September 2018 - Members - lists.sigcis.org

Re: [SIGCIS-Members] Konrad Zuse's 1936 patent - German text?
by Brian Randell 24 Sep '20

24 Sep '20

Hi Mark: I have a copy of the original 1936 Zuse patent application that I had translated into English for my Origins book. (It took some finding - some of my Zemanek documents had strayed into the middle of the Zuse documents, and so had obscured them! :-) It is a type-written document, on the letterhead of Zuse’s patent attorney Dr.-Ing. Bruno Wolf, Berlin Charlottenberg 5, Kantstrasse 85, dated 9.4.36 (i.e. 9 April 1936). It is some twenty or so pages in length. However I should warn you that some of the pages are barely legible (though could probably be deciphered by someone who knows German - which I don’t). I could scan this document for you if you wish. (I have about two inches thick of documents about Zuse’s work, including a number of patents and patent applications, some pre-war, immediately some post-war, together with several typescripts from him. My plan is that this material will be added to the archive of my files held in the Special Collections section of Newcastle University Library. This already holds all the extensive correspondence that I was involved in while compiling Origins.) Cheers Brian On 24 Jan 2017, at 10:58, Mark Priestley <m.priestley(a)gmail.com<mailto:m.priestley@gmail.com>> wrote: Dear list, Zuse's 1936 patent "Method for Automatic Execution of Calculations with the Aid of Computers" is reprinted in Brian Randell's "Origins of Digital Computers" collections. Does anyone know if/where I can get hold of the German original? Thanks in advance. Mark _______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org<http://sigcis.org>, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org -- School of Computing Science, Newcastle University, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE1 7RU, UK EMAIL = Brian.Randell(a)ncl.ac.uk<mailto:Brian.Randell@ncl.ac.uk> PHONE = +44 191 208 7923 FAX = +44 191 208 8232 URL = http://www.ncl.ac.uk/computing/people/profile/brianrandell.html

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Book Announcement: Power Button: A History of Pleasure, Panic, and the Politics of Pushing
by Plotnick, Rachel 27 Sep '18

27 Sep '18

Hi SIGCISers, I am pleased to announce the publication of my book, Power Button: A History of Pleasure, Panic, and the Politics of Pushing? with The MIT Press in the Science, Technology & Society series. The book historicizes computing by thinking about definitions of "digital" as they apply to fingers and button pushing, tracing the roots of a 19th-century society that becomes transfixed with the notion of pushing a button to accomplish work or play. Alongside thinking about electrification and industrialization, it considers everything from push-button warfare, vending machines and cameras to "Like" buttons in social media. It asks questions about how and why buttons became a ubiquitous technology and button pushing became an entrenched practice - one fraught with concerns about skill, effort, gender, age and class. Check out an excerpt here: https://medium.com/@mitpress/pleasure-panic-and-the-politics-of-pushing-123… And purchase options here: https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/power-button Thanks and regards, Rachel Rachel Plotnick, PhD Assistant Professor, Cinema and Media Studies The Media School Indiana University http://www.rachelplotnick.com?

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New Website on Minnesota's Computing History (and a future documentary)
by Jeffrey Yost 26 Sep '18

