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“David Rothman’s SILICON JUNGLE is an aphrodisiac for anyone interested
in the computer revolution. There is a real sense of self-liberation for
the reader, in whose mind the dawn lights up the incredible, awful,
wonderful reach of the little computer chip.”
William F. Buckley, Jr.
“Everything you’ve always wanted to know about computers but were afraid
to ask for fear of not getting a straight answer in plain English. David
Rothman is Indiana Jones, guiding us through the hype, hardware,
software, and confusing jargon of THE SILICON JUNGLE.”
Bettina Gregory
ABC News Correspondent
and IBM PCXT owner
“David Rothman’s SILICON JUNGLE is an inspired, fast-paced, often
maniacal view of today’s microcomputer scene. While laced with hard
facts, Rothman’s anecdotal style makes the book fun reading. The perfect
book for the newcomer to the scene and the old-timer lost in the
jungle.”
John C. Dvorak
Technology columnist,
_The San Francisco Examiner_
and _InfoWorld_
“THE SILICON JUNGLE has proved helpful in both my business and personal
use of computers. It is down-to-earth, easy to understand, and has made
me and my computers better friends.”
Ellen R. Gordon, President
Tootsie Roll Industries, Inc.
“THE SILICON JUNGLE is an insightful book that provides a foundation for
dealing with the complicated world of personal computers.”
Chris Christiansen
Senior Analyst
The Yankee Group
“Of all the books about computers, THE SILICON JUNGLE is the best I’ve
seen.... Fun to read and Instructional as well. David Rothman not only
blazes a sure path through the jungle, but he has told us almost
everything there is to tell about the computer world at this point—and
told it very well.”
Jerald F. Terhorst
Ford Motor Executive
DAVID H. ROTHMAN
_The_
SILICON
JUNGLE
BALLANTINE BOOKS · NEW YORK
Copyright © 1985 David H. Rothman
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright
Conventions. Published in the United States by Ballantine Books, a
division of Random House, Inc., New York, and simultaneously in Canada
by Random House of Canada Limited, Toronto.
Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 85-90645
ISBN 0-345-32063-8
Manufactured in the United States of America
First Edition: July 1985
WITH LOVE
TO
HARRY AND HORTENSE ROTHMAN
Special thanks to Michael Canyes, Mack Truslow,
David Fay Smith, Don Carrol, Robert B. Wyatt, Richard McCoy,
Frank Lavena, Pat Ehresmann, Ruth Aley and Berenice Hoffman
Contents
1 • The Silicon Jungle 1
2 • The Kaypro Phenomenon: How Solana Beach Took
on Silicon Valley 14
3 • After the War 36
4 • WordStar: The Creators 45
5 • The Select Word Processor: Martin Dean versus
the Command-Driven Restaurants 65
6 • Three Software Stories: Motorcycles, Homes,
and the $200,000-a-Year Disk 73
7 • Graphics (or How a Mouse Helped Joe Shelton’s
Friends Stop Feeling Like Rats) 93
8 • People: The Who-How Solution 100
9 • The Hal Syndrome 128
10 • Jewels that Blip 163
11 • Wired to Work 200
12 • How I Found “God” on MCI (and a Few Other Odds
and Ends About Electronic Mail) 228
13 • Net Gain$ 234
14 • As the Jungle Thickens (AKA the Great
Modeming) 249
Afterword 271
BACKUP • More Tips and Tales from the Jungle 279
BACKUP I • Twenty-Six Questions to Ask at (and About) the
Computer Store 281
BACKUP II • A Few Grouchy Words on Printers 294
BACKUP III • The Lucky 13: What to Look for in Choosing
Software 302
BACKUP IV • On the Evolution of Software (and a “Perfecter
and Perfecter” Program) 310
BACKUP V • “3-D” versus Mail-Order Software—and How to
Shop 319
BACKUP VI • “Easy” Data Bases: Another View (Mensa Member
Versus InfoStar) 323
BACKUP VII • Graphics Tips 331
BACKUP VIII • Consultant Contracts: Some Who-How Questions 339
BACKUP IX • Window Shopping 343
BACKUP X • Of Mice and Men—and Touch Pads, Touch Screens,
Etc. 346
BACKUP XI • The Micro Connection: Some Critical
Explanations 349
BACKUP XII • MODEM7: An Almost-Free and Fairly Easy Way to
Talk to Other Computers 354
BACKUP XIII • Why Not an Electronic Peace Corps? 366
INDEX • 375
_The_
SILICON
JUNGLE
1 ❑ The Silicon Jungle
Americans are fighting each other not just in the marketplace but also
in the Silicon Jungle.
