The Coleco Adam

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Hello, everyone.

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Hello to our friend, the computer.

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My name's Ana, and I am Camila.

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Hi. Thanks.

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Should we?

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Yeah.

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I mean, you know, we've been trying
to work out what our little tagline is.

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I made a new alteration to it.

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We explore niche computer histories

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focusing on society
and politics and alternative narratives

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to the popular story about the evolution
of computers and the World Wide Web.

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So the thing I changed is that normally
we say we focus on non-U.S

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centric stories, but today is a U.S.

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centric story.

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So I just removed it so that could

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we have to do an alteration
for every single episode,

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because I feel like
they're going to be quite veried.

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But before we start,
we have really fun news.

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We're now a sister project of the Media
Archeology

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Lab at the University of Colorado
at Boulder. Yay!

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Queue confetti, confetti, confetti.

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We're very excited.

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Founded in 2009 by Dr.

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Lori Emmerson,
the Media Archeology Lab is a place

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for cross-disciplinary experimental
research, teaching and creative practice,

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using one of the largest collections
in the world of still functioning media.

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They're our dream collaborators.

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So smart, so fun.

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I'm excited.

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I'm excited for the future.

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Yeah, I'm really excited
and everyone over there seems really nice.

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Yeah, I can't wait to kind of,
like, build it with them.

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Yeah, we're so brainstorming
and kind of working out

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how this partnership will look,
but we're just very grateful

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that it will allow us to keep making
this podcast for you and to sort of expand

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our research further and keep going.

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And yeah, so be great.

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I have this dream of going to Colorado
and doing like

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we got to do it or something with like
maybe the material that they have

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or the things that they have in the lab
or with some of the people working there.

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Yeah, last time I went to London

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and we went on excursions
and this time you can come to the U.S.

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and we can go on vacation here. Yeah.

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So tell me about the research
that you have made for this episode.

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I want to know.

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So it's accidentally
really long, and I'm sorry.

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I mean, I

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look, I was doing episodes about hypertext
and still doing them,

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but I got really excited
about your microcomputer

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Apple Clone

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episode, and I started to look at home
computers, early home computers,

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and I discovered this
like the seed of this idea

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through the previous episode we did
about the neighbor network in Canada.

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And I saw it was really funny
and I wanted to do it.

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There's something in this story
about like,

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you know, like the how the way we position
computers, like having changed

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so of computer as tech object versus game

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or toy
business computers versus home computers.

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And just kind of those early days where
we were navigating what our relationship

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to computers is and the role
that computers were to play in our lives

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and the way that is reflected
or was reflected in the market.

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Yeah, I think even in the last episode
we kind of talked a little bit

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about the launch of the first Mac
and how that was the failure to Apple

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and that relationship
between having a home computer

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as either a toy or something

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that is more practical was like that
line was very ambiguous in the early days.

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And I mean, still is, but now
we're sort of used to that ambiguity.

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Whereas before, in terms of it being sold
as a product, it wasn't that didn't help.

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I mean, even early home computers
that weren't necessarily made for games

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or entertainment purposes,
but just introduced lots of new designs

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or ones that would do many diversions
to initiate new systems

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would largely be dismissed as toys,
even though they weren't, you know,

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gaming computers.

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So the early home computing period
had this very popular affiliation

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with seeing computers
as toys in one way or another.

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Yeah.

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And I mean, it does totally come from

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video game consoles
like the late seventies, early eighties.

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Like that was the like video
or like computer thing

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that was marketed to the home versus

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there was like this real distinction
between home market and business market.

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Yeah.

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And so when you write it, like when there
was that shift into computer computers

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moving into the home, the only other
real experience of technology

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of that sort of technology in the home
was television and video games

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As we sort of navigated
while a computer was in the home.

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They were kind of
our only example was to that point.

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Yeah, because early, early computers were

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you would have to navigate them with

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command lines
and you'd have to use a terminal

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and you'd essentially
have to be a programmer

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and have some kind of like basic knowledge

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of programing
to be able to use early computers.

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So once that was taken away,
like with the first Mac

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hobbyists that were used to computers,
saw that as a toy

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because you weren't able to program on it

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and you weren't able to like compile
files.

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It was just like too easy and dumb to use.

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So that was their definition
of like a toy computer.

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And I think these early, like
the computer's just before that moment,

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which is what we're looking at.

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They had programing capabilities
with basic, but it was

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it was simple programing.

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It was that shift from like like they
they also just had

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like a writing program on start up.

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So it is sort of that moment

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where it shifts between
and we'll look at we'll look at that.

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So we previously had this episode
about the Neighbor network in Canada.

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This was an early computer network
that was really focused on gaming.

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It ran through a cable TV network
and was kind of

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the first online subscription streaming
service for games.

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I was going to say that it was like
Netflix before games, but now that Fox

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is moving into the subscription
gaming market a little bit.

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So really, I like that.

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Yeah, I feel like it just goes to show
that everything sort of ends up

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full circle. Yeah.

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So the hardware system used for gaming on
this network

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was the Calico Vision
video game system from the company.

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Calico.

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Calico was originally set in the thirties
and the name was an abbreviation

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of the Connecticut Leather Company
through various company

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acquisitions that moved into plastic goods
and swimming pool manufacturing.

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And by the eighties, it was a company
focused on children's toys.

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It had begun making small, handheld
electronic games

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in the seventies
and a console pong style game.

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But by the early eighties,
it had developed the Coleco vision system.

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This was released in 1982
and came bundled with the first home

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version of Donkey Kong, which gave it a
like a really big sales boost.

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It also boasted arcade level graphics,
which was which was much better

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than the Atari 2600,
which was also popular at the time.

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So this was a really interesting time
for Calico.

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The calico vision was selling pretty well,

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but 1983 brought the start of the video
game crash the video game recession On,

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which lasted from 83 to 85, largely
in just in North America.

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And while they were actually riding
this wave reasonably well,

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they were looking for ways
to both branch out from gaming

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and sort of also use what they had with
the calico vision to create a new product.

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They did this in two ways.

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One was that they started making Cabbage
Patch Kids.

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But you as you don't know what a Cabbage

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Patch kid is, no Cabbage Patch Kids,
come on.

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It's like

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they're these like dolls that kind of,
like, pudgy, cute dolls.

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And I didn't grow up with them,
but I was, like, aware of them.

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And they I

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think there's, like, this whole story
where they just, like,

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a grown from cabbages
and then the farmers take them

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and then you can adopt them and you get,
you get like a little adoption

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certificate or something.

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I think that's I think that's the story

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they look like
because I've probably seen them.

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I mean, I think over the years
they changed what they were made of,

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but I feel like they have
maybe a hard head and a soft body

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and they've got like chubby cheeks

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and they're in like rompers.

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That's hilarious.

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Oh, yeah, I've seen them,
but I've never seen one IRL.

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I've never seen one.

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And it's true environment.

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They're cute.

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Yeah, but they became super, super, super,
super popular.

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It was like a wild market.

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In 1984,
they sold 20 million Cabbage Patch Kids.

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There were even Cabbage Patch riots

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where parents got into violent fights
in retail stores trying to get all that.

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The only like the next toy that had
that happen was the Tickle Me Elmo.

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This is like the precursor to that market,
that toy market.

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So they were doing this on one side.

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They, like got the rights from
whoever made them originally.

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And this was their big thing,
making a lot of money.

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But on the other side of that business,
they had this calico Vision

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gaming console.

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So what they decided to do was to adapt
this as a way of entering

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the hot
new speculative space of home computers.

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And this computer
would be called the Calico Atom.

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It was sold as a standalone system, but
also as an expansion of the calico vision.

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So if you already had it,
you could get like a smaller version

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of the computer
that clicks in to your video game system.

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Okay. Yeah,

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it's funny

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talking about the like the name of Calico

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and the fact that it came out of the name,
what was it, Connecticut Leather.

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Leather. Yeah,
Connecticut Leather Company.

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And then it started doing like,
you know, synthetic products

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and plastic products and remember,

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we talked about like the name of Silicon
Valley and sort of how that came about

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and how it was literally
just like built on the fact

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that it was a chip manufacturing space
and yeah, yeah.

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So this also kind of like
has a connection to a plastic,

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you know, it's got that
like plastic background connection,

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but it's not
because it's been making chips,

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it's because it's been making toys
and then it's been making computers.