26 Sep '18

Dear Colleagues, Wanted to make people aware of a public history project/partnership to document and broadly disseminate the rich history of computing in the State of Minnesota (Engineering Research Associates, Remington Rand, Sperry-Univac, Control Data Corporation, Honeywell, Cray Research, Lawson Software, IBM Rochester, etc.). Over the past year the Charles Babbage Institute (CBI), the UMN-HSTM Program, the Minnesota Historical Society (which provided funding through a competitive grant program for MN history), Twin Cities Pubic Television (TPT), the Dakota County Historical Society and Lawshe Museum (DCHS/LM), the Minnesota High Tech Association, and industry volunteers (Univac's VIP Club of retirees) partnered to produce a Minnesota computing history website (and to lay the groundwork for an upcoming documentary). https://www.mncomputinghistory.com The site has interactive time-lines, film/video footage, many photos, historical essays, etc. The project's aim was two-fold from the start, to produce this website, and to launch the effort for a major public television documentary on the topic. On the latter, many dozens of hours of video interviews with more than 30 pioneers (and historian Tom Misa, who authored *Digital State: The Story of Minnesota's Computing Industry*) were conducted. [Tom was an important early advisor and a major inspiration for this project.] The final stage of fundraising is happening now to create the television documentary. On this one-year (phase 1) project, Univ. of Minnesota HSTM ABD student Elizabeth Semler was the chief researcher and project manager, HSTM Post-doc Jonathan Clemons a consulting advisor, and CBI Archivist Amanda Wick the primary archivist advisor. I served as the primary historian advisor. This project represents CBI's efforts to boost our already strong commitment to public history and outreach, a commitment extended by CBI's recent hire of longtime science museum curator Dr. Juliet Burba (most recently Director of Collections at the Bakken Museum) as our Outreach Historian and Administrator. On a related note, we are grateful to the (Sperry-Univac) VIP Club's help, and to Lockheed for donating extensive Sperry-Univac archives to CBI (and important Sperry-Univac artifacts and photographs to the DCHS/Lawshe Museum). Best, Jeff Jeffrey R. Yost, Ph.D. Director, Charles Babbage Institute Research Professor, Program in the History of Science, Technology, and Medicine 222 21st Avenue South University of Minnesota Minneapolis, MN 55455 612 624 5050 Phone 612 625 8054 Fax

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BINAC: A Brief Look Back
by Brian Berg 25 Sep '18

25 Sep '18

Hello, I just received word of the following very interesting new video (12:35 in length) about the BINAC, the Binary Automatic Computer of 1949. Thanks to Rebecca Mercuri <notable(a)mindspring.com> for informing me. As many of you know, Eckert and Mauchly created a beautiful little computer called BINAC that often gets ignored in the history books. Over the past few weeks I've had the pleasure of working with Mark Greenia, who runs the Computer History Archive Project. He has a number of vintage films available on his YouTube site. We collaborated on a short documentary combining resources I had and those he had or was able to find; then he added the writing, editing, and production talent to make it happen. Bill Mauchly <bmauchly(a)opgate.com> (son of John and Kay Mauchly) Welcome to the release of the new computer history video: BINAC: A Brief Look Back https://youtu.be/udJUWenPK4w/ This is a very special presentation featuring rare films & photos (many previously unpublished) of the 1949 BINAC computer (“Binary Automatic Computer”), which was designed by Dr. John W. Mauchly and J. Presper Eckert, inventors of ENIAC and UNIVAC. This was the first computer built by their fledgling computer company “Eckert-Mauchly Computer Corporation” (EMCC). BINAC the first stored-program computer built in the U.S. It was built for Northrop, and it used Mercury Delay Line Memory. It was a one-of-a-kind machine. This 12 minute video includes footage of the BINAC in operation, a very rare 1948 “behind- the-scenes” film courtesy of John William Mauchly Jr. (son of inventor Dr. John Mauchly) which shows EMCC engineers during the computer’s construction, rare photos of the BINAC in the early EMCC factory, and photos of the early EMCC staff. Eckert-Mauchly Computer Corporation was purchased by Remington Rand in 1950, and the famous UNIVAC 1 was released in 1951. Many groundbreaking computers followed, including UNIVAC Solid-State, Univac File Computer, Univac Scientific, UNIVAC-LARC and others. Comments are welcome. Mark Greenia, for the Computer History Archives Project. Acknowledgements and Credits: = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = /John William Mauchly Jr. - 1948 EMCC Film & Photos and Accompanying Music Score/ /Professional Narration – David Melvin/ /Tony Buglioni, Manager External Communications & and Media Relations, Unisys/ /-Angela Schad, Reference Archivist, Digital Archives Specialist -Kevin Martin, Curator of Audiovisual Collections Hagley Museum and Library, Wilmington, Delaware //https://www.hagley.org//// /Dag Spicer, Senior Curator, Computer History Museum, Mountain View, CA //http://www.computerhistory.org/// /-- -- -- --/ /The “UNIVAC” and “Sperry-Rand,”“Remington Rand” names are (c) Unisys Corporation./ BINAC FILM: https://youtu.be/udJUWenPK4w/ _________________________ Brian A. Berg / bberg(a)StanfordAlumni.org Berg Software Design 14500 Big Basin Way, Suite F, Saratoga, CA 95070 USA Voice: 408.741.5010 / Cell: 408.568.2505 Consulting: Flash Memory/USB/Storage/Patents visit the Storage Cornucopia: www.bswd.com FMS Technical Chair: www.FlashMemorySummit.com <http://www.flashmemorysummit.com/> IEEE Milestone <http://www.ieeeghn.org/wiki/index.php/Milestones:List_of_IEEE_Milestones> Coordinator for Region 6 <http://www.ieee-region6.org/> IEEE SCV Section <http://www.ewh.ieee.org/r6/scv/> Past Chair / IEEE-CNSV <http://www.californiaconsultants.org/> Board Director IEEE Silicon Valley Tech History Committee <http://www.siliconvalleyhistory.com/> Chair

