Yet another origin of "personal computer"

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1 total messages Started by brown jonathan%e.mfenet Thu, 07 Nov 1985 19:25

#1420

Author: brown jonathan%e.mfenet
Date: Thu, 07 Nov 1985 19:25

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There has been a number of claims as to who originated the term
"personal computer."  The following is an excerpt from an interview
with Alan Kay by Kevin Strehlo, which appeared in Computer Currents,
The Bay Area's Own Computer Newsmagazine, Third Year, Number 11,
page 37:
 
     Strehlo: What's the impact of IBM being so important in
              personal computing?
 
     Kay:     I think there are two things to think about.  One
              is that they haven't made a personal computer yet.
-->           I was the one who made up the phrase personal computer,       <--
              and they haven't made one.  One of our tests for
              whether a machine is a personal computer is whether
              people would be willing to do anything so mundane as
              to put their grocery list on it.
 
Also in this interview, Alan talks about Project Bivarium.  He envisions
building animal-like creatures that you send on missions, such as finding
information out of a network.  Perhaps one of his creatures will stumble
upon this message someday.
 
                               Jonathan Brown
                  "brown jonathan%cma.mfenet"@lll-mfe.arpa

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