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Yeah, yeah. No, you're right.

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So that's quite funny.

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But it already has the kind of plastic
like heritage in a way

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that the Calico Adam
I think is a really funny name

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because it's like the first man,
like the first computer or something.

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And it's also,
I think, interesting to think about.

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Like to me, when I first had this story,
the the Cabbage Patch

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Kid Dolls
and the computer seemed so different.

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But there is, I think, something in
because because I think that's like

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the Cabbage Patch dolls.

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It's also a bit
like it's like birth creation.

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I mean, I don't know how they're
conceived, but like immaculate conception.

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I don't know what happens
in the Cabbage Patch, but

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there's something in those
in those kind of two figures as well.

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Yeah, like the Garden of Earthly Delights
was just,

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oh, patches.

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So they had these two things going
on, the dolls on the computer.

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Michael Bay,
who works for NABU in Canada, is quoted

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in an Ottawa Rewind article
as saying to the calico suits

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the atom and the Cabbage Patch
doll with the same thing, just sausage.

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So essentially they were building
the next stage of that business.

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And these are there to like big bets,
but like,

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what's the, you know, their products,
their products, What's the difference?

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You know, just sort of just product,
just sausage.

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So this computer,
it was going to be a game changer.

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It was a full home
computer system that cost around $600

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or about $1,350 today.

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It included 60 4K ram,
a tape drive, a keyboard

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games and software
and a letter quality daisy real printer.

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This was the first computer printer bundle
and the price at the time

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was about the same as like the cheapest
letter quality printer on its own.

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Nice. I want it already.

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That's not a bad price.

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Apparently the box was really, really big
and really, really heavy

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because it just included everything
in the same boat. Yeah.

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The smart

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ride of printer could work
as an electronic typewriter,

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which was like,
you know, a normal typewriter

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where you type letters
and they printed as you type them.

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Or the atom also had word
processing software.

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So it would, as you're typing,

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it would save your work
and then print when you were finished.

236
00:13:33,612 --> 00:13:36,916
So the clicker atom was introduced
in the same year as the Cabbage

237
00:13:36,916 --> 00:13:40,519
Patch Kids. It was announced in June 1983

238
00:13:40,519 --> 00:13:44,223
at the Summer Consumer
Electronics Show in Las Vegas.

239
00:13:44,290 --> 00:13:47,226
They were promising
so much of this computer

240
00:13:47,226 --> 00:13:50,462
that at this point
it was still a prototype.

241
00:13:50,529 --> 00:13:53,632
The computers that they had
at the Consumer Electronics

242
00:13:53,632 --> 00:13:56,635
Show were handmade
and not all the parts worked.

243
00:13:56,802 --> 00:14:01,974
So they employed a tricky trick,
which was to put them behind tinted glass

244
00:14:02,041 --> 00:14:05,611
so that you weren't able to fully
see the hand, hold edges

245
00:14:05,611 --> 00:14:08,981
and not actually look able
to work the machines.

246
00:14:09,048 --> 00:14:10,983
I'm going to use that trick for things.

247
00:14:10,983 --> 00:14:12,651
Yeah, I'm not finished.

248
00:14:12,651 --> 00:14:16,121
They were tinted, tinted glass,

249
00:14:16,222 --> 00:14:18,224
Kasey, anything can touch it.

250
00:14:18,224 --> 00:14:23,963
But it's just that just me testing of it,
they were really confident.

251
00:14:24,063 --> 00:14:26,799
Another quote from Michael Bay,
the sausage guy

252
00:14:26,799 --> 00:14:30,536
said at the CBS show in Vegas

253
00:14:30,536 --> 00:14:35,107
in the summer of 83, Kaleka had
one of those three story pavillion booths.

254
00:14:35,174 --> 00:14:36,308
They were pushing the atom

255
00:14:36,308 --> 00:14:39,645
as the most sophisticated headed home
computer ever created.

256
00:14:39,645 --> 00:14:42,948
And their spokesman made that point
by climbing up on the podium

257
00:14:43,148 --> 00:14:48,487
and taking each of the competitors units
and into an Atari 2600 r a Sega,

258
00:14:48,554 --> 00:14:53,158
and he'd stick it in a toilet
with a flushing sound effect.

259
00:14:53,225 --> 00:14:56,662
And a quote from an exec at the time said,

260
00:14:56,762 --> 00:15:00,966
We move with blinding speed.

261
00:15:01,066 --> 00:15:03,869
They were really, really selling this guy.

262
00:15:03,869 --> 00:15:05,037
Yeah.

263
00:15:05,037 --> 00:15:08,474
This announcement kind of sent
the industry into a bit of a spin.

264
00:15:08,607 --> 00:15:12,278
Other companies like IBM and smaller
companies started to develop

265
00:15:12,278 --> 00:15:16,649
cheaper home computer models and computer
printer bundles.

266
00:15:16,715 --> 00:15:20,819
But the atom should
have been first to market.

267
00:15:20,886 --> 00:15:21,620
However, yeah,

268
00:15:21,620 --> 00:15:24,623
I mean,
it sounds like they were pretty confident,

269
00:15:24,723 --> 00:15:28,661
you know, from the quotes that you took
and also just from the name like

270
00:15:28,727 --> 00:15:34,033
insinuating the first man that
they would be the first one on the market,

271
00:15:34,099 --> 00:15:37,336
I would guess from the product name, that

272
00:15:37,436 --> 00:15:40,172
that was their whole marketing strategy.

273
00:15:40,172 --> 00:15:42,608
Like the fact that it's like the first,
you know,

274
00:15:42,608 --> 00:15:46,679
the first computer, the first man,
and that just the whole business model

275
00:15:46,679 --> 00:15:50,983
was that everything will go well
as long as they are the first to come.

276
00:15:51,050 --> 00:15:54,053
I could imagine
they would push this regardless

277
00:15:54,053 --> 00:15:57,690
of like good quality,
especially when their prototype

278
00:15:57,690 --> 00:16:02,928
was so underdeveloped that they had
to, like, put it behind tinted glass

279
00:16:03,128 --> 00:16:07,967
and still want people to charge what,
a grand and 300 for it.

280
00:16:08,200 --> 00:16:11,971
Yeah, I guess it was Calico at the time.

281
00:16:11,971 --> 00:16:16,675
There was like the business
computer market, which was more expensive

282
00:16:16,742 --> 00:16:19,979
and this was kind of the start of the
home computer market.

283
00:16:19,979 --> 00:16:21,580
So the

284
00:16:21,647 --> 00:16:22,247
you know, and they

285
00:16:22,247 --> 00:16:25,284
were already in the house
with the calico vision.

286
00:16:25,317 --> 00:16:28,220
So it seemed like an easy thing
to sort of shift

287
00:16:28,220 --> 00:16:32,191
those customers into the home
computer market.

288
00:16:32,191 --> 00:16:35,861
And it was I think it was largely

289
00:16:35,961 --> 00:16:41,633
advertised to teenage boys
and like their dads.

290
00:16:41,700 --> 00:16:44,403
And it was a lot to do with homework.

291
00:16:44,403 --> 00:16:46,605
A lot of the
I watched some of the ads on YouTube.

292
00:16:46,605 --> 00:16:49,775
It was like a lot about like
getting my homework done in time,

293
00:16:49,975 --> 00:16:51,643
you know, that kind of thing.

294
00:16:51,643 --> 00:16:54,213
Interesting. Yeah. Gamify homework. Yeah.

295
00:16:54,213 --> 00:16:55,180
Yeah.

296
00:16:55,180 --> 00:16:59,084
So the first item was released
in October 83,

297
00:16:59,084 --> 00:17:02,087
but pretty much straightaway
started having issues.

298
00:17:02,254 --> 00:17:05,991
The main problem was that the printer
wasn't reliably working.

299
00:17:06,091 --> 00:17:10,763
This was not just an issue of a lack of
printing capability, but for some reason

300
00:17:10,863 --> 00:17:15,000
the power supply for the entire computer
system ran through the printer.

301
00:17:15,000 --> 00:17:18,971
So if the printer didn't work,
the computer didn't work. Hmm.

302
00:17:19,038 --> 00:17:20,339
It was also having issues

303
00:17:20,339 --> 00:17:21,206
like it would start

304
00:17:21,206 --> 00:17:25,577
printing letters on a slant, so you'd have
to send the printer off for repairs.

