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08-25-2002, 09:49 AM
|  | Schmoopy Woopy | | Join Date: Jul 2000 Location: A stone's throw from Geezerville, FLA
Posts: 5,289
| | A Letter From The Old Days | |
I've come across a wonderful essay James Fallows wrote for The Atlantic about making the leap from writing on a typewriter to a computer.
Here's the cool part: It was first published in July 1982.. Living With a Computer
Brian
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Hubba hubba hey. |
08-25-2002, 12:53 PM
|  | Mr. Nice Man | | Join Date: Sep 2000 Location: New York, NY, USA
Posts: 2,479
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Brian,
Excellent article!
To young folks, the computer is a tool to be used and taken for granted. To someone like me (a neanderthal), who has lived through the typewriter and carbon paper days, the computer is a miracle that continues to thrill and amaze me to this day.
Rich |
08-26-2002, 11:33 AM
|  | Mistress of Mayhem | | Join Date: Jun 2000 Location: New York
Posts: 17,175
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Wow. What a blast from the past. 
Thanks for sharing that.
Sara
Who has worked on a Wang, and graduated to Paperclip, WordStar and Multimate
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Stress: What happens when your gut says no and your mouth says, "Of course, I'd be glad to." |
08-26-2002, 11:41 AM
|  | Hot and Juicy | | Join Date: Nov 2000 Location: off campus
Posts: 46,671
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Thanks, Brian!
That brought back memories. I remember travelling by local train from Philadelphia to Central Jersey on weekends just so that I could work on term papers on my dad's word-processor instead of my electric type-writer. I used to struggle with WordStar back in those days.
I am continually amazed by the capabilities of PCs and the ease of today's word-processing and spreadsheet programs - forget the internet - that really blows my mind! |
12-12-2002, 01:30 AM
| | Epinions Members | | Join Date: Feb 2001 Location: Mich
Posts: 112
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OMG! I had a blast reading that!
My first computer experiences were with Commodore 64's, TRS 80's and Heath H90's. All my friends (but me) had C64's and when we'd get together they'd all swap games. One of my best friends had a H90 with Wordstar and when we were on the college paper together we'd write movie reviews together on his machine in his basement.
At the newsroom at school we mainly had some ANCIENT manual typewriters, and a handful of IBM Selectric II's. Not a computer to be found. This was in 1985-87, mind you.
Around '89 I worked at a local radio station doing news, and we wrote copy on another H89 with wordstar. Heath was a local business, so those we're probably more prevelant in our area then anywhere else in the country.
I bought my first computer in '90 or '91, a Apple Mac Plus with a 20 gig hard drive. I still have it and it was the primary computer in our home until my wife and a sprung for a new Compaq system about 2 years ago. She'd been running an old 286 machine up to then. (Obviously, neither of us are technogeeks or early adapters)
I've recently seen Mac's only slightly older then mine in two different museum displays.  |
12-14-2002, 04:39 AM
|  | Ordinary Jo in disguise | | Join Date: Jul 2002 Location: Chicago IL suburbs
Posts: 1,215
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Quote: Originally posted by rich2003dm
Brian,
Excellent article!
To young folks, the computer is a tool to be used and taken for granted. To someone like me (a neanderthal), who has lived through the typewriter and carbon paper days, the computer is a miracle that continues to thrill and amaze me to this day.
Rich | Don't forget those of us who lived through the day of the teletype for news!
Robin Peters
fondly remembering her own rip and read college journalism days  | |
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