The jungle isn’t greenery. It isn’t land. It’s nothing more than the
mineral in tiny computer chips that switch electronic impulses.
But a jungle it is:
● Airline X accused Airline Y of electronically sabotaging X’s
reservations operation and contributing to a $733-million bankruptcy.
The charges may have been false. But their very existence dramatized
the increasing link between computer security and corporate survival.
● Car thieves have computerized to keep better track of hot auto parts.
That’s bad news not only for police but also for rival thieves with
antiquated record keeping. Meanwhile, a hooker ring, too, has
automated. And a gambling operation analyzed its profits daily through
a big computer hooked up to smaller ones in forty-three cities.[1]
● An editor confesses he snooped on the competition by figuring out the
computer password of Brand X newspaper (“it’s like playing Scrabble—a
matter of time and an interested mind”).
● Millions of more scrupulous Americans are increasingly relying on
micros to outwit their rivals.
Footnote 1:
_Computerworld_, July 23, 1984, is the source of the reports on
criminals’ use of computers.
Consider two deadline-ridden lawyers locked in combat over the same
case. Lawyer A might ferret out legal precedents through eye-straining
research at libraries, while B could cover the same territory in minutes
through the right taps on a new IBM personal computer.
Siliconized war is “in” between and among giants and gnats.
“One hundred years ago in Colorado, the Colt .44 was a great equalizer,”
a westerner once said; now he said his suitcase-sized micro was.
Today better machines sell for around $1,000. With trimmings they can:
● Electronically zip messages to other computers and people across the
country.
● Be word processors, doubling some writers’ production.
● Prepare spreadsheets, which help businesses quickly calculate the
future costs of providing products or services.
● Keep records electronically.
● Help you whip up jazzy charts to whet your boss’s interest in your
work—in a nice way.
This book will tell you how to make the best use of portables and other
business computers wherever you are—large company, small, or on your
own. Big bureaucracy is here, also, complete with the Case of the
Missing Cafeteria (explained in Chapter 7).
Instead of hearing just about computers in the abstract, you’ll learn
about them in life. Arthur C. Clarke, the world-famous science-fiction
novelist who wrote _2001_ and _2010_, will tell how WordStar software
made him “a born-again writer.” And the FBI, top consultants, and a
felon named Captain Zap will warn against electronic crooks.
There’ll be computer tips, too, from obscure but savvy business people,
such as a New York real estate executive whose micro skills lead to his
six-figure income.
You’ll also hear from some stars of the industry, including WordStar’s
creators, and you’ll learn how their lives and philosophies tie in with
the products on sale at your local computer store.
We begin with the Ten (Micro) Commandments:
DON’T FALL FOR THE SOFT SELL—OR
HARD SELL.
THE COMPUTER BUSINESS IS A JUNGLE.
“This machine here is a Mercedes,” a Radio Shack man once told me.
“Apple’s the Ford. You want to buy a Mercedes or a Ford?”
How do you cut through the hype to buy a machine that is better than
your competitor’s?
You’ve got your own jungle to survive, and, by learning how computer
firms make and market their offerings, you’ll be a better shopper.
Especially beware of the computer hawker who says he’s a “technician”
with your interest in mind.
BUT REMEMBER THAT GOOD GUYS
CAN FINISH FIRST.
The New York executive saved his blue-chip company a fortune and won his
$100,000-plus salary without firing anyone, groveling before his boss,
or cheapening a product or service.
By picking the right computer or program, you just might get a head
start on the office toady.
AVOID THE SNACK-FOOD PROGRAMS—THE
ONES EASY TO LEARN
BUT LESS SATISFYING TO USE.
