[author : Marlin Ouverson] #Edito

Extract : «  This is the "Blue Period" volume.

Even the most casual observer of the microcomputer scene in 1982 knew the year belonged to IBM. It began with the Justice Department dropping a longstanding antitrust suit against "Big Blue" and ended with the computer newsweekly InfoWorld selecting IBM’s first personal computer as Product of the Year.

IBM had introduced the PC the preceding August and by January 1982 the entire microcomputer software industry was already in IBM’s long, blue shadow. By March the PC-compatible hardware products were multiplying. Before Christmas, IBM had driven a wedge between Microsoft and Digital Research, caused a half-year delay in the release of a new version of what had been the industry-standard operating system, and made Apple Computer, Inc. revamp its entire marketing strategy. In short, the billion-dollar multinational corporation, with firm notions of corporate secrecy and a reputation for letting other companies take innovative risks, made very big waves that year. Those waves altered an industry that had been created from nothing over the preceding decade by a bunch of hobbyists and wild-eyed dreamers accustomed to openly sharing technological ideas. [...]  »