305
00:17:25,577 --> 00:17:28,247
And in the meantime,
you couldn't use the computer.

306
00:17:28,247 --> 00:17:31,083
Oh, Adam had bad handwriting.

307
00:17:31,083 --> 00:17:33,819
Oh. Oh,

308
00:17:33,886 --> 00:17:38,991
no. Very good homework, then. No.

309
00:17:39,091 --> 00:17:43,362
So they had to temporarily
stop production to fix this.

310
00:17:43,429 --> 00:17:45,864
But there were many other issues, too.

311
00:17:45,864 --> 00:17:48,367
One of these was a power surge
that would happen

312
00:17:48,367 --> 00:17:49,802
when you turn the system on.

313
00:17:49,802 --> 00:17:52,171
And if you had a software
cartridge in the machine,

314
00:17:52,171 --> 00:17:55,941
which they called a digital data pack,
it could potentially ruin it.

315
00:17:55,941 --> 00:17:59,645
It would like erase it could erase
the content you'd been working on.

316
00:17:59,711 --> 00:18:02,981
But the manual that came with the Adam,
I believe,

317
00:18:02,981 --> 00:18:06,652
actually instructed the user to have
the software cartridge in the machine.

318
00:18:06,652 --> 00:18:07,719
When you turned it on.

319
00:18:07,719 --> 00:18:11,190
So the manual was confusing,
just giving wrong information.

320
00:18:11,190 --> 00:18:12,224
Yeah. Uh huh.

321
00:18:12,224 --> 00:18:16,395
Adam's for return at a higher rate
than all the other comparable computers

322
00:18:16,395 --> 00:18:17,162
at the time.

323
00:18:17,162 --> 00:18:20,165
Some stores reported that
five of every six were returned

324
00:18:20,165 --> 00:18:25,404
for technical problems, and returns
ended up costing Calico over $100 million.

325
00:18:25,471 --> 00:18:27,539
Jesus.

326
00:18:27,539 --> 00:18:29,041
Jesus. Adam.

327
00:18:29,041 --> 00:18:30,008
Jesus, Adam.

328
00:18:30,008 --> 00:18:33,412
To me, this feels a little like a failed
Kickstarter campaign or something.

329
00:18:33,412 --> 00:18:35,080
Like they announced in June.

330
00:18:35,080 --> 00:18:38,150
They got preorders,
started shipping in October.

331
00:18:38,150 --> 00:18:39,685
Immediately had to stop.

332
00:18:39,685 --> 00:18:44,990
Yeah, it sounds like a classic Kickstarter
Fyre Festival situation.

333
00:18:45,090 --> 00:18:45,591
They all do this.

334
00:18:45,591 --> 00:18:48,594
Adam and all I got
was this really bad cheese sandwich.

335
00:18:48,760 --> 00:18:49,895
Yeah, where am I?

336
00:18:49,895 --> 00:18:54,500
So, I mean, Cabbage Patch Kids.

337
00:18:54,600 --> 00:18:55,934
There's an article in Atari

338
00:18:55,934 --> 00:18:59,972
magazine
from the time that said, in August 1983,

339
00:19:00,005 --> 00:19:04,076
Greenberg claimed Coleco would ship
half a million atoms by Christmas.

340
00:19:04,143 --> 00:19:06,678
Then the deadline started slipping by.

341
00:19:06,678 --> 00:19:09,114
He said they would begin shipping
September 1st, then

342
00:19:09,114 --> 00:19:12,618
September 15th,
then October 1st and October 15th.

343
00:19:12,718 --> 00:19:14,453
They'd leaves fell. On November came.

344
00:19:14,453 --> 00:19:17,456
Pinkerton did not return
and the atom did not ship.

345
00:19:17,589 --> 00:19:21,293
Is Pinkerton
is that a madame Butterfly reference?

346
00:19:21,393 --> 00:19:23,162
No idea. Yeah.

347
00:19:23,162 --> 00:19:28,934
So this continued so much that they missed
the entire 1983 Christmas buying season.

348
00:19:29,034 --> 00:19:34,373
In 1984, they were forced
to drop the prices to under $500.

349
00:19:34,473 --> 00:19:38,310
They also began
including an incentive of a $500 college

350
00:19:38,310 --> 00:19:40,412
scholarship bundled into each purchase,

351
00:19:40,412 --> 00:19:44,650
which would pay out $125
for each completed year of college.

352
00:19:44,716 --> 00:19:45,817
That's so crazy, isn't it?

353
00:19:45,817 --> 00:19:49,555
Sometimes you're reminded of like,
how Christmas is such a deadline

354
00:19:49,555 --> 00:19:53,859
for businesses, and if they don't hit
that deadline, they are just going to go

355
00:19:53,926 --> 00:19:55,360
possibly bankrupt.

356
00:19:55,360 --> 00:19:59,298
Like there's so much revenue
pressure on Christmas.

357
00:19:59,298 --> 00:20:02,167
I mean, it's such an obvious thing to say,
but it's just. Yes.

358
00:20:02,167 --> 00:20:06,371
Sometimes I'm reminded by how just like
capital is just like turned due

359
00:20:06,371 --> 00:20:10,309
to like this Christmas deadline
constantly over and over again every year.

360
00:20:10,342 --> 00:20:14,246
I mean, even I've been feeling that
like I was going to I have like

361
00:20:14,246 --> 00:20:17,816
some prints that I've made recently
and I was like, Oh, I'll sell them.

362
00:20:17,816 --> 00:20:20,152
And it's like 3rd of December.

363
00:20:20,152 --> 00:20:23,956
And I'm thinking if I,
if I won't be able to do it this weekend,

364
00:20:23,956 --> 00:20:28,060
like if I do it next week,
is that enough time to ship?

365
00:20:28,126 --> 00:20:29,127
Have I left it too late?

366
00:20:29,127 --> 00:20:31,163
Should I just hold off and do it later?

367
00:20:31,163 --> 00:20:32,965
Like after Christmas? It's hard.

368
00:20:32,965 --> 00:20:34,633
Yeah. Yeah, it's hard. Yeah.

369
00:20:34,633 --> 00:20:37,636
And then also, obviously
because like it is

370
00:20:37,803 --> 00:20:41,273
in so many places, people
just take time off for Christmas as well.

371
00:20:41,273 --> 00:20:46,144
So there's going to be a delay
in procurement if you don't get it in time

372
00:20:46,144 --> 00:20:47,746
for Christmas or before Christmas.

373
00:20:47,746 --> 00:20:49,982
So yeah, got stressful.

374
00:20:49,982 --> 00:20:50,749
So the clicker.

375
00:20:50,749 --> 00:20:55,220
Adam ran software by two cassette players
in 1983.

376
00:20:55,220 --> 00:20:55,954
Most games in

377
00:20:55,954 --> 00:20:59,858
software were on cassette, but by the time
the item was being shipped,

378
00:20:59,925 --> 00:21:04,162
the floppy disc had started to come in
and quickly superseded the cassette.

379
00:21:04,263 --> 00:21:09,067
Part of The Joy of the Atom was that
because it included a click vision system

380
00:21:09,134 --> 00:21:12,971
or an upgraded or existing one,
you could play games on it as well.

381
00:21:13,038 --> 00:21:17,175
But outside of clicker
vision specific games, only around 40

382
00:21:17,175 --> 00:21:20,512
games were published for the Atom cassette
and there was some like,

383
00:21:20,612 --> 00:21:25,083
you know, not going to super go into it,
but there was sort of a lot of control and

384
00:21:25,083 --> 00:21:28,587
restriction that they had on manufacturers

385
00:21:28,754 --> 00:21:31,990
of software for the Calico Atom,

386
00:21:32,090 --> 00:21:37,129
where they would make them sign
really intense contracts.

387
00:21:37,129 --> 00:21:42,000
And if Calico didn't like the software,
they would make them destroy it all.

388
00:21:42,000 --> 00:21:46,004
And like, it was sort of
I think that's what restricted the

389
00:21:46,104 --> 00:21:48,607
the software of the game, right?

390
00:21:48,607 --> 00:21:49,775
Yeah.

391
00:21:49,775 --> 00:21:54,613
So the Cabbage Patch kids were the thing
keeping Calico afloat.

