🚀 go-pugleaf

The Great Secret behind the success of minicomputers (and now
microcomputers), is the discretionary spending limit.

Many people are allowed to authorize purchases that are below a
certain limit. Above that, the purchase must be first reported up
through official channels for review.  So, back in the minicomputer
days, DEC found a lot of (say) $15,000 upgrades purchased as two
$8,000 upgrades, simply because the customer's discretionary limit
was $9,999. And some PDP's snuck in as "programmed data processors"
(no kidding).

Many early microsystems were semiworthless toys, incapable of solving
the purchaser's problem. However, the total purchase was below just
about everyone's discretionary spending limits. Even if management
had forbidden computer purchases, the things snuck in as "office
equipment" or "word processors".

This is where today's industry came from. Believe it.
-- 
Don		D.C.Lindsay 	Carnegie Mellon Computer Science