With press agents and flashy boxes for disks, the software market is
going Hollywood.
It’s also, however, becoming more like the cupcake industry—geared not
to nourish but to please instantly.
Some marketeers are trying to displace good, solid business programs
with Twinkie-like products that _sell_ well but don’t _work_ well.
LEARN ABOUT COMPUTERS
AS THEY RELATE TO YOUR JOB.
Normally, you and your employees needn’t become true computer experts.
In most cases you’ll lack the time or talent to write the programs you
need to be fully competitive. Very likely you can use off-the-shelf
software instead.
Also, you can find the right computer consultant and carefully oversee
his work; this book will help you avoid gobblers.
BE HUMANE—PROFITABLY.
Micros can be efficient and humane at the same time. Don’t confuse _The
Silicon Jungle_ with _Winning through Intimidation_. Often, for
instance, some humanity can improve your efficiency by lowering the
number of errors your people may make. This book tells how to choose
equipment that’s easiest on your people’s eyes and backbones.
BONE UP ON COMPUTER CRIME—BUT
DON’T NEGLECT ROUTINE WAYS OF MAKING YOUR
ELECTRONIC RECORDS SAFE.
You should worry about computer crime, while not neglecting
garden-variety problems of “data security,” like coffee spilled on
floppy disks.
Pity a poor wedding-cake maker. The other day on the radio I heard that
he couldn’t fill his orders because a forgetful computer had wiped them
from its memory.
“WIRE IN” TO TELECOMMUTING
IF IT’S RIGHT FOR YOUR
COMPANY—AND PERHAPS SAVE
THOUSANDS IN OFFICE RENTS.
Working at home on a computer isn’t for everyone. Some jobs will always
require face-to-face contact.
Telecommuting, however, is a nifty new way to gain an edge on the
competition while ending some workers’ rush-hour woes. Say, you now
spend $4,000 annually on rented space for each employee. Allowing home
work may save you more than $8,000 per telecommuter, totaled up over
five years, if your tax rate is 35 percent.
REJOICE! MOST LIKELY
YOU’LL JUSTIFY YOUR
TRAVAIL.
Computerization is harder than your friendly computer store might lead
you to believe, but most likely you’ll justify your travail.
Someone once said he never knew of an author who gave up his computer
and returned to a pen. I’ll buy that.
THROUGH IT ALL,
KNOW WHAT THE OTHER GUY’S UP TO.
You’re better off if you know what the other guy—or woman—is up to.
This book is, frankly, for top executives and mid-level people, small
businessmen, and professionals. And if your employees read it? Well, so
much the better.
“You” here is many people.
Some of my most enterprising readers, by the way, won’t just be
interested in computers for themselves or their companies. They’ll also
see them as marketing opportunities involving the rest of the world.
Take Mike Bell, a Xerox executive. We talked about munytels—neighbor
centers offering child care and other services for people “commuting” to
the office via computer. And Mike had an idea. Why not _franchise_ the
munytels like McDonald’s hamburger stands? Maybe Xerox will start a
Munytel Division.
The “other guy” principle also applies to small businessmen selling to
the Xeroxes of this world. If you know how the data-processing people
think in a large corporation, you may be more understanding if you’re
having problems hooking up to a large customer’s computer.
Likewise, the “other guy” idea can help businessmen keep up with
competitors and appreciate their own employees’ computer-related fears.
In short, this book is for people who want to survive—and make money—by
_listening_.
Ranging over many topics, it may come across as a series of essays
rather than a normal guide. So be it. I’m not going to cheat you of
helpful facts that _most_ readers won’t care about or that are far
removed from the main thrusts of the chapters. You may be desperate for
this very material. And items at the ends of the chapters will refer you
to “Backup: More Tales and Tips from the Jungle.” “Backup” follows my
main book.
=BREAK OUT OF THE USERS-GUIDE GHETTO.=
You already have. _The Silicon Jungle_ is for owners and prospective
owners of Radio Shacks, Apples, IBMs—all kinds of machines.
_Do_ buy a guide for your model of computer or your pet software
program; this book isn’t a replacement.