392
00:21:54,680 --> 00:22:00,652
Well, so is there like an association
with Sour Patch kids here?

393
00:22:00,686 --> 00:22:05,057
Because I don't really understand,
like, these U.S.

394
00:22:05,223 --> 00:22:07,859
cultural references.

395
00:22:07,859 --> 00:22:08,460
I did.

396
00:22:08,460 --> 00:22:10,829
I did
look this up because I was intrigued.

397
00:22:10,829 --> 00:22:12,130
I hadn't really thought about.

398
00:22:12,130 --> 00:22:15,200
I see them as different things that like

399
00:22:15,300 --> 00:22:18,570
I always thought
Sour Patch Kids is such a strange name.

400
00:22:18,570 --> 00:22:19,104
It is.

401
00:22:19,104 --> 00:22:20,038
And then to hear it in

402
00:22:20,038 --> 00:22:23,975
this context is like maybe
there is like some story behind this.

403
00:22:23,975 --> 00:22:27,446
Well, the Cabbage Patch kids are a toy
in the Sour Patch.

404
00:22:27,446 --> 00:22:30,248
Kids are a sour candy.

405
00:22:30,248 --> 00:22:33,485
But I looked it up
because I had like it is weird

406
00:22:33,518 --> 00:22:38,557
that they have the same style of name,
but apparently the Sour Patch kids in like

407
00:22:38,557 --> 00:22:42,661
the seventies were called Mars Men
because I guess they look like aliens

408
00:22:42,661 --> 00:22:43,261
or something.

409
00:22:43,261 --> 00:22:48,333
And there was like this whole interest
in space and exploring Mars.

410
00:22:48,400 --> 00:22:51,303
But then when the Cabbage Patch Kids
craze happened

411
00:22:51,303 --> 00:22:54,272
in the eighties,
they just decided to change their name.

412
00:22:54,272 --> 00:23:00,312
So there's not like a connection, but
they did steal the name from the garage.

413
00:23:00,379 --> 00:23:01,413
Just kind of like.

414
00:23:01,413 --> 00:23:03,715
Right, that phrase. Yeah.

415
00:23:03,715 --> 00:23:05,617
Yeah. Interesting.

416
00:23:05,617 --> 00:23:09,888
So they were still doing really, really
well with the Cabbage Patch Kids and,

417
00:23:09,988 --> 00:23:10,689
you know, an L.A.

418
00:23:10,689 --> 00:23:15,360
Times article from 1985
said that the games and clickers,

419
00:23:15,360 --> 00:23:19,264
while conventional toys have become
minor items in comparison to the Cabbage

420
00:23:19,264 --> 00:23:23,301
Patch Kid dolls and related items
which Calico said accounted

421
00:23:23,301 --> 00:23:27,873
for more than 500 million of its estimated
$800 million in revenue.

422
00:23:27,873 --> 00:23:33,011
In 1984, The New York Times
estimated that that that was one

423
00:23:33,011 --> 00:23:37,349
for every child between ages three
and eight in the United States and Canada.

424
00:23:37,416 --> 00:23:40,786
So they're lucky
that they have the cabbage patch.

425
00:23:40,786 --> 00:23:45,757
Yeah, right there is saving the whole tech
industry back then.

426
00:23:45,824 --> 00:23:48,093
Yeah, at least little kids.

427
00:23:48,093 --> 00:23:52,197
So at the same time
as this Cabbage Patch Kids boom,

428
00:23:52,264 --> 00:23:57,402
there was talk of the death of the home
computer industry in January 1985.

429
00:23:57,402 --> 00:24:00,739
Kaleka is president and Chief
executive Officer Arnold C.

430
00:24:00,772 --> 00:24:03,241
Greenberg,
who we heard from earlier, said,

431
00:24:03,241 --> 00:24:06,678
We continue to believe that
the home computer explosion will happen.

432
00:24:06,778 --> 00:24:09,548
The most exciting
part of the industry is yet ahead.

433
00:24:09,548 --> 00:24:13,385
But as is the case in most industries
in the early days, there can be confusion

434
00:24:13,385 --> 00:24:18,123
over technology and overproduction
that can produce chaos in the marketplace.

435
00:24:18,190 --> 00:24:22,093
Texas Instruments, Mattel and Timex
had already gone out of the home

436
00:24:22,093 --> 00:24:23,295
computer business.

437
00:24:23,295 --> 00:24:27,499
Calico, Atari and Commodore were left
at the lower price point.

438
00:24:27,599 --> 00:24:32,270
Consumers seemed more interested
in more complex machines like the IBM

439
00:24:32,270 --> 00:24:36,808
PC Junior, which was announced in late
1983 after the atom.

440
00:24:36,808 --> 00:24:39,911
But by this point
it would come a lot cheaper.

441
00:24:39,911 --> 00:24:41,780
So I was like, That was under $1,000.

442
00:24:41,780 --> 00:24:44,983
And there was sort of in a similar market
price point.

443
00:24:44,983 --> 00:24:48,887
I really like this quote
from a New York Times article from 1985.

444
00:24:48,987 --> 00:24:51,990
The enthusiasm just exceeded the reality.

445
00:24:52,123 --> 00:24:55,927
The first question people asked about home
computers is, Do I need it?

446
00:24:55,927 --> 00:24:59,297
And a lot of companies
just didn't have an answer. Yes.

447
00:24:59,297 --> 00:25:02,000
So is that I think part of like home
computers or what?

448
00:25:02,000 --> 00:25:03,001
What's the point?

449
00:25:03,001 --> 00:25:08,340
Just like in the last episode, I feel like
there was a very similar emotion

450
00:25:08,340 --> 00:25:14,112
running through over at Apple headquarters
at the same time when the campaigns

451
00:25:14,112 --> 00:25:18,216
really hyped everyone up in the industry
and then suddenly there was burnout.

452
00:25:18,283 --> 00:25:22,654
And yeah, it didn't really like the kind
of hyping up of this product

453
00:25:22,654 --> 00:25:28,693
never really correlated with what people
had felt or needed, like the buyers.

454
00:25:28,793 --> 00:25:30,061
And that's why I think

455
00:25:30,061 --> 00:25:34,866
these endeavors
were before like microcomputer boom.

456
00:25:34,866 --> 00:25:38,770
It was mostly a success
when they were introduced by the state

457
00:25:38,870 --> 00:25:42,173
rather than by like private companies,
because people were introduced to them

458
00:25:42,173 --> 00:25:48,013
as something that they could kind of opt
in with no major consequences.

459
00:25:48,013 --> 00:25:53,852
And it was more of a choice rather
than something that was like necessary.

460
00:25:53,919 --> 00:25:56,454
And it just kind of like was there to,

461
00:25:56,454 --> 00:25:59,457
you know, make life easier, like
public transport and things like that.

462
00:25:59,457 --> 00:26:02,160
And there was just like no major risk.

463
00:26:02,160 --> 00:26:05,430
Are you talking about like when
when we were doing our video techs.

464
00:26:05,430 --> 00:26:09,034
Video techs, Yeah. Episodes. Yeah. Yeah.

465
00:26:09,167 --> 00:26:09,634
So yeah.

466
00:26:09,634 --> 00:26:13,438
And, but then once like private companies
start introducing

467
00:26:13,505 --> 00:26:16,775
tech, it's
more of like they'll start marketing it

468
00:26:16,775 --> 00:26:20,579
as a thing that people need to be able
to run more

469
00:26:20,579 --> 00:26:25,183
successful businesses
or to have happier kids or smarter kids.

470
00:26:25,250 --> 00:26:27,152
And that pressure is suddenly there.

471
00:26:27,152 --> 00:26:31,389
So when you used a computer
for the first time

472
00:26:31,456 --> 00:26:33,858
with these kind of states product,

473
00:26:33,858 --> 00:26:37,629
it's like the pre network computers
that we talked about,

474
00:26:37,629 --> 00:26:42,100
like mid-table and, and presto,
your expectations were really that high.

475
00:26:42,100 --> 00:26:45,236
And it wasn't because it just wasn't
a necessary purchase.

476
00:26:45,236 --> 00:26:46,204
You're totally right.

477
00:26:46,204 --> 00:26:49,441
Like when I was researching this,
there was a lot of kind of discussion

478
00:26:49,608 --> 00:26:52,978
in that era around what software

479
00:26:52,978 --> 00:26:55,981
people could possibly need for the home.

