The Rise of Personal Computers and the Revolutions That Caused Their Evolution Part 2

FROM THE STUDYING MIND OF ANDREW–The breakthrough of the transistor heralded a new era for computers. First generation computers such as ENIAC and EDVAC were massive machines which spanned whole rooms and contained thousands of vacuum tubes. While this design worked, it left little room for improvement as the method would require an increase in size to produce an increase in speed. However, the transistor brought an age of miniaturization, effectively replacing the vacuum tube. The first transistor was based upon a germanium semiconductor base and used a diode to control the flow of electrons. This was known as the grown-junction transistor. However, this was not the final form. While this grown-junction transistor was important, the design was unstable. Germanium, while holding the potential for great speeds, would prove to be too unreliable for any commercial use. Silicon was later found to be a much more suitable semiconductor to use in transistors.

This discovery is what jump started the transistor into the mass market. It is a perfect example of the evolutionary process that defines the world of computing. This is the exact form of development that Ralph Gomory, mathematician and IBM executive, believes is important in studying computers. He finds that the world of computers is defined through an evolutionary process, as are almost all technological innovations. Yet, while the evolution of the transistor into its many forms was important, he believes that the creation of the transistor was a true revolutionary breakthrough, a term that he admittedly does not use lightly. Gomory states that this computer evolution is one of equal magnitude and importance to that of the steam engine.

The large computers which made up the first computer era were extremely costly which often restricted them to government and research uses. The main form of interaction with these computers was through the use of punch cards. These punch cards would require holes to be made within certain areas to represent the binary logic behind a program. In time, computers began to utilize the transistor and various other components to make computers more reliable and manageable. However, these new transistor-based computers were not much of an improvement for the average consumer. It took a new invention to lead towards the second generation of computers.

In 1958, the integrated circuit was developed by Jack Kirby at Texas Instruments. The integrated circuit took all of the components of electronic circuits and miniaturized them on to a single semiconductor substrate. The effects of the integrated circuit led to the development of the microprocessor, an advanced integrated circuit which became known as the Central Processing Unit (CPU) of the computer. The first microprocessor to hit the market was Intel’s 4004 processor which was released on November 15, 1971. The 4004 held 2,300 transistors and had a modest clock speed of 740 kHz.

This evolution began to bring the world of computing into John Doe’s hand. In 1974, Arthur Robinson wrote an article on the change of computing from the “maxi-level to the micro-level.” At this stage in time the microprocessor was still a relatively new device, yet he has several predictions about the far reaching imprecations of the device. At this point in time, the only real encounter that the average person had with the world of computing was the first few hand-held calculators began to be sold (most notably by Texas Instruments).

However, Robinson saw other uses for the microprocessor including uses in factory machinery, computerized cash registers, and computer terminals. What is important to notice is his expectations for the future of computing. While he does not outright acknowledge an abstract personal computer, he gets close to the idea. His idea is that the main user of the microprocessor and the microcomputer would be OEMs (original equipment manufacturers). OEMs would develop unique machines with microprocessors embedded in them that carried out individual jobs, each one fine tailored towards a specific goal or task. For example, he discusses supermarket terminals. These terminals would be used to keep track of inventories, authorization of credit cards, and price look-up. However, he stipulates that these terminals would be linked towards a central computer, much like the terminals of the first generation computers were used.

Final installment to follow…

The Rise of Personal Computers and the Revolutions That Caused Their Evolution Part 1

FROM ANDREW’S HTS 3083 TERM PAPER — The 20th century has seen giant leaps in several technologies, stemming from a massive increase in research and development on all fronts.

With the driving force of two world wars and a massive cold war, it became ever more important for countries to spend billions of dollars in development of new technologies that would drive their society, both militarily and culturally, towards dominance.

The most important of these technologies is without a doubt the rise of the computer and its permeation into the personal market. The evolution of computers would never be defined by a single invention, but rather an ideal to push towards a singular goal: the personal computer. Closer examination of the history in the computer’s evolution shows an important trend in which affordable and powerful personal computers were the first step in a digital revolution which would drive society both technologically and culturally into the 21st century.

It is difficult to lump the computer into a single invention that could be analyzed. The computer itself is not a singular technology that was just created overnight but rather a major basis for the electronic and computing system. This system is not separate from human society and culture, but would instead ingrain itself into the very fabric of society. Therefore, this paper will focus on the introduction of two key inventions which led to the evolution of this computing system. They are the transistor and the microprocessor, two major components which define the computer and electronic era.

The first step in understanding the evolution of the computer is the study of the engineering and technological efforts after the Second World War. With inventions such as radio and radar becoming increasingly more valuable in the defense market, governments began to view technology as a vital player in the international marketplace. Government spending in research and development began to increase dramatically as well as drive the private sector into the game. It also showed that scientists would play a key role in the post-WWII era.

