
"In late January 1978, Mr. Suess (rhymes with “loose”) was part of an
early home computer club called the Chicago Area Computer Hobbyists’
Exchange, or CACHE. He and another club member, an IBM engineer named
Ward Christensen, had been discussing an idea for a new kind of computer
messaging system, but hadn’t had the time to explore it. Then a blizzard
hit the Great Lakes region, covering Chicago in more than 40 inches of snow.
As the city shut down, Mr. Christensen phoned Mr. Suess to say that they
finally had enough time to build their new system. Mr. Christensen
suggested that they get help from the other members of the club, but, as
he recalled in an interview, Mr. Suess told him that that would be a
mistake because others would just slow the project down.
“Forget the club, it would just be management by committee,” Mr.
Christensen recalled him saying, noting that Mr. Seuss had been a
self-taught computer technician whose decisions typically came hard and
fast. “It’s just me and you. I will do the hardware, and you will do the
software.”
The idea was to build a central computer that club members could connect
to using their own computers and telephone lines. They thought of it as
an electronic version of the cork bulletin boards on the walls of
grocery stores, where anyone could post paper fliers.
Two weeks later, their system was up and running, and the club was
trading messages about meetings, new ideas and new projects."
Via Esther Schindler, who wrote "I will whistle a sound like a
1200bps-modem in his honor"
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://www.xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
http://www.glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
http://www.sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