480
00:26:56,214 --> 00:26:59,684
I just didn't know because for businesses
you can be like, okay, I need budgeting,

481
00:26:59,684 --> 00:27:01,353
I need whatever, whatever.

482
00:27:01,353 --> 00:27:02,954
But for the home, it's like,

483
00:27:02,954 --> 00:27:06,524
well, what what are you doing in the home
that you need a computer for?

484
00:27:06,758 --> 00:27:10,195
But you're right
that like those video tech systems

485
00:27:10,195 --> 00:27:14,332
were just kind of digitizing things
that people did like to connect

486
00:27:14,332 --> 00:27:17,802
with the state or to connect
with like the bank and things like that.

487
00:27:17,869 --> 00:27:22,440
But this is like individual software
that you use for your own stuff.

488
00:27:22,440 --> 00:27:24,676
It's not necessarily like networked.

489
00:27:24,676 --> 00:27:27,212
Yeah, yeah.
You're not connected to the Internet.

490
00:27:27,212 --> 00:27:31,883
You're you're like,
How can I type up my know my recipes

491
00:27:31,916 --> 00:27:37,689
or my Christmas cards as opposed to like,
how can I buy train tickets?

492
00:27:37,856 --> 00:27:40,158
Exactly. Yeah. Yeah.

493
00:27:40,158 --> 00:27:45,664
In January 1985, Calico discontinued
the atom and left the computer business.

494
00:27:45,664 --> 00:27:50,235
They had sold less than 400,000 atoms
in the 18 months of its life.

495
00:27:50,335 --> 00:27:54,639
It was hoped that by dropping the failing
atom and focusing on the Calico vision

496
00:27:54,639 --> 00:27:57,042
game system and the Cabbage Patch kids,

497
00:27:57,042 --> 00:27:59,844
that the company
would finally be profitable again.

498
00:27:59,844 --> 00:28:03,515
But after a difficult 1985,
they discontinued the Calico

499
00:28:03,515 --> 00:28:07,118
Vision system in October
and it was too little, too late.

500
00:28:07,118 --> 00:28:10,321
And Calico filed for bankruptcy in 1988.

501
00:28:10,388 --> 00:28:14,259
Really, even with the Cabbage Patch Kids.

502
00:28:14,325 --> 00:28:16,361
Wow, that's sad.

503
00:28:16,361 --> 00:28:19,064
And they'd been around
for some of the kids.

504
00:28:19,064 --> 00:28:22,033
Yeah. Yeah, totally.

505
00:28:22,033 --> 00:28:26,004
Like, went through this huge evolution
and then some me as soon as like,

506
00:28:26,137 --> 00:28:31,976
oversaturation of the tech industry came
about, it just like got knocked over. Wow.

507
00:28:32,043 --> 00:28:35,246
Something I found interesting
was that there's like $500 college

508
00:28:35,246 --> 00:28:37,682
scholarship vouchers
that were given away with the atom.

509
00:28:37,682 --> 00:28:40,285
It seems like they never paid out on them.

510
00:28:40,285 --> 00:28:41,853
They closed before people could cash in.

511
00:28:41,853 --> 00:28:43,054
I found a comment

512
00:28:43,054 --> 00:28:47,225
from someone on like a blog post
that said the selling point for the system

513
00:28:47,225 --> 00:28:50,995
was the $500 college scholarship
that was being given away by Calico.

514
00:28:50,995 --> 00:28:53,898
When you purchase one of these,
I've never seen a dime of that.

515
00:28:53,898 --> 00:28:59,037
And then like dollar signs,
I remember being some type of class action

516
00:28:59,037 --> 00:29:02,941
suit over it at some point,
but it's hard to get blood from a stone.

517
00:29:03,007 --> 00:29:06,478
Yeah, people must have been mad
because it was only a couple of years

518
00:29:06,478 --> 00:29:08,046
later that they folded.

519
00:29:08,046 --> 00:29:11,282
Oh my God. Angry parents as well.

520
00:29:11,349 --> 00:29:12,517
Because of the advertising.

521
00:29:12,517 --> 00:29:15,386
Because it was looking often
looking at like helping

522
00:29:15,386 --> 00:29:17,789
your kids do homework
or do better at school.

523
00:29:17,789 --> 00:29:20,258
So, like, that's why
they bundled the college scholarship.

524
00:29:20,258 --> 00:29:24,562
So it's like, we'll help you now
and we'll help you in college.

525
00:29:24,662 --> 00:29:25,096
Yeah.

526
00:29:25,096 --> 00:29:28,666
And then they they did neither.

527
00:29:28,767 --> 00:29:30,568
There were a lot of great lines
in news articles

528
00:29:30,568 --> 00:29:34,639
from the time two of my favorites
were from Atari magazine.

529
00:29:34,739 --> 00:29:38,076
The atom seems to have fallen from the
Got It without even

530
00:29:38,076 --> 00:29:43,448
getting a bite out of apple
or a kiss from Eve

531
00:29:43,515 --> 00:29:47,118
that left the people unsatisfied.

532
00:29:47,218 --> 00:29:50,989
Yeah, and there was one from a Washington
Post article about the impact of Adams

533
00:29:50,989 --> 00:29:52,724
failure on Calico stuck.

534
00:29:52,724 --> 00:29:55,593
The Bears were yelling that the atom bomb
was going

535
00:29:55,593 --> 00:30:00,165
to make coleslaw of the cat
out of the cabbage patch.

536
00:30:00,265 --> 00:30:01,733
Well, I don't really.

537
00:30:01,733 --> 00:30:07,705
I don't get the is there is the like and
the bears and the the bears and the bulls.

538
00:30:07,772 --> 00:30:11,509
One of them is like people
that like a bearish market

539
00:30:11,509 --> 00:30:16,314
or a bullish market with stock market
actually like a bearish market is one

540
00:30:16,314 --> 00:30:21,486
where like you're not buying much like
you're being a little conservative.

541
00:30:21,719 --> 00:30:25,156
But then a bullish market
is when you're like

542
00:30:25,323 --> 00:30:28,259
buying lots of stock
and feeling really good about it.

543
00:30:28,259 --> 00:30:32,263
So it's like the Bears were
yelling at the atom bomb.

544
00:30:32,363 --> 00:30:34,866
Like the atom,

545
00:30:34,866 --> 00:30:37,869
Yeah, is going to make this

546
00:30:38,069 --> 00:30:39,470
cabbage patch.

547
00:30:39,470 --> 00:30:40,638
It's really good.

548
00:30:40,638 --> 00:30:43,374
Like, oh they said yeah.

549
00:30:43,374 --> 00:30:46,177
So I all these analogies

550
00:30:46,177 --> 00:30:49,180
and like you know that the right
I was so proud of themselves.

551
00:30:49,380 --> 00:30:50,081
Yeah.

552
00:30:50,081 --> 00:30:53,685
There's like three puns in there

553
00:30:53,785 --> 00:30:56,855
while Calico
blame the atom for their downfall.

554
00:30:56,855 --> 00:30:57,188
Really.

555
00:30:57,188 --> 00:31:00,992
It was a mix of the 1983 video game crash
and what could be seen

556
00:31:00,992 --> 00:31:04,262
as a home computer crash in 1985.

557
00:31:04,329 --> 00:31:08,132
A Washington Post article from June of
that year titled Computer Industry

558
00:31:08,132 --> 00:31:13,504
Slump is Broad, Deep Details
Mass layoffs and losses of flat profits

559
00:31:13,504 --> 00:31:17,408
at many companies,
including Apple, Intel and IBM.

560
00:31:17,475 --> 00:31:19,410
This extended across the industry.

561
00:31:19,410 --> 00:31:24,148
A quote from that article
says Some experts argue that the computer

562
00:31:24,148 --> 00:31:28,286
slump reflects a fundamental change
in the industry, that the pace of new

563
00:31:28,286 --> 00:31:32,757
computer technology has been too fast
for America's industries to absorb that.

564
00:31:32,757 --> 00:31:36,294
The hardware and software
to link computers into productive networks

565
00:31:36,294 --> 00:31:39,330
has been too slow in coming,
and that personal computers

566
00:31:39,330 --> 00:31:43,968
can't deliver the power and performance
that produces have promised.

