e9 – Triumph of the Nerds, part 1

We embark on watching the classic PBS documentary mini-series Triumph of the Nerds. We learn a little we didn't know about the early history of Apple, get excited with Woz, and facepalm with Jobs over the many offensive things that got said and done in the computer industry 20+ years ago (and, sadly, still today).

Links for this episode:

• EV followup
  • Naev
  • Starsector
  • SpaceSimCentral
• shoutouts to other Apple history podcasts
  • Welcome to Macintosh
  • RetroMacCast
• Robert X. Cringely
  • aka Mark Stephens
  • InfoWorld also still using the name
  • Cringely's about page
  • dodgy claims
    • early Apple employee
    • Stanford PhD

Triumph of the Nerds

• watch episode 1 online [YouTube] [archive.org]
• Accidental Empires
• Revenge of the Nerds
• sequel: 2.0.1
• extended Jobs interview

Episode 1, scene by scene

• Paul Allen
  • Seattle Supersonics, Seahawks, Sounders
• Woz: No, Apple was not started in a garage
• Macintosh Color Classic
• Eudora chicken!
• Douglas Adams

I think a nerd is a person who uses the telephone to talk to other people about telephones. And a computer nerd therefore is somebody who uses a computer in order to use a computer.

• vacuum tubes to transistors to integrated circuits
• Grace Hopper
• Woz on Segway polo
• Intel museum (yes, located at their HQ!)
• Gordon Moore and his law
• MITS, creators of the Altair 8800
• Apple I, Apple II
• VisiCalc