That just seems weird, because when I was a kid, up to around about that time, various famous WWII fighters, bombers, tanks etc were hitting their 40th and that felt like they were ancient. Meanwhile I was poring through these trying to figure out this new crap, which don't seem but a few years ago... https://usborne.com/ca_en/books/computer-and-coding-books

BitWrangler wrote on 2021-08-12, 17:07:

That just seems weird, because when I was a kid, up to around about that time, various famous WWII fighters, bombers, tanks etc were hitting their 40th and that felt like they were ancient. Meanwhile I was poring through these trying to figure out this new crap, which don't seem but a few years ago... https://usborne.com/ca_en/books/computer-and-coding-books

Just be glad we got to experience the golden age of home computers. Those times were magical to me as a teenager. I have to admit I got butterflies in my stomach when I first experienced the Commodore Amiga in 85 though. Blew me away.

Isn't every time magic in some ways? 😉

20s had early wireless sets and great movie festivals and black tuesday; 30s had something else;
40s had a mad painter that aimed for world domination; 50s had elegant cars and sputnik;
60s had first transistors, apollo 11, star trek, oscar-1 civilian sat, xxx revolution, eliza a.i., hippies;
70s had first micros, imsai8080, pr0n/vhs, 555 ic, 74xx series ics, freq. synthesizers/pll, a2600, pioneer 1x and voyager probes;
80s had war games movie, flight of the navigator movie, MIR space station, e-mail, teletext, atari st, vga, hdtv, online services, tmnt;
90s had web, bankrupt c=, os/2, novell DOS, win3.1, stereograms, virtual reality, wayne's world, bill and ted's excellent adventure;
2000s had teletubbies..

Btw, XP celebrates its 20th this year, too. 😉

'30s had the Depression.

and there was always a war going on someplace....

80s-present had me, so clearly the best

Jo22 wrote on 2021-08-12, 19:47:

80s had war games movie

Explorers was clearly the better movie. 😉 The kid who said his Apple IIc had only 128K. I remember thinking in the movie theater, "I wish I had 128K." 🤣

Happy 40th to DONKEY.BAS!!!!

liqmat wrote on 2021-08-12, 23:58:

Jo22 wrote on 2021-08-12, 19:47:

80s had war games movie

Explorers was clearly the better movie. 😉 The kid who said his Apple IIc had only 128K. I remember thinking in the movie theater, "I wish I had 128K." 🤣

Oh, wow! Didn't expect someone to remember this one! What about D.A.R.Y.L.?

leileilol wrote on 2021-08-13, 00:34:

Happy 40th to DONKEY.BAS!!!!

YAY!! 🥳

Do you think anyone actually bought the 16KB diskless model? ... and if so do you think they're still sitting waiting for IBM to release cassette tape software for it? 🤣

BitWrangler wrote on 2021-08-12, 17:07:

That just seems weird, because when I was a kid, up to around about that time, various famous WWII fighters, bombers, tanks etc were hitting their 40th and that felt like they were ancient. Meanwhile I was poring through these trying to figure out this new crap, which don't seem but a few years ago... https://usborne.com/ca_en/books/computer-and-coding-books

I don't know about that, but me and my friends did organize a super secret spy ring using the super secret code that was printed in the Usborne Spy's Guidebook.

BitWrangler wrote on 2021-08-13, 02:54:

... and if so do you think they're still sitting waiting for IBM to release cassette tape software for it? 🤣

Yes they are. Let me show you what that looks like.

^You two made my day! 😂👍

leileilol wrote on 2021-08-13, 00:34:

Happy 40th to DONKEY.BAS!!!!

Lest we forget, it still retains the title for best 8088 compatible game written at 3AM in a closet by a future billionaire.

IBM's loss was everyone else's gain. I can confidently say you'll never see as open a platform ever again. None of our current corporate behemoths are likely to repeat the mistake we're celebrating.

Not quite on time, but since I couldn't get anything else done for the occasion, there is some celebratory ANSI art here. 😉

Big Pink wrote on 2021-08-14, 21:42:

IBM's loss was everyone else's gain. I can confidently say you'll never see as open a platform ever again. None of our current corporate behemoths are likely to repeat the mistake we're celebrating.

Yes, very much to our extreme detriment and disadvantage. The spirit of "openess" is absolutely dead in today's corporate environment of greed, walled gardens, and closed mindededness -- or rather extreme attention to one goal only -- making as much money, as quickly as possible, without regard to whether something is *good* (lasting) or not.

Can't imagine in 2060 anyone will still be using an Apple product or an Intel product -- if those companies even still exist -- from 2020. The very concept will be "politically incorrect" as planned obsolesence will have mutated into nefarious and, even "biological" concept. From the cradle, companies will totally control our lives by having control of the "convenience" factor and the psychological control of knowing just how powerful laziness and apathy can be in swaying people. We've seen it already over the last 20 years.

IBM in 1981 didn't really take personal computers seriously. This was to the benefit of everyone but themselves. They would never have produced an easily cloneable mainframe machine. No way. Those were 'real computers' and the company's bread-and-butter.

For the same occasion... anyone had a look at the results of PCjam? https://pcjam.gitlab.io/

Not all of these are new, but there's some neat stuff in there - although at least three of these don't quite run properly (or at all) on the original hardware. 😉