567
00:31:44,068 --> 00:31:45,169
And that's sort of interesting.

568
00:31:45,169 --> 00:31:48,239
You know, like the atom could have been,
I think

569
00:31:48,239 --> 00:31:51,843
if it had worked,
it would have given home.

570
00:31:52,043 --> 00:31:56,581
Home users
the computer that they wanted and needed.

571
00:31:56,581 --> 00:32:00,785
But the technical errors
made it impossible to use.

572
00:32:00,852 --> 00:32:05,523
And so it never got past
like one year of of production.

573
00:32:05,757 --> 00:32:06,391
Yeah. No.

574
00:32:06,391 --> 00:32:10,061
When you talked about the kind
of capabilities of the atom computer

575
00:32:10,061 --> 00:32:15,033
and the kind of possibilities in what
it was marketed by, I it was very like,

576
00:32:15,233 --> 00:32:20,371
I sound great and it sounded fun
and it sounded like cheap and easy to use.

577
00:32:20,371 --> 00:32:22,307
And they knew their market.

578
00:32:22,307 --> 00:32:25,510
They'd be in the home
for a really long time.

579
00:32:25,510 --> 00:32:30,815
And I think, you know, the of Vision was
like, we're going to give you everything.

580
00:32:30,882 --> 00:32:33,151
And it
was because it came with like gaming.

581
00:32:33,151 --> 00:32:36,120
If you didn't have a calico vision,
the atom was like

582
00:32:36,354 --> 00:32:40,992
it had joysticks, it had a keyboard.

583
00:32:41,059 --> 00:32:45,563
It came with games and then it also came
with like word processing software.

584
00:32:45,630 --> 00:32:47,398
So, so cool.

585
00:32:47,398 --> 00:32:47,765
Yeah.

586
00:32:47,765 --> 00:32:50,835
I want to see one face to face,
first of all,

587
00:32:50,835 --> 00:32:54,439
to come face to face with an atom
with an atom.

588
00:32:54,539 --> 00:32:56,641
So contributing to this home

589
00:32:56,641 --> 00:33:00,945
computer slump was oversupply,
oversaturation of the industry

590
00:33:00,945 --> 00:33:04,782
and a strong US dollar,
which led to more imports.

591
00:33:04,849 --> 00:33:07,085
The home computer crash
also eventually extended

592
00:33:07,085 --> 00:33:11,356
overseas, such as PRISM R, X and Claire
and ACORN in the UK, all going under.

593
00:33:11,356 --> 00:33:12,991
In 1985.

594
00:33:12,991 --> 00:33:16,761
A report from 1985 said that in 1983,

595
00:33:16,761 --> 00:33:20,531
worldwide sales of personal computers
increased 76%.

596
00:33:20,598 --> 00:33:23,568
But in 1984 the increase was only 19%.

597
00:33:23,568 --> 00:33:29,540
And in 1985, analysts were predicting
that sales growth would slow to about 4%.

598
00:33:29,640 --> 00:33:33,544
The number of American computer
makers had declined from over 150

599
00:33:33,544 --> 00:33:38,750
to about 40, with a similar drop
among software developers.

600
00:33:38,850 --> 00:33:41,552
So for me, this story brings up
two things.

601
00:33:41,552 --> 00:33:43,021
One is the question of

602
00:33:43,021 --> 00:33:46,924
what is a toy, what is a computer
and who is being marketed, those things.

603
00:33:46,991 --> 00:33:50,395
And then also like this
history of the discovery of

604
00:33:50,395 --> 00:33:53,498
what is the role of a computer
in the household?

605
00:33:53,664 --> 00:33:57,502
Yeah, it was a very messy realization.

606
00:33:57,502 --> 00:34:00,071
I mean, not even realization
because I don't think we've fully

607
00:34:00,071 --> 00:34:05,710
come to realize the role of it yet,
or whether there are lines to be drawn

608
00:34:05,710 --> 00:34:09,380
between the kind of
what are the boundaries we need to

609
00:34:09,447 --> 00:34:13,718
and as well, or just like the kind of
whether it should be like,

610
00:34:13,718 --> 00:34:15,153
you know, an entertainment system

611
00:34:15,153 --> 00:34:18,189
or whether it should be something
that we should be working on.

612
00:34:18,189 --> 00:34:21,426
Because the fact that it's
like the same hardware that we use

613
00:34:21,426 --> 00:34:24,529
for both purposes, it makes us work

614
00:34:24,662 --> 00:34:28,599
more for less,
which is problematic, obviously.

615
00:34:28,599 --> 00:34:34,172
But yeah, I mean, it's also really funny
because profit making companies,

616
00:34:34,338 --> 00:34:37,341
they tend to blur the lines of products

617
00:34:37,442 --> 00:34:41,813
for fun into necessary products,

618
00:34:41,913 --> 00:34:45,550
basically
just for the expansion of of capital.

619
00:34:45,550 --> 00:34:50,188
And there simply are risks, risk factors

620
00:34:50,188 --> 00:34:54,759
that occur when that happens
because it's also an obscuring of reality.

621
00:34:54,759 --> 00:34:58,529
It's a lie when like, when
like a company tells you that you need

622
00:34:58,529 --> 00:35:03,301
this in your home, when actually you
you just can have it in your home.

623
00:35:03,367 --> 00:35:05,136
Yeah, it's not true.

624
00:35:05,136 --> 00:35:08,139
So yeah,
and I don't really know where I'm putting

625
00:35:08,306 --> 00:35:12,043
what we're saying with this,
like with the eighties is that kind of

626
00:35:12,143 --> 00:35:17,448
how do we move, how to, how to market is
find a way to make it unnecessary.

627
00:35:17,448 --> 00:35:17,682
Yeah.

628
00:35:17,682 --> 00:35:22,820
I think to have in the home
and they were trying different things

629
00:35:22,920 --> 00:35:25,490
they didn't know what would hit

630
00:35:25,490 --> 00:35:28,493
on the first point
about like the toy stuff.

631
00:35:28,593 --> 00:35:32,864
I found this quote in the Washington
Post article from 85 that said

632
00:35:32,964 --> 00:35:35,700
this was not
an area toy companies should have been in.

633
00:35:35,700 --> 00:35:39,604
In retrospect and now the last toy company
is out of the game.

634
00:35:39,670 --> 00:35:41,706
When you come up with a $500 item

635
00:35:41,706 --> 00:35:45,643
or even a $250 item,
you move beyond the realm of toys.

636
00:35:45,710 --> 00:35:50,948
These were toy companies playing
in the area known as consumer electronics,

637
00:35:51,015 --> 00:35:53,751
because there were so many
that a lot of like

638
00:35:53,751 --> 00:35:55,853
toy companies that were starting to make.

639
00:35:55,853 --> 00:35:59,690
But like I say, like this,
you know, the evolution for Calico

640
00:35:59,724 --> 00:36:03,961
is that they were making handheld
like single game

641
00:36:03,961 --> 00:36:10,368
things like machines in the seventies,
they made a pong style console,

642
00:36:10,468 --> 00:36:13,271
then they made the click of vision,
then they made the atom.

643
00:36:13,271 --> 00:36:17,141
And that what they were doing with
that was bringing arcade style games

644
00:36:17,141 --> 00:36:20,478
which were really popular into the home.

645
00:36:20,578 --> 00:36:24,015
And so it's not so much of a leap for like

646
00:36:24,015 --> 00:36:27,685
I can see now what they were trying to do
with, the atom, you know.

647
00:36:27,685 --> 00:36:30,922
So I think to say like they were,
you know, playing

648
00:36:30,922 --> 00:36:33,991
in a different feel
like they shouldn't have been doing that.

649
00:36:33,991 --> 00:36:35,927
Like, no,
because it made sense at the time.

650
00:36:35,927 --> 00:36:36,961
I mean, in

651
00:36:36,961 --> 00:36:41,599
I guess it's like it didn't work out,
but why didn't it work out for sure?

652
00:36:41,766 --> 00:36:44,936
And then also, yeah,
like my second point about that,

653
00:36:44,936 --> 00:36:47,939
people just didn't
know what the home computer would have.

654
00:36:48,072 --> 00:36:51,375
And this was like limiting
the software that was being produced,

655
00:36:51,475 --> 00:36:55,012
which limited amount of people
that wanted it in their home.