It offers, however, more detachment than a guide touting the virtues of
a single machine. I’ll write about the computer I own—yes, I have my
biases—but it’ll be as an example, not as the final answer. Frankly,
_for graphics work alone_, my Kaypro II would not suffice. The screen
isn’t good enough. The Kaypro’s electronic brain just is not very
visually inclined, and all in all, I’d be far better off doing charts
with an Apple Macintosh.
Many good paths wind through the Silicon Jungle.
■ ■ ■
There’s no doubt—the computer business _is_ a jungle. While I was
writing this book, Osborne Computers filed for bankruptcy under Chapter
XI. “I’m just devastated,” said Adam Osborne. The previous year, his
firm had sold 110,000 portable computers listing at $1,795.
I, too, was sorry he’d failed. Osborne’s was the first company to
produce a bargain-priced business computer with good, free software
thrown in. If his company hadn’t revived itself under new management,
the industry would have offered buyers that much less choice.
Part of Osborne’s problem were his marketing blunders. Also, however, an
arch rival, Kaypro, had come out with a better machine. I bought one.
Chapters 2 and 3 tell how Kaypro has fought Osborne and other foes—wars
of interest to you, since you’ll win a better deal if you know about
micro-makers and the origins of their computers. While this chapter and
the next one focus on Kaypros, much in them would apply to other
machines.
Most microcomputers don’t emerge from tile-floored laboratories;
instead, they come from companies that refine existing technology and
carve out niches in the marketplace. But what’s “refine”? High tech is
enough of a gamble for the more solid computer makers. Shakier ones can
be reckless, and often at customers’ expense. A newspaper perceptively
observed, “Computers are hyped before they’re ready, announced before
they’re shipped and sometimes outdated and outpriced before they reach
retailers’ shelves.”
I’ll try to _help_ you find the machine that’s best for you—not
necessarily the one that computer hustlers envision on your desk.
Beware:
● In Maryland, a sail maker ended up with a micro useless as anything
but an anchor.
● A midwestern company sued a major micro maker for $456,000 because an
$8,000 computer allegedly didn’t perform as advertised.
● A construction executive invested over $9,000 in a name-brand computer
but could do next to nothing with it, while a colleague was making out
fine with a little Zenith micro selling for around half the price.
“I’ve seen too many company presidents march through there hoping to
make a final decision in less than an hour,” said a sales manager at a
Michigan computer store. “In almost every case he’s ended up paying
either too much for the right equipment or too little for the wrong
equipment.”[2]
Footnote 2:
The Michigan quote comes from a magazine article by Washington writer
Joel Makower.
Just as important as the hardware—the computers and other machines—are
the programs on those plastic disks. In fact, you should even think
“software” before you do hardware, because your machine will be useless
if it doesn’t do the tasks you want it to. And the programs supply these
necessary instructions. More than thirty thousand programs for micros
are on the market; so _The Silicon Jungle_ can’t say which one is
exactly right for you, but it can help you find out for yourself by
showing how a software classic comes into existence.[3]
Footnote 3:
Chris Christiansen, with the Yankee Group, a Boston-based marketing
research firm, offered the estimate on the number of programs.
I talked to Seymour Rubinstein and Rob Barnaby—the subjects of Chapter
4, “WordStar: The Creators”—and learned that Barnaby and I had some
common work habits. Maybe that’s why I like WordStar so much. I feel as
if the people behind it used ESP to discover how I liked to move words
around on my spooky green screen.
Some complain that WordStar is too complex. I disagree. New versions of
WordStar and other programs, however, will become simpler to learn as
the machines themselves grow more powerful. The new WordStar 2000 is an
example.
Smart production-minded buyers meanwhile should avoid the
“user-friendly” software that’s easy to learn but hard to use. One
example is the Select, a clunky word processor discussed in Chapter 5
after WordStar. I expressed my loathing with my wallet. Although Select
came free with my Kaypro, I junked it. Had I not spent my $250 on
WordStar, I would have taken much, much longer to write this book.[4]
Footnote 4:
Kaypro, too, junked Select. Select Information Systems claims that’s
because Kaypro wanted a cheaper word processor. Kaypro says it was
unhappy with Select because it didn’t work right with some printers.