One of the main hotbeds for this research was Bell Laboratories, an offshoot of AT&T and Western Electric Research Laboratories. Immediately after the war, then director of research at Bell Labs, M. J. Kelley, decided to investigate the role of semiconductors, elements which in the past had several uses. Semiconductors were common components in crystal radios before the invention of the electron tube was invented. The main goal of this research as was to “gain a deeper understanding of the physics of these substances (semiconductors).”

The researchers began to realize the potential in such materials and decided to take another look in a device which could control the flow of electrons in solids. This research eventually led to the invention of the transistor by Walter Brattain and John Bardeen. In his article published in Scientific Monthly, Ralph Brown, director of research the year the transistor was invented, stated that when they publicly announced the invention of the transistor, they would remain quiet on their hopes and dreams and rather just announced what they could certifiably state as facts.

In retrospect, Brown states that the act of announcing only accomplished tasks that the transistor had performed led to misunderstanding and lack of interest by the news media when reporting on the invention.

To be continued.

Andy Kaufman should get a producer’s credit for America’s wakening to solipsism

FROM JASON’S COPY OF THE GREAT GATSBY — It’s hard to tell whether Andy Kaufman hated his audiences or was some sort of messiah sent to raise them to a new state of mind.

His goal, I think, was never to make the crowd laugh. He insisted he wasn’t a comic and didn’t tell jokes — unless it was to show how flawed conventional humor was.

“I’m not trying to be funny. I just want to play with their heads,” he told The New York Times.

Every Kaufman bit forced the audience through the gears and far past the confines of conventional humor. He made them squirm. He pushed discomfort to an art. He was a study in negative space and his audience’s reaction to it.

In that way, he was a masterful deconstructionist. He wanted to turn the entire idea on its head. He wanted to try reverse-reverse-reverse-reverse psychology. He wanted to piss people off, and he never made a secret of it — especially in his staged inter-gender wrestling stunts and legendary appearance on Fridays later in his career.

But angering people wasn’t the end goal — it was just a necessary transitional state. He always aimed to show people how to peel through the fake veneer of life and find the elusive truth underneath.

“What’s real? What’s not? That’s what I do in my act, test how other people deal with reality,” he said.

It was a concept that few people understood, especially the network executives he asked to back him. But he bludgeoned his way through show business anyway, pummeling the American public with a do-you-believe-everything-you-see solipsism that was infectious to an entire generation. He flippant attitudes toward what could be done or said on television changed the perspective of the multitudes, even if they didn’t realize it at the time.

It was like Kaufman was trying to be unpopular, just to prove how silly the entire notion of culture is.

“There’s a little voice that says, ‘Oh, no, you can’t do that, that’s breaking all the rules,’” he said. “That’s the voice of show business. Then this other little voice says, ‘Try it.’”

Watch how he breaks the crowd in this 1977 HBO Young Comedians special. The audience members don’t know whether to take him seriously. They don’t know up front whether Andy’s stuttering, hesitant, self-effacing front is real. Andy keeps pushing and pushing the limits of their credulity, then slaps them a little in face to let them know it’s all an act.

Once he had disabused the confused masses of their expectations, he would show them his own home-brewed physical comedy.

It was so tangential to their expectations that they would be just excited and confused enough to fall prey to his abusive alter-egos. Here, Tony Clifton launches a raunchy assault born in the night clubs of both Reno and Tahoe.

Note that Mel Sherer is a plant — he helped Kaufman put together his “Andy’s Playhouse” special that (I think) never aired on ABC. Bob Zmuda was his obvious sidekick, though it’s unlikely the audience had any idea, and Larry Feinberg and Luther Adler were both Jewish comedic actors.

Many mass media outlets that clamored to interview and review the hot new “comedian” didn’t know that he and Clifton were one and the same. Sometimes, in fact, they weren’t — he would give his brother, Michael, and good friend Bob Zmuda turns depicting Clifton — again, just to mess with peoples’ minds.

After he added makeup, shades, and a little bit of weight to the Clifton costume, the gag was so convincing that it continues to baffle fans. Continued Clifton appearances post-Kaufman’s death of cancer in 1984 have even added fuel to the popular theories that Andy may have faked his own death.

Before his death, he was working on a script about a man who fakes his own death. He told others he wanted to actually do it as a type of performance art. Zmuda even said Andy was obsessed with the idea. But Kaufman did not rise from the dead to revel in the success of his hoax in 2004, as he bragged he would.

But that’s not the point. Kaufman still succeeded by doing what any good absurdist or mentalist does — he convinced us that it was possible that he wasn’t dead, and he kept us talking about it for 23 years. That’s a bigger trick than most men can ever hope to spring, and it’s what made Kaufman’s anti-comedic outlook on life so revolutionary.

YouTube Cinema: The Best of Bugs and Yosemite Sam

FROM JASON’S SATURDAY MORNINGS OF YORE – Bugs Bunny never needed samurai skills, a robot sidekick, a secret base, superpowers, or a gun.

Using just his wits and impeccable luck, he managed to fend off hungry hunters, vengeful rednecks, ravaging Tazmanian devils, and even the devil himself.