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The Birth of Informatics
by Laurent Bloch 21 Sep '18

21 Sep '18

Dear all, In that video, Pierre-Éric Mounier-Kuhn relates (in French) the birth of informatics, in Manchester in 1948, and many other things around that event: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dcN9QXxmRqk Cheers! -- Laurent Bloch - https://laurentbloch.net - lb(a)laurentbloch.org Si vous trouvez que l'éducation coûte cher, essayez l'ignorance ! (A. Lincoln)

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My blog post on Grosch's law...
by Allan Olley 14 Sep '18

14 Sep '18

Hello, I have written a blog post, on the history of Grosch's Law, in honour of what would have been Herb Grosch's 100th birthday (September 13th, 2018). This is also a preview of some material from my upcoming talk at the SIGCIS meeting. I hope it is of some interest. https://4ll4n0.livejournal.com/19167.html -- Yours Truly, Allan Olley, PhD http://individual.utoronto.ca/fofound/

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SIGCIS Book Auction - Friday, October 12
by Andrew Russell 12 Sep '18

12 Sep '18

Hello everyone! With SHOT annual meeting just a month away, it's time to remind you of one of the most important activities we do—the Friday book auction. In addition to providing a nice panorama of new books and old favorites, the purpose of the auction is to raise money for the SIGCIS Travel Grants that are awarded to some individuals who are presenting their work at the Sunday SIGCIS Conference. We’re lucky once again this year to have the peerless Tom Haigh as our auctioneer. The auction will take place during our annual lunch on Friday from 12:30-2 pm. When you register(ed) for SHOT, there was a box to check to register for the lunch. As usual, our agenda for the lunch, beyond eating, will be (1) introductions, especially to highlight the first-time attendees; and (2) the SIGCIS book auction. Regarding the latter, I have two reminders: a. Please bring books you would like to donate for the cause. It would help our accounting and record-keeping system if you can tell me ahead of time what book you plan to bring. And, if you have books to donate but don’t plan to travel to St. Louis, please let me know and I’ll relay instructions. b. Please bring cash to pay for books, or to otherwise donate to SIGCIS. We are lucky to have so many generous members in SIGCIS, since your donations allow us to award travel grants to students and others who need travel support. This year we are awarding over $2500 in travel support; to make this sustainable, we need to raise an equal or greater amount. If you’d rather donate to SIGCIS online or by check, we would be happy to facilitate that as well. Thank you as always for your generosity! Andy Russell SIGCIS Chair

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Doctoral opportunity
by Bernardo Batiz-Lazo 10 Sep '18

