What Makes a PC? Thoughts on Computing Platforms, Standards, and Compatibility
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Addressing computing platforms as negotiable constellations of producer and user norms, not rigid standards, we can broaden the historiography of personal computing geographically and culturally.
[1] 88 Most notably through the thinly veiled totalitarian references in the iconic Macintosh launch advertisement (1984). More subtly, "Think Different" (1997–2002) plays on IBM's venerable corporate motto "THINK!"
[2] "The legal/technical acrobatics of the reverse-engineering process involved are elegantly summarized in P. Ceruzzi," A History of Modern Computing, MIT Press, 2003, pp. 277–280.
[3] For instance: G. Laing, Digital Retro, Ilex, 2004, pp. 6–7, 186.
[4] M. Campbell-Kelly and W. Aspray, Computer: A History of the Information Machine, Westview, 2004, pp. 121–122.
[5] See for instance the threefold division of "Low cost," "Medium-priced," and "Business" in H. Varley and I. Graham, The Personal Computer Handbook, Pan, 1983, pp. 182–187.
[6] B. Bagnall, On the Edge: The Spectacular Rise and Fall of Commodore, Variant, 2005.
[7] Ibid., p. 152; L. Haddon, "The Home Computer: The Making of a Consumer Electronic," Science as Culture, vol. 2, 1988, pp. 7–51.
Index Terms:
personal computing; microcomputing; PC; Macintosh; standards; compatibility
Citation:
James Sumner, "What Makes a PC? Thoughts on Computing Platforms, Standards, and Compatibility," IEEE Annals of the History of Computing, vol. 29, no. 2, pp. 88, 87, Apr.-June 2007, doi:10.1109/MAHC.2007.30
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