In Chapter 6, “Three Software Stories,” businessmen tell how they
coexisted—or didn’t—with their software. One of them is the New York
real estate executive mentioned earlier. He saved his new employer
$200,000 a year by boning up on software and using micros rather than
expensive time and an outside company’s mainframe. A Maryland
construction executive did well, too. He thinks his software knowledge
helped him snare a new job as a company president with one-third
interest in the firm. Like the New Yorker, he successfully concentrated
on micros as they related to his job. Another man, an accountant good at
his work but uneasy around computers, offers some observations on the
failings of existing software and his difficulties finding the right
program.
Graphics will be one of the hotter software topics over the next few
years, now that cheap computers can do more visual tricks. And in
Chapter 7 and Backup VII, you’ll learn (1) the basics, (2) when charts
are worth the trouble, and (3) how to select the best programs in that
category. Most existing computer guides are overly technical about
graphics, or they just about shun the subject. That’s too bad. Graphics
can actually save your company money; computerized charts can help you
set priorities and keep your projects on schedule. At times, too, there
are other advantages. A little Macintosh won’t replace your art
department, but it might enable you to whip up flashy graphs to impress
your customers.
Even with the supposedly simple Mac-style machines, however, you may
still need a good consultant—one of the topics of Chapter 8, “People.”
He or she can help you select the right software, for instance, or teach
you how to use it. But you can’t always trust credentials, and here
you’ll read of a young company that wasted $40,000 on the wrong
consultants and their bungles. One man was so learned in computers that
he had helped design the systems on an aircraft carrier, yet he lacked
the exact technical expertise to help the company get _its_ work done.
My old newspaper in the Midwest made another people-type mistake,
letting a computer expert befuddle staffers with technical jargon. A
white-haired editor suffered especially. Although he knew his town
better than did just about any other newsman and had been a fixture in
the scruffy city rooms since World War II, the paper exiled him from the
copy desk after the training program failed him. His health gave out
amid the strain, and he ended up on extended sick leave, done in partly
by the course’s scary talk of bits and bytes. You use a calculator
without being—as one man put it—“calculator literate.” Why must you be
“computer literate”? Be so if you’re an aspiring programmer or if you
enjoy computers as a hobby. If, however, you don’t, well, forget it.
Instead, simply concentrate on (1) finding the right experts for the
grubby technical chores and (2) helping yourself and your employees
learn _the programs of use on the job_.
You can also treat people well by guarding against “The Hal Syndrome.”
I’ve named Chapter 9 after the uppity computer in _2001_ and _2010_.
The best weapons against Hal are good, common-sense ones, like viewable
screens and easy-to-use keyboards, which can cut down on headaches and
backaches. Forget about the white tiles and bright fluorescents you see
in traditional computer rooms. They can torture your eyes. As for
keyboards, you’ll learn the wisdom of using the detachable kind, which
makes it easier for you to be the right distance from both the keyboard
and the screen. Why not buy equipment that can adjust to both your eyes
and your back? Foreigners caught on to this issue much more quickly than
we did; some European firms even sawed the keyboards off American-made
terminals. And now U.S. workers are demanding action. “They affected my
stomach quite a bit,” a former insurance company worker says of the
machines that caused her to quit her job. “Most days I worked I would
throw up in the ladies room.” Whether you use micros or big computers,
you’ll get more work out of people—and be able to hire better ones—if
the equipment is comfortable to use. Still another precaution against
Hal is good job design. See if you can rotate your employees’ computer
work with other duties to reduce the stress of being at the keyboard all
day.
In the Hal Syndrome chapter, you won’t simply read academic wisdom.
Instead, you’ll hear about the true health and safety concerns of people
working the computer keyboards—eminently valid worries in many cases.
And you’ll read in an accompanying backup about another hot topic in
this era of contact between man and machine. It’s the =mouse=, the
palm-sized gadget that you push along your desktop to guide the =cursor=
(the little blinking line or other marker that shows where you’re typing
on the computer screen).
