>> Where did it all begin?Do you mean, where did the non-serious names begin?Apple, in 76, and Altair, in 75, both come to mind.Engelbart called it the "mouse" in 1968.RAND had the Johnniac in 1954.Although, there was Edmund Berkeley's "Simon" in 1950.On Tue, Feb 20, 2024 at 3:11 PM Ceruzzi, Paul via Members <members@lists.sigcis.org> wrote:_______________________________________________I finally had a chance to look at the summary of Jim's book from CBI, and I thoroughly enjoyed it. I always found IBM's control over nomenclature noteworthy: "Electronic Data Processing," not "Computer"; "Diskette" not "floppy"; "pointing Device" not "mouse." And others. I remember being shocked – shocked! when IBM called its OS2 operating system "Warp." So out of place, but the world, and IBM, moved on.
Now we see the proliferation of what I consider inappropriate names for software and services that have a serious place in society: Google, Twitch, Slack, Yahoo! When Tom Haigh & I were writing our Third Edition, we had a discussion about whether to include the exclamation point in Yahoo. We left it off. And when I suggested to my office mates at the Smithsonian that we adopt Slack, they thought I was joking. I'm glad we didn't adopt it, regardless of how useful it isd or isn't. Could you imagine President Eisenhower issuing a Tweet? (General Eisenhower once said, in response to a RAND Corporation report, "There will be no software in this man's army!"
Where did it all begin? Maybe from a programmer named Tom Pittman, author of Tiny Basic. He called his service "Itty Bitty Computers." This was around 1976 or so. Anyone have better information?
Paul Ceruzzi
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