George Morrow on software development: "Ninety percent of the software gets written in 10 percent of the time. The next 9.5 percent takes 90 percent of the time. The last one-half percent never gets done. But the software still gets sold."
Computer Chronicles Revisited
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"Computer Chronicles Revisited" is a monthly newsletter reviewing the people, products, and companies featured on the PBS series that aired from 1983 to 2002. Published by Deviled Egg Press. Edited by S.M. Oliva.
Florida appeals court sanctions attorney for filing two briefs with a combined 46 "hallucinated authorities" generated by AI. scholar.google.com/scholar_case...
scholar.google.com
I recently acquired this lot of manuals originally sold with a Morrow Micro Decision in April 1984. I know the date because one of the manuals still had a card (with a handwritten note) from the salesperson, along with a punched card for some reason. #retrocomputing
Founded in 1980, Software Publishing Corporation developed a series of low-cost office application programs under the "PFS" brand. I detailed SPC's history in a November 2025 podcast. You can read the full transcript here: www.computerchronicles.blog/transcript-a... #retrocomputing
The Apple IIGS can produce mind-boggling effects. The IIGS has become my new computer fascination. It's such an fascinating mix of specific audio and visuals bolted to a woefully slow processor.
Inviting an actual teenage software "pirate"--appearing under a pseudonym--to demonstrate how to commit software piracy while a lawyer for the Software Publishers Association watched is, quite possibly, the funniest thing Stewart Cheifet ever did. www.computerchronicles.blog/computer-chr...
Computer Chronicles Revisited 29 — Locksmith, PC-Talk, and Frankie Mouse
The Computer Chronicles discusses software piracy.
computerchronicles.blog
If you think getting a hold of RAM is difficult now, back in the 1970s you had to wander the streets at night looking for George Morrow and hoping he hadn't sold out of 8K boards. #retrocomputing
Lockard's story is incredible. He appeared on a 1987 "Computer Chronicles" to discuss turning his Mahjong Solitaire game into Activision's "Shanghai." www.computerchronicles.blog/computer-chr...
Computer Chronicles Revisited 99 — Shanghai, Tower of Myraglen, Earl Weaver Baseball, and Ferrari Formula One
The Computer Chronicles discusses computer games
computerchronicles.blog
martin pichlmair@martinpi.bsky.social · yesterdayThe original Mahjong Solitaire (Brodie Lockard, 1981) on the PLATO looked glorious. Also clever to show stack height with outline width.
"Computer Chronicles" opened season 7 looking at personal finance software, including Intuit's "Quicken" and MECA's "Andrew Tobias' Managing Your Money." Intuit would later consider buying MECA before instead acquiring ChipSoft, the makers of "TurboTax." www.computerchronicles.blog/computer-chr...
Computer Chronicles Revisited 136 — Quicken, On Balance, Dollars and Sense 5.0, MacMoney, and Andrew Tobias' Managing Your Money
The Computer Chronicles discusses personal finance software
computerchronicles.blog
Before there was "we need to invest all our resources in AI because of China," there was "we need to invest all our resources in AI because of Japan."
Just putting it out there that in 1803, the House of Representatives impeached a federal judge for being drunk and swearing on the bench, and the Senate removed him from office despite his lawyer trying to plead his client's diminished mental capacity as a defense.
The Equinox 100 was a microcomputer system released in 1977 by Parasitic Engineering of Albany, CA. Designed by Howard Fullmer and George Morrow, it came with an Intel 8080A CPU running at 2 MHz, a 20-slot S-100 bus, an Octal digit LED, and a 12-key pushbutton keyboard. #retrocomputing
When you asked for a copy of Microsoft BASIC but your parents could only afford the dollar-store knockoff...
Weird computer tech of the late 90s: thought-powered card games and holographic Quake through wireless 3D glasses. Computer Chronicles had the lowdown of the odder exhibits at CES 1997. #VideoBytes
Deborah Brecher, an early computer educator, warned in her 1985 text, "The Women's Computer Literacy Handbook," about the looming risks to personal privacy posed by companies selling "dossiers" or curated information profiles through on-line databases. www.computerchronicles.blog/computer-chr...
Some thoughts on the whole Mullenweg mess. It’s a bit early to say if there’s something underlying going on here, but the fact is, Automattic lost a lot of goodwill over the past two years. tedium.co/2026/09/10/m... new @tedium.co
Automattic Minus Matt: Mullenweg’s Forced Break
Matt Mullenweg just got suspended from Automattic, the company behind WordPress. Could that give WordPress room for a cultural reset?
tedium.co
"Why pay $1,999 for an Apple iPhone Duo when for just $1,795 you can walk home today with an Osborne-1 pre-loaded with a complete suite of office productivity software."
I recently acquired a copy of the Osborne Computer Corporation bankruptcy filings. This 128-page document includes a (failed) reorganization plan filed by several Osborne employees trying to save the company. I've made the full document available on IA. archive.org/details/in-r...
Osborne Computer Corporation Bankruptcy Filings
A set of filings related to the bankruptcy of Osborne Computer Corporation, including the First Amended Plan of Reorganization Proposed by Employee/Creditors, dated January 27, 1984, and related Discl...
archive.org
In 1985, Nat Goldhaber and Ed Zschau appeared in back-to-back episodes of "Computer Chronicles." Zschau was a congressman; Goldhaber ran a company that made a file-sharing system for the Mac. Both men share an odd distinction: They were unsuccessful candidates for the Reform Party VP nomination.
The best part of researching a historical Apple product is you also get to research all of the litigation surrounding that product.
Stewart Cheifet, the creator and longtime host of "Computer Chronicles," died at the end of 2025. Earlier this year I published a podcast detailing his life and career. You can read a transcript of that podcast here. www.computerchronicles.blog/transcript-r...
Transcript — Remembering Stewart Cheifet
Learn more about the life and career of the creator of Computer Chronicles
computerchronicles.blog
A footnote from this month's newsletter. Robert Flast was an American Express VP who pushed the company to install an expensive "expert system" to speed up credit transaction reviews. AI professor Ed Feigenbaum claimed the system would save AMEX $27M/yr. As for Mr. Flast, well, read the footnote:
Life before e-mail and social media: This is a May 22, 1984, Western Union mailgram sent from Ed Niehaus, a marketing director at Morrow Designs, to Byte staff writer Mark Welch with a correction regarding the disk drive supplier for the Morrow Pivot (the machine pictured in my avatar).
God bless Tim Cook and the Apple marketing machine for giving me the perfect introduction for next month's newsletter. 😆
In this month's newsletter, I cite the work of Dr. Hubert Dreyfus, a longtime Berkley philosophy professor and early critic of of AI. Dreyfus' 1986 book, "Mind Over Machine," who offered this warning about depending on so-called expert systems being pushed by AI evangelists:
George Morrow on AI hype in 1984: "More money has been wasted in artificial intelligence than in any other area of computer technology. We're still not close to having any real idea or model of how the human brain works."
At the 1990 Portable Computing Expo in NYC, Randall Fields, the CEO of Mrs. Fields Cookies (and Debbi Fields' husband) gave the keynote speech, in which he declared that Macintosh-style GUIs were a communist abomination and #Windows could ruin the American economy. #retrocomputing #pchistory