Some manufacturers love the mouse as a marketing gimmick. And it’s
indeed nice for graphics. If you’re a writer or secretary, however, and
if you lack three hands, you may be better off mouseless. Why? See
Backup X, “Of Mice and Men.”
I’ll also try some candor on another touchy topic—computer crime.
In Chapter 10, “Jewels that Blip,” you’ll learn how to protect your
company secrets inside your computer and how to prevent the machines
from suffering amnesia and destroying electronic records. Although
electronic Willie Suttons exist, your real worries are often mundane.
This book won’t keep you from spilling coffee on a floppy disk, but it
will tell how, using good software and good habits, you can help ward
off both crooks and accidents.
Much of Chapter 10 is about larger computers, and quite logically so.
Increasingly, your micros will be talking to mainframes, as the big
machines are called, and your facts are only as safe as the electronic
repositories where you store them.
Computer security will particularly matter in the era of telecommuting,
a subject covered in Chapter 11, “Wired to Work,” which will show you
how “electronic cottages” often can be both productive and humane.
A California professor says by 1990 as many as 10 million U.S. workers
could be tapping away on keyboards at home. In Chapter 11, you’ll learn
how you may be able to “telecommute” within weeks or months if (1) your
boss and company are sympathetic and (2) your office politics permit you
to do so without harming your career. Why wait for official
telecommuting programs from corporate headquarters? Chapter 11 advocates
nothing less than a grass-roots telecommuting movement by corporate
writers, programmers, salespeople, and working mothers. Toting up the
savings that telecommuting can yield, more and more corporations will
encourage experiments. Many people—though not all—thrive on it.
“It seems foolish for me to get in a car to go to an office,” said a
Washington-area telecommuter, “if I can go to that office by phone.”
Without the wear and tear of rush-hour driving he became more
productive.
You needn’t telecommute every day. The chapter, in fact, starts with the
example of the rush-hour hater who made it a point to keep up with the
office crowd in person on occasion.
Chapter 12, “How I Found ‘God’ on MCI (and a Few Other Odds and Ends
about Electronic Mail),” tells more about sending computer messages over
the phone lines. Some E-mail nets even link up with the old Telex
networks. During the writing of this book I corresponded via computer
with people ranging from William F. Buckley, Jr., to Captain Zap and the
MCI mail-Telex connection transmitted last-minute changes to my
publisher.
In Chapter 13, “Net Gain$,” you’ll learn how different computers in your
own office can share the same programs and exchange information without
people constantly having to carry floppy disks from one desk to another.
A Michigan company may be enjoying as much as DLR $1,000 a year more in
effective work time from each staffer as a result of its internal
computer net.
Of course, with today’s imperfect technology, such hookups can be a real
struggle. But so often they’re worth it.
You could say the same, indeed, of micros in general—today and in the
future.
It seemed especially true when, for my last chapter, I tried to reach
Arthur Clarke’s micro in Sri Lanka. I wanted him to answer questions
about microcomputers in 2001—the year in which his Hal was killing
humans. Did our phone-computer connection succeed? Read Chapter 14, “As
the Jungle Thickens.”
Struggles notwithstanding, computers often _do_ pay for harried
professionals and business people. “This $5,000 machine has saved me
from hiring a $20,000-a-year assistant,” said a New York investment
adviser using an IBM PC to write reports and make financial calculations
at home. A young trader forsook the bedlam at the New York Cotton
Exchange for an electronic office in his apartment. Now he can go to
work in his bathrobe and delay his shower until lunchtime. “It’s more
challenging this way,” he said. “More contemplation, less raw
instinct.”[5]
Footnote 5:
The examples of the investment adviser and cotton trader come from
_New York_ magazine.
Another self-employed man, Jimmy Carter, composed his memoirs on a word
processor—perhaps inspired by the example of a former Carter speech
writer who wrote a well-reviewed book on national defense.
Then there’s Isaac Asimov, the legendary science-fiction novelist, who,
even with an ancient manual, could write faster than the old Teletype
machines could clatter along. But he didn’t always produce the neatest
copy. “How different now!” he exulted in an article. “Staring at a page
of type on a television screen, I eagerly look for typos so I can have
the fun of changing them.” You needn’t be a professional author,
however, to benefit from computerized writing. In Maryland, an
architect-consultant, once typewriter shy, is now churning out reports
several hundred pages long on his IBM PC.
