Computer stories

January 4, 2018

Comment from E-mail

I just read all the emails posted on your site. They got me in the mood to send one too. In 1983 I bought and Apple ][e. A great machine, and I still have it! It still works! When I started college in 1982 the Physics department had four black apples made by Bell and Howell. We used them for tutorials and to do homework on. That’s what convinced me to get an Apple in ’83. I used the machine all through collage, and several other students did too. Not many people had a computer at school in those days. I used to write programs that would do calculations for me and also plotting programs to print out my results from labs and stuff. They were good times. That’s when I realized I loved computers because they are really flexible tools that you could program to do things for you! In 1989 I started work for the U.S.Army. at FT. Monmouth. We did most of our work on PCs, but we did our graphics work on Macs. It wasn’t long before I fell in love with the elegance and simplicity of the Macs. I didn’t need to know about its guts to get it to work for me! By that time I was programming on the PC all the time at work. A few years later my “future” wife bought me a Powerbook 100. I loved it, and still do! It is so neat being able to play on the computer where ever you want! Right before my wife and I got married, she asked my if it was alright if she didn’t like computers. (she used PCs before) I said sure! no problem! Then I bought a PowerMac 6100/av I still have that one too. That’s the main machine we all use. My wife looked at me do things with it for a few months. Get on the internet, write letters, record video clips, make HyperCard stacks, etc. She now is a happy Mac user! She loves it. Funny, she still hates computers though. Gee, this letter is real long. Sorry. I’ll finish this up as quick as I can. My little girl told me when she was three that she wanted a “pink ‘puter”. She must have got a hold of someone at Apple, a few months later the fruity colored iMacs arrived. Both my children love the ‘puter these days, and I think they have more software than I do. The girl is now 4 and the boy is 3. Thanks for starting a company that makes great computers. Jeff D.

Woz

I’m glad to be a ‘collection point’ for all these lifetime computer stories like yours. I have to share a secret. My wife uses and lives on her computer but she really doesn’t like them either. I get to spend all the time it takes to make things work.