What would the 1950s think of 2013

[hobbsyoyo]

Sure, I take it that these are monitors that provide access to some gigantic mainframe rather than "microcomputers" as those of us who lived through the 80s think of them. But the form factor, and mode of interaction, are what make them so strikingly familiar, at least in my opinion. Where the guts of the machine are located is arguably less significant.

Yeah they could be just terminals, but I don't remember them ever being explicitly presented as that. And when you get down to it, with so much computation being done in the 'cloud' these days, we're in a way going back to the old terminal-mainframe dynamic. In any case the Star Trek computers could do things that computers of the time simply couldn't, which is an important distinction.

 

[ls612]

Here's what I think a 1950's time traveler would say/think.

1. "What do you mean, I can't smoke here?"
2. "You mean we forgot how to be capitalists?"
3. "What?! People cohabitate without getting married?"
4. "Really? This little pad can give me all of the world's data? Why do you use it then to look at those pictures?"
5. "There's a game called Civilization, where you get your own little nation??"

(sorry, couldn't resist the last one)

 

[Traitorfish]

"You mean we forgot how to be capitalists?"

Compared to the 1950s, we (as in the, the West generally) have lower taxes, weaker unions, weaker anti-trust laws, a smaller public sector and less private-sector regulation. If anything, the last sixty years have been spent remembering how to be capitalists.

 

[Cutlass]

Here's what I think a 1950's time traveler would say/think.

1. "What do you mean, I can't smoke here?"
2. "You mean we forgot how to be capitalists?"
3. "What?! People cohabitate without getting married?"
4. "Really? This little pad can give me all of the world's data? Why do you use it then to look at those pictures?"
5. "There's a game called Civilization, where you get your own little nation??"

(sorry, couldn't resist the last one)

The second is wrong. They would instead say

1. "You mean we forgot how to keep capitalists on a leash?"

 

[Carras Dad]

Back then it still was also more about the guys beyond the technology - the geniuses - than just the technology, wasn't it? These people could be superstars. Imagine that nowadays. Superstars. Though given, that trend already was going downhill in 1912. Big Company and increasingly even media and so on.

well, we reached a point where groundbreaking inventions arent made by some guy in his garage anymore, because some guy in his garage doesnt have the ressources to make a groundbreaking invention at all.

you cant market a team as a genius.

 

[ls612]

well, we reached a point where groundbreaking inventions arent made by some guy in his garage anymore, because some guy in his garage doesnt have the ressources to make a groundbreaking invention at all.

You should tell that to Bill Gates.

 

[hobbsyoyo]

well, we reached a point where groundbreaking inventions arent made by some guy in his garage anymore, because some guy in his garage doesnt have the ressources to make a groundbreaking invention at all.

you cant market a team as a genius.

It many areas I'd agree with you and by-and-large we're heading in the direction you've outlined. However, for inventions that are purely software, one guy in a basement can figure it out all on his lonesome.

 

[ParkCungHee]

On the other hand, the extent to which discoveries in the past were actually made by lone geniuses in the past has been greatly exaggerated.

Edison being a wonderful example of this.

 

[Birdjaguar]

If our 1950s person was an investor, he would be impressed by the the stock market. In 1950 the DJI was at 200. Today it is at 14,000.

 

[ace99]

If our 1950s person was an investor, he would be impressed by the the stock market. In 1950 the DJI was at 200. Today it is at 14,000.

I wonder what someone from the 1930's would think of that.

 

[Quackers]

Compared to the 1950s, we (as in the, the West generally) have lower taxes, weaker unions, weaker anti-trust laws, a smaller public sector and less private-sector regulation. If anything, the last sixty years have been spent remembering how to be capitalists.

Sauce please. Genuinely interested in this.

 

[Lord Baal]

You should tell that to Bill Gates.

The man who purchased his greatest "invention," MS-DOS, for $30,000 from a former IBM employee?

 

[Dachs]

Sauce please. Genuinely interested in this.

Wouldn't it be embarrassingly obvious in Britain, where the postwar consensus has been steadily dismantled for the past thirty years?

 

[Traitorfish]

Sauce please. Genuinely interested in this.

What kind of source, and on which topics? It's a pretty broad issue, so I'm not really sure how to respond without just dumping some generic overview of the last thirty-forty years, which seems a bit cheap.

 

[Quackers]

Well I don't know how it is"embarrassingly obvious" after all; i'm not sure how just living in britain makes it obvious?

No; I read it in newspapers all the freakin' time. The end of the kenyesian post war consensus the "neo-liberal" changes by Thatcher - but I've only ever heard rhetoric from idealogues from each side. I actually want some data, some facts and evidence.

 

[ls612]

The man who purchased his greatest "invention," MS-DOS, for $30,000 from a former IBM employee?

And then changed it and added stuff to it, along with others. He may not have done it alone, but by no means did he have the resources IBM or other corporations had at the time, which was what I think the OP's point on that was.

 

[Lord Baal]

And then changed it and added stuff to it, along with others. He may not have done it alone, but by no means did he have the resources IBM or other corporations had at the time, which was what I think the OP's point on that was.

Nobody had the resources of IBM. Bill Gates did, however, have a very wealthy father and a Harvard education when he founded MicroSoft. He also screwed his cancer-suffering business partner out of literally billions of dollars in the 1980s, before MicroSoft really took off. The dude was smart, but he was hardly Leonardo da Vinci, toiling away alone for weeks on end in his workshop, funded entirely by capricious noblemen.

 

[WindFish]

"Gay people can do what?"

then it would be followed by

"Sod it, we're moving to the USA because its like the land we used to know"

 

[ls612]

Nobody had the resources of IBM. Bill Gates did, however, have a very wealthy father and a Harvard education when he founded MicroSoft. He also screwed his cancer-suffering business partner out of literally billions of dollars in the 1980s, before MicroSoft really took off. The dude was smart, but he was hardly Leonardo da Vinci, toiling away alone for weeks on end in his workshop, funded entirely by capricious noblemen.

I don't ever remember comparing Gates to Da Vinci. And no one can do anything without some source of funds, be it from nobles, family members, or investors. And Gates also dropped out of Harvard.

 

[Cutlass]

I think the point is that Gates is neither an inventor nor innovator. He is an extremely successful businessman. But he himself invented no product or service.