10 Sep '18

Colegues We will appreciate if you circulate this doctoral bursary opportunity on the history of computers in banking Best wishes Bernardo Dear Bernardo, I hope you had a great summer. We have an open position for a doctoral student that could maybe be of interest for some students in your academic network ? Please feel free to publicize it : https://recruitment.uni.lu/fr/details.html?id=QMUFK026203F3VBQB7V7VV4S8&nPo… Best regards, Valérie SCHAFER Professor in Contemporary European History Luxembourg Centre for Contemporary and Digital History (C²DH) University of Luxembourg Belval Campus Maison des Sciences Humaines 11, Porte des Sciences L-4366 Esch-sur-Alzette https://www.c2dh.uni.lu/people/valerie-schafer -- ================== Twitter @BatizLazo Cash and Dash: How ATMs and Computers Changed Banking By Bernardon Batiz-Lazo (Oxford University Press, 2018) https://global.oup.com/academic/product/cash-and-dash-9780198782810?cc=gb&l… The Book of Payments: Historical and Contemporary Views on the Cashless Society Edited by Bernardo Batiz-Lazo and Leonidas Efthymiou (Palgrave, 2016) http://www.palgrave.com/de/book/9781137602305 Technological Innovation in Retail Finance: International Historical Perspectives Edited by Bernardo Batiz-Lazo, J. Carles Maixé-Altés, and Paul Thomes (Routledge, 2011) http://www.taylorandfrancis.com/books/details/9780415880671 Home page: http://www.bangor.ac.uk/business/staff/bernardo_batiz-lazo.en.php Working papers: http://ideas.repec.org/e/pba14.html

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Company archives of 1980s-1990s computer game companies?
by Gleb J. Albert 10 Sep '18

10 Sep '18

Dear colleagues and list members, This is a question that has kept me busy for quite some time, yet I am afraid I might have missed some crucial bit of information, and this is why I would like to address it to you. Are there any preservation institutions (archives, museums etc., apart from The Strong Museum / National Museum of Play in Rochester/NY) that host either company archives of computer game companies or personal papers of people involved in the production and marketing of home computer games in the 1980s and early 1990s? As I already mentioned on this list back in February, I am doing a post-doc research project on the transnational history of (non-commercial, low scale) home computer games piracy before the mass availability of the Internet, and, of course, the perspective of the back-then games industry is crucial in this question. Of course, the industry back then was extremely volatile - when companies went bankrupt, the last thing they thought about was preserving their archives (in the case of Psygnosis, for example, as far as I know everything was simply dumped). And those very few 1980s companies which are still active are very seclusive about their archives (which is sort-of understandable, given the retromania of today and their possible hopes of reviving/porting old titles). Nevertheless, the papers of Broderbund, Sierra On-Line, and a couple of other companies luckily ended up at The Strong - and to my knowledge, this is the only public institution that hosts materials like these. But maybe I missed some essential info? Are there any other holdings I am not aware of, particularly concerning the European games industry? I would be very thankful for any hints (as well as for contacts to former game studio and/or publisher/distributor folks who still might have kept their business papers). Best wishes, Gleb -- Dr. Gleb J. Albert Historisches Seminar, Universität Zürich Forschergruppe "Medien und Mimesis" Universität Zürich Historisches Seminar Culmannstr. 1 CH-8006 Zürich Switzerland Tel. +41-446346187 <http://uzh.academia.edu/GlebJAlbert> <http://www.fg-mimesis.de> Review editor: H-Soz-Kult, review team "History of Knowledge" - <http://www.hsozkult.de>

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digitalization of banking and payment innovations
by Juan Carlos Maixé Altés 09 Sep '18

09 Sep '18

May be of interest to SIGCIS-Members: two recent articles on banking digitalisation and payment innovations: Maixé-Altés, J. Carles (2018): "The Digitalisation of Banking: A New Perspective from the European Savings Banks Industry before the Internet," Enterprise and Society<https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/enterprise-and-society/article/digi…> (online 4 Sep) [DOI: 10.1017/eso.2018.18]. Maixé-Altés, J. Carles (2018): "Retail trade and payment innovations in the digital era: a cross-industry and multi-country approach", Business History<https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/00076791.2018.1471062> (online 19 Jul) [DOI: 10.1080/00076791.2018.1471062] Best, Carles Maixé Facultad de Economía y Empresa Universidad de A Coruña Spain http://ecoapli1.udc.es/maixe

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