“A boon to the small businessman” is how Hugh Hunt, a son of the late
oilman H. L. Hunt, described micros. “Now he can compete with the larger
corporations as far as obtaining data and processing it quickly.”
Hunt himself was using portable computers in his land-development
business. But he also noted their helpfulness in law:
“Computers are one of the ways that small attorneys can compete with
large corporations. By joining a computer bank, they can research briefs
and do word processing, just as the large companies can.”
Many Americans apparently shared his views. In 1985, they might buy six
million computers for business use, and within two more years, that
number might almost double.[6] While I was writing this book, the United
States was emerging from the worst economic ordeals since the Great
Depression; a few college graduates had been reduced to shopping-bag
ladies, but the microcomputer business was still growing, even if at a
reduced rate. You might wait three months or more for your Macintosh or
IBM. Some companies died, but others took their places; and even in
times of inflation most prices on micros were dropping; years would pass
before scientists could no longer keep dramatically increasing the
silicon chips’ powers. Forget about the physical smallness of the chips.
It was as if the entrepreneurs in Silicon Valley—in exploiting the
scientists’ advances—were opening up a vast electronic territory. “The
only thing you worry about with computers,” Hunt said, pleased, “is
‘Should I wait until something better comes along?’”
Footnote 6:
The estimates of the number of business computer buyers come from the
Yankee Group’s Chris Christiansen.
“I’m sort of a computer groupie,” said Art Buchwald, the syndicated
humor columnist. He was caught up in the new pornography of the era:
those luscious, ad-packed micro magazines crammed with the vital
statistics of IBMs and Apples. “It used to be that when _Playboy_
arrived at the house, my wife would say, ‘Your _Playboy_’s here,’”
Buchwald told an advertising magazine. “Now she says, ‘Your
_InfoWorld_’s here.’ I’m not sure which she prefers. I have a feeling
that _Playboy_, at least, she could discuss with me.”
It was like radio during the 1920s, this micro craze.
_Time_ had proclaimed the computer “Machine of the Year” in 1982, and I
recalled a song that a friend of my parents, an old woman, had written
years ago. “Marconi, Marconi,” the lyrics went, “the world is at your
feet.” How long until the novelty of microcomputers seems just as quaint
as that of radio? The parallels could be there. Two San Francisco-area
authors, Andrew Fluegelman and Jeremy Joan Hewes, in _Writing in the
Computer Age_, urged readers to “become full-fledged computer
citizens—as writers, poets, artists, musicians, programmers,
number-crunchers, networkers....” The Fluegelman-Hewes book was useful
and well done. But “computer citizens”? The phrase grated. I was a user
at the keyboard, a “citizen” in the voting booth.
Still, I could understand why Fluegelman and Hewes called themselves
“computer evangelists.” I felt the same way. After having brought us
Muzak and junk food, technology for once was making life better.
I say this with reservations. Educators correctly warned of the computer
literacy gap between Harlem and Scarsdale—of the dearth of machines in
the slums and the bounty in some suburbs. Rich and poor clashed at
school-board meetings. In my own county, Fairfax County, Virginia, a
well-off PTA reportedly saved up for micros, then withheld purchases
until it learned whether the school board would spend tax money helping
other schools catch up. And what about unemployment as automation cost
more jobs? Or U.S. firms using computer-satellite hookups to pipe in the
work of $3-an-hour clerks? The People’s Republic of China was even
preparing to sell programming skills to the rest of the world. A billion
_programmers_, maybe? So much for high tech as a refuge for the American
jobless.
How could you make computerization a joy to all? That was one answer
you’d never find in a computer store.
You could, however, set up the right retraining program for valued
employees to see them through automation. You could fight the Hal
Syndrome. You could work to end boring tasks. In short, you could do
your best to make your computers benefit both your employees and your
company’s earnings.
2 ❑ The Kaypro Phenomenon:
How Solana Beach Took on
Silicon Valley
As _The Silicon Jungle_ was lighting up my Kaypro screen one September
day in 1983, several similar machines were whirring and clicking in the
Washington offices of Walter Mondale’s presidential campaign.