656
00:36:55,112 --> 00:37:00,184
It's really funny to read back articles
from that time, from the mid eighties

657
00:37:00,184 --> 00:37:04,255
that are basically like,
I don't understand this computer thing.

658
00:37:04,322 --> 00:37:05,489
I found this car.

659
00:37:05,489 --> 00:37:08,659
I found this article from the Australian
Financial Review

660
00:37:08,759 --> 00:37:12,263
from 1985, though
they reprinted it in like recent years

661
00:37:12,263 --> 00:37:16,634
because they were doing a series
of like revisiting funny old articles.

662
00:37:16,734 --> 00:37:19,136
The reality
is that while personal computers

663
00:37:19,136 --> 00:37:21,672
can take away
much of the drudgery of office work,

664
00:37:21,672 --> 00:37:25,309
there is little application
for them in the home except as an adjunct

665
00:37:25,309 --> 00:37:28,312
to business or for computer hobbyists.

666
00:37:28,379 --> 00:37:31,549
There is little advantage
in storing recipes on a floppy disk.

667
00:37:31,582 --> 00:37:35,419
The average person does not write
enough letters to justify the cost,

668
00:37:35,519 --> 00:37:38,623
and the person who cannot balance
his checkbook with a calculator

669
00:37:38,623 --> 00:37:41,959
and pencil is unlikely
to be able to do so on a computer.

670
00:37:42,126 --> 00:37:43,928
But they did know about logs.

671
00:37:43,928 --> 00:37:47,031
That's why I get all my rescues from 1995.

672
00:37:47,031 --> 00:37:50,768
Yeah,

673
00:37:50,835 --> 00:37:53,371
and it was a quote from Dave Norman

674
00:37:53,371 --> 00:37:57,708
who owned like a large chain
of computer stores called Business Land.

675
00:37:57,808 --> 00:38:00,311
Where is he really to To Don

676
00:38:00,311 --> 00:38:03,481
Norman,
who is the first Unix designer ever?

677
00:38:03,481 --> 00:38:06,651
I, I don't think so. I did look it up.

678
00:38:06,651 --> 00:38:11,289
I couldn't find any evidence of it,
but Business Land did do a deal

679
00:38:11,289 --> 00:38:16,727
with Steve Jobs at some point
to, like, have an Apple computer

680
00:38:16,827 --> 00:38:20,131
only sold through their stores.

681
00:38:20,364 --> 00:38:23,934
So there's some pictures of Steve Jobs
and Dave

682
00:38:23,934 --> 00:38:27,138
Noonan and Dave
sorry Dave and Dave Norman.

683
00:38:27,138 --> 00:38:29,573
Yeah together.

684
00:38:29,573 --> 00:38:35,112
But I don't I guess
like normal kind of a normal name hahaha.

685
00:38:35,212 --> 00:38:39,350
The he was on his on this episode of a TV
show called The Computer Chronicles

686
00:38:39,350 --> 00:38:40,084
and they did like a

687
00:38:40,084 --> 00:38:44,288
double episode in the eighties
about the slowdown of the industry.

688
00:38:44,355 --> 00:38:48,793
And he said he was asked about
like home computers because he mostly did.

689
00:38:48,893 --> 00:38:50,528
You know, he was his local business land.

690
00:38:50,528 --> 00:38:52,863
You must have business computers.

691
00:38:52,863 --> 00:38:56,167
And he said, well,
we have never really been in the home

692
00:38:56,400 --> 00:38:59,236
marketplace
and I have trouble understanding it.

693
00:38:59,236 --> 00:39:01,639
I guess my first response is
I really don't

694
00:39:01,639 --> 00:39:04,809
see at this point where there's value
to buy a computer for the home.

695
00:39:04,809 --> 00:39:07,345
In all honesty,
it suddenly isn't worthwhile

696
00:39:07,345 --> 00:39:10,781
putting your menus in a computer,
the home, and doing your budgeting.

697
00:39:10,781 --> 00:39:12,850
I don't think it's there yet.

698
00:39:12,850 --> 00:39:15,953
And then, yeah, there was in that show,
there was also some discussion around

699
00:39:15,953 --> 00:39:17,388
like what use is it?

700
00:39:17,388 --> 00:39:21,025
And it was like it's full work, like,
you know, work

701
00:39:21,025 --> 00:39:24,395
that you don't finish at your job
and you want to finish it at home.

702
00:39:24,395 --> 00:39:29,300
It's for work from home, which they said
was basically like your side hustle.

703
00:39:29,500 --> 00:39:30,801
Yeah, yeah, it was home.

704
00:39:30,801 --> 00:39:35,239
But yeah, children doing that
I but also it's just like,

705
00:39:35,239 --> 00:39:39,910
well, once the World Wide Web came about,
it just changed everything.

706
00:39:39,910 --> 00:39:43,447
It changed
the placement of computers forever.

707
00:39:43,647 --> 00:39:46,650
Like I can imagine,
I would have probably maybe

708
00:39:46,650 --> 00:39:51,222
had similar thoughts to if I,
if I lived before,

709
00:39:51,322 --> 00:39:55,593
you know, 1991 or whatever,
when the World Wide Web was invented.

710
00:39:55,659 --> 00:39:59,263
And it was about like video techs,
the video techs that works

711
00:39:59,363 --> 00:40:02,500
like those computers or those terminals,
like the first time

712
00:40:02,500 --> 00:40:04,935
people were using things like,
yeah, for sure.

713
00:40:04,935 --> 00:40:09,440
But again, those were like mainly
subsidized, but they were networked.

714
00:40:09,573 --> 00:40:11,609
Yeah, that's when it's useful. Yeah.

715
00:40:11,609 --> 00:40:11,976
Yeah.

716
00:40:11,976 --> 00:40:17,381
This is interesting that it's like the
you get the computer first in this case

717
00:40:17,448 --> 00:40:20,551
and then you get the internet later
and you get that reality.

718
00:40:20,551 --> 00:40:23,354
Yeah, I talk further home
particularly, you know.

719
00:40:23,354 --> 00:40:26,791
But you know, obviously
all this was figured out in the end is I

720
00:40:26,791 --> 00:40:31,395
look at you on my computer and we're
recording this focus across two countries.

721
00:40:31,395 --> 00:40:35,566
I've got two computers in front of me. So

722
00:40:35,666 --> 00:40:36,400
what occurred in

723
00:40:36,400 --> 00:40:40,171
1985 was
sort of a consolidation of the market.

724
00:40:40,171 --> 00:40:44,341
You know, we ended up with instead of all
of these different companies trying stuff

725
00:40:44,341 --> 00:40:47,745
out, we ended up with large companies
like IBM, Apple,

726
00:40:47,845 --> 00:40:50,848
who had previously been mostly
in the business sector.

727
00:40:51,015 --> 00:40:53,551
And then they started taking up
a much larger percent of the home

728
00:40:53,551 --> 00:40:54,685
computer sector.

729
00:40:54,685 --> 00:40:59,957
Yeah, I have this silly sentiment
deep inside me that believes in

730
00:41:00,057 --> 00:41:03,394
like underdog products,
especially in tech.

731
00:41:03,461 --> 00:41:06,697
And I mean, obviously that's just
why we're doing this, this upset.

732
00:41:06,697 --> 00:41:09,867
I'm sure you can relate,
but I have this Google phone

733
00:41:09,867 --> 00:41:12,870
that I've had for years
and it's really bad.

734
00:41:12,870 --> 00:41:17,575
And but I don't want to like I don't want
to give in to buying an iPhone

735
00:41:17,575 --> 00:41:20,945
just because for some reason in my head,

736
00:41:20,945 --> 00:41:23,948
I think that me having this Google phone

737
00:41:24,048 --> 00:41:29,420
is helping like maintain
the kind of variety of phones,

738
00:41:29,420 --> 00:41:33,257
but that's just like completely untrue
because it's a Google phone.

739
00:41:33,257 --> 00:41:36,627
Like it's good to variety
but variety from what?

740
00:41:36,627 --> 00:41:38,395
Like Apple, from Google?

741
00:41:38,395 --> 00:41:43,167
Yeah, I don't know it's sad that are like
inner need for encouraging diversity

742
00:41:43,167 --> 00:41:47,238
I guess has been quenched
by not only a limited options

743
00:41:47,238 --> 00:41:52,243
but the ones that only consist
of multinational enterprises.