Chuck Jones, the legendary Warner Brothers animation director who gave us the best Looney Tunes, never needed fancy computer-generated landscapes or extravagant cell-shaded character models, either. There’s something to be said for the simplicity and minimalism of Jones’ watercolor matte backgrounds and Escher-ish settings; very few modern cartoons with much larger budgets have achieved the same atmosphere.

Rather than focusing on the style (though there was plenty — it was just understated), Jones and WB dallied instead on giving us relatable wise-guy heroes and surly-yet-sympathetic antagonists.

My favorite of the later by far was Yosemite Sam, who throughout his tenure as Bugs’ anvil-dropping nemesis went by a dozen different aliases as the setting dictated.

Director Friz Freleng (his first name was Isadore, typically truncated in the credits to I. Freleng) said Sam was based on his own irritable and rash characteristics. The mustachioed villain was intended to be a leaner, meaner, more cunning version of Elmer Fudd, but he still never managed to hand Bugs Almighty his comeuppance.

But at least you knew that whereas Fudd was… well… a fuddy duddy, easily fooled and manipulated, Sam was much less of a push-over. Bugs versus Fudd was always the San Francisco 49ers versus the Cleveland Browns. But Bugs versus Sam was the 49ers versus the Dallas Cowboys.

That’s what made these three videos, my favorite Bugs and Sam match-ups, so much fun to watch. No matter how many times the 50-odd-year-old episodes ran, I always thought maybe — just maybe — Sam would get his day in the sun.

Sahara Hare

While searching for the ever-elusive Miami Beach, Bugs instead finds himself in northern Africa. When he tries to take a swim in an oasis, he becomes embroiled in a property rights dispute with Sam.

Let’s pony up to the truth here (or camel up to it). Censors, sensibility, and sensitivity would never let this piece air today. We’re too afraid of depictions of anything Arab (even though this is Africa) to let children watch this.

That aside, this short gave birth to one of the most memorable catchphrases in the Looney Tunes/Merry Melodies cannon: “Whoooooaaaaa, camel!” I was born in the 80s and had fun watching it about 35-40 years after this cartoon was made — but my little brother and I to this day quote “whoooooaaaaa, camel!”

All of these episodes have the same ploy-and-counter-ploy feel as the Road Runner cartoons, with Sam as the stand-in Wile E. Coyote. But while this has the quick-talking and self-assured Bugs to anchor it, Sam’s failure lacks the long-suffering resignation resignation we see every time Coyote plunges to the canyon floor.

Don’t worry. Someday I’ll post about those shorts, too.

Roman Legion-Hare

The Roman Emporer Nero (Nero Claudius Caesar Germanicus, 37-68 A.D.) demands gladitorial entertainment and sends Sam to find a suitable victim. Guess who he finds.

Jones and Freleng always had a way of making historical contexts interesting. Here, they have problems with dating — construction of the Colosseum didn’t even start until 72 A.D., and didn’t finish until 80 A.D.

Nero does fiddle at the end of the short as his lions turn on him (as the old legend goes, “Nero fiddled while Rome burned”), but as historians have often remarked, the instrument is entirely anachronistic. Fiddles weren’t even invented for another 1,000 years after his death. Maybe Nero harped while Rome burned — that would make far more sense.

Especially obvious here is Jones’ attention to shadowing, which other cartoons simply didn’t do. It added an element of depth and integrity to the pictures. Pay special attention to the sun-lit walls in the prison cells.

That’s where the absolute best bit happens: Bugs casually walks through a lions’ den, then as Sam tries to tip-toe through, Bugs lowers an alarm clock into the midst of the sleeping cats. Another anachronism? Sure. Hilarious? You better believe it, buddy.

Knighty Knight Bugs

This short actually won an Academy Award in 1959 for Best Short Subject (Cartoon) and was even released on the big screen.

Court Jester Bugs is sent to recover (the absent) Prince Valiant’s Singing Sword, the sister blade of King Arthur’s Excalibur. The sword was stolen by the Black Knight (Sam) and is guarded by the sneeze-a-rific Gerry the Dragon.

In a brilliant call-back to Sahara Hare, we get, “Whoooooaaaa, dragon!”

When CBS used to air this one, it would censor the scene where Bugs smashes Sam on the head with a mallet. The resulting edit wouldn’t make any sense; we saw Sam cinch up a rope trying to storm the castle, then without explanation we saw he slide back down the rope in his boxers.

Bring Looney Tunes back

It’s time for Bugs and Sam and the rest of the gang to return to television. Sure, the cartoons are nearly 60 years old, but they hold up remarkably well. While I’ve seen them hundreds of times, young viewers haven’t.

I remember ABC would have the Bugs Bunny and Friends hour every Saturday morning. Nickolodeon used to air them every night, then Cartoon Network took up the cause. No longer. I miss them, and I would watch diligently. The least I’m asking for is a regular slot on TV Land.