744
00:41:52,343 --> 00:41:55,813
Yeah and it's like it ends up
becoming this like one size fits

745
00:41:55,813 --> 00:41:59,850
all situation as opposed to kind of a,

746
00:41:59,917 --> 00:42:04,855
yeah, personalized experience of the
technological world and you know I'm

747
00:42:04,922 --> 00:42:08,792
yeah like they even think about phones
and how many different phones that were

748
00:42:08,792 --> 00:42:13,764
and how what phone you had like
your Motorola Razr or your Nokia

749
00:42:13,797 --> 00:42:18,969
whatever was a different like different
personalities had different phones.

750
00:42:19,069 --> 00:42:20,104
It's a little sad.

751
00:42:20,104 --> 00:42:23,541
You're right to think that like I'm
an Apple phone person

752
00:42:23,541 --> 00:42:27,545
and it's just like, okay,
when can I afford a new one?

753
00:42:27,611 --> 00:42:30,247
But it's all the same.

754
00:42:30,314 --> 00:42:31,849
It's all the same thing, you know?

755
00:42:31,849 --> 00:42:35,653
And I think for the large part, I think
it's because, you know, because of this

756
00:42:35,653 --> 00:42:40,391
tech industry recession
that you talked about in in 85, it's

757
00:42:40,491 --> 00:42:43,661
there was a consolidation
of the market afterwards.

758
00:42:43,761 --> 00:42:47,031
It meant that only some companies
were able to survive.

759
00:42:47,231 --> 00:42:51,101
I want to know if there was like a mobile
phone.

760
00:42:51,168 --> 00:42:53,404
Recessions, recessions.

761
00:42:53,404 --> 00:42:56,073
Because I'm thinking about
like when there were a bunch of different

762
00:42:56,073 --> 00:42:59,476
phones and even,
you know, like you could buy ringtones.

763
00:42:59,476 --> 00:43:03,147
And there were so many ads for that
because the thing is, with this 85

764
00:43:03,213 --> 00:43:06,717
recession,
it wasn't just the computer makers.

765
00:43:06,717 --> 00:43:07,718
It was like the chip

766
00:43:07,718 --> 00:43:11,622
makers and the, you know, the software
makers like everything was affected.

767
00:43:11,722 --> 00:43:16,660
So I guess, like maybe when the iPhone
came in other oh, even like M.P.

768
00:43:16,660 --> 00:43:18,095
three players before the

769
00:43:18,095 --> 00:43:22,566
like iPod iPhone came
in, there was so many different sorts.

770
00:43:22,633 --> 00:43:23,334
Yeah.

771
00:43:23,334 --> 00:43:26,837
And then when it starts consolidating
and we start just

772
00:43:26,837 --> 00:43:31,542
having one or two big companies
making the main phones

773
00:43:31,609 --> 00:43:34,745
and they have control over what
the ringtones are,

774
00:43:34,778 --> 00:43:38,882
what the, you know,
we lose all of that other stuff around it.

775
00:43:38,882 --> 00:43:39,183
Yeah.

776
00:43:39,183 --> 00:43:43,687
All the other businesses that were
popping up to kind of support phone users.

777
00:43:43,787 --> 00:43:44,922
Yeah. Interesting. Yeah.

778
00:43:44,922 --> 00:43:49,293
I wonder if there was a phone dip
from the flip phone phone.

779
00:43:49,293 --> 00:43:52,663
Flip dick? Mm hmm. Yeah.

780
00:43:52,763 --> 00:43:53,864
Yeah. That was the end.

781
00:43:53,864 --> 00:43:54,431
That was the idea.

782
00:43:54,431 --> 00:43:59,536
Calico As for video games, which had
seriously slowed down in the U.S.

783
00:43:59,536 --> 00:44:03,273
of the 83 crash, they came back
with a vengeance with the introduction

784
00:44:03,273 --> 00:44:06,777
of the Nintendo entertainment system
in 1985.

785
00:44:06,844 --> 00:44:10,981
And for Cabbage Patch Kids, Hasbro
took over their rights in 1988

786
00:44:10,981 --> 00:44:14,752
after the Coleco bankruptcy,
and they've continued to be produced

787
00:44:14,752 --> 00:44:19,256
under various companies to this day
a.k.a Sour Patch Kids.

788
00:44:19,323 --> 00:44:22,726
Different things.

789
00:44:22,826 --> 00:44:24,995
I'm kidding.

790
00:44:24,995 --> 00:44:26,497
I I'm kidding.

791
00:44:26,497 --> 00:44:28,999
I've learned a lot from you.

792
00:44:28,999 --> 00:44:31,602
If the only thing you learned from
this episode is the differences.

793
00:44:31,602 --> 00:44:34,171
So Cabbage Patch Kids. Oh, we have.

794
00:44:34,171 --> 00:44:36,306
We still do. Still didn't get that.

795
00:44:36,306 --> 00:44:39,677
But I understood everything
else, you know, that was so cool.

796
00:44:39,710 --> 00:44:41,045
Fun little story.

797
00:44:41,045 --> 00:44:42,680
I wish our computers were just toys.

798
00:44:42,680 --> 00:44:44,248
At the end of the day, not stupid.

799
00:44:44,248 --> 00:44:48,085
Like vessels of work and depression.

800
00:44:48,185 --> 00:44:50,421
Are you okay?

801
00:44:50,421 --> 00:44:50,821
Yeah.

802
00:44:50,821 --> 00:44:53,390
This is definitely like, brighten my mood.

803
00:44:53,390 --> 00:44:55,893
The full story. Thanks for sharing that.

804
00:44:55,893 --> 00:44:58,862
Thanks for your contributions
and listening.

805
00:44:58,862 --> 00:45:01,565
I'm just so intrigued about computers.

806
00:45:01,565 --> 00:45:03,000
Like we're so used to them now,

807
00:45:03,000 --> 00:45:05,436
but when they first came out
it was like, Well, what were they?

808
00:45:05,436 --> 00:45:06,870
How do we market them? What?

809
00:45:06,870 --> 00:45:09,573
Who's it for? Who's going to use them?

810
00:45:09,573 --> 00:45:13,343
I'm just I would be so intrigued to know
what if all the

811
00:45:13,544 --> 00:45:17,748
if the the home computer slowed down in 85

812
00:45:17,748 --> 00:45:21,552
and that all the technical issues
hadn't happened.

813
00:45:21,652 --> 00:45:24,655
Like what would that
what would the atom have led to?

814
00:45:24,822 --> 00:45:28,192
This is a very I mean, I would have
definitely bought one, that's for sure.

815
00:45:28,292 --> 00:45:30,394
Yeah. Yeah.
I would have thought it was really cool.

816
00:45:30,394 --> 00:45:31,495
I would've thought the printer was cool.

817
00:45:31,495 --> 00:45:34,398
Apparently the printer was really loud,
like crazy loud.

818
00:45:34,398 --> 00:45:39,870
The people would put, like,
towels and blankets over it to stuff it.

819
00:45:39,937 --> 00:45:41,171
It was really slow.

820
00:45:41,171 --> 00:45:45,242
I mean, it's kind of a cool
and a risky endeavor

821
00:45:45,242 --> 00:45:48,712
to do by a toy
company is to build like a computer,

822
00:45:48,812 --> 00:45:51,348
like imagine all the money
and time and labor

823
00:45:51,348 --> 00:45:54,918
and like knowledge you have to implement
to make a system like that.

824
00:45:54,918 --> 00:45:59,690
That's kind of turning like perhaps
a New York Times system into a computer.

825
00:45:59,790 --> 00:46:02,626
Exactly. But yeah, awesome.
Thank you so much.

826
00:46:02,626 --> 00:46:03,794
Thank you.

827
00:46:03,794 --> 00:46:07,798
Maybe we'll do a little we'll do a little
special over the holidays.

828
00:46:07,798 --> 00:46:11,335
Maybe we'll find some Christmas
related topic.

829
00:46:11,401 --> 00:46:12,703
A Christmas computer.

830
00:46:12,703 --> 00:46:15,272
Not the atom, though. Baby
Jesus. Computer.

831
00:46:15,272 --> 00:46:17,841
All right. Bye bye.