Kaypros kept track of donations and the $18-million budget. They helped
churn out news releases, speeches, and letters to voters in important
primary states. Just eighty people worked at headquarters seven months
into the campaign; Kaypros and other affordable micros were a major
reason why Mondale wouldn’t need legions of back-room staffers in
Washington later on. I didn’t know if Mondale would win or lose the
primary, but whatever happened, it wouldn’t be for want of computing
power.
Forty-five miles away, near Baltimore, Kaypros at a Westinghouse plant
were receiving computer messages from defense installations abroad.
Other Kaypros sat on the desks of William F. Buckley, Jr., ex-Governor
Jerry Brown’s research director, and the president of Tootsie Rolls; and
still another, some months earlier, had helped study Barney Clark, the
first man with an artificial heart. A Kaypro in the Midwest was tracking
something else, the milk and manure output of cows.
All of us, Mondale’s people, the others, and I, had benefited from the
struggle between Adam Osborne and Andy Kay.
Osborne, a brash ex-columnist for computer magazines, had marketed the
first mass-produced portable computer. Andy Kay had soon followed with
the Kaypro.
Adam Osborne was a dark-haired, mustached man in his forties who enjoyed
toting his product within sight of photographers. His father, a British
missionary of unconventional stripe, had tried to convert Christians to
Hinduism. Nor did the younger Osborne himself blend into the crowd; he
founded his computer company in 1981 and was soon comparing himself to
Henry Ford and the Osborne 1 to the Model T. “I give you,” he said,
“ninety percent of what most people need.”
His rival, Kay, was shorter, about five feet seven inches, but also
slim; like Osborne, he had studied chemical engineering and was a
maverick and newcomer in the personal-computer business. There, however,
the resemblances ended. Kay was soft-spoken, graying, an old electronics
hand; his friends depicted him as a quality-obsessed engineer and
Osborne as a flashy marketing man. They said Osborne had seemed
technically incapable of making a good portable with a nine-inch screen.
Adam Osborne, in turn, spoke of Kay’s computer as if he were a
four-hundred-pound wrestler forecasting an instant demise for a foe:
“The Kaypro’s gonna die.”[7]
Footnote 7:
“Gonna die” is from _Popular Computing_. The Osborne statements come
from oft-repeated statements to newspapers or from magazines. “Mr.
Osborne,” an aide said when I revealed that this chapter was on Brand
X, “does not want to discuss the Kaypro.”
Andy Kay himself did not speak to me in a normal interview. His
literary agent-friend, William Gladstone, feared that it might
conflict with a project of their own, and Gladstone sought to deny me
ownership of quoted material. Normally I would have told him to stuff
it, but I needed the right quotes to tell the full story of _my_
computer. So Gladstone and I worked out a compromise. After I sent
thousands of words of questions via my Kaypro over the phone lines, he
obtained Kay’s replies on tape. I submitted follow-up queries when
Kay’s answers did not satisfy me. Gladstone insisted on reading this
chapter for accuracy but never tried to censor me; in fact, he was
helpful and pleasant to deal with. He even brought this manuscript to
the attention of a publisher he knew (although I placed it through my
agents). Gladstone’s help, incidentally, didn’t influence my
perception of the Kaypro II as better than the archrival Osborne. I
bought a Kaypro at a time when “William Gladstone” was nothing more to
me than the name of a nineteenth-century English statesman; I
_already_ loved the company’s product. Just the same, determined not
to write an extended press release, I’ve consulted with the
corporation’s critics, and I have run this chapter past a _San Diego
Union_ reporter named Dan Berger, who exposed some of Kaypro’s less
admirable management practices. I’m as grateful to Dan as to Bill.
The computer magazines had portrayed Osborne as a lone maverick taking
on the Silicon Valley establishment with the portable that the rest of
the industry said couldn’t be built. But Kay claimed a similar idea had
hit him at the same time.
Andy Kay had seen his son-in-law struggling to carry an Apple and its
trimmings between home and office and decided that a market might exist
for a small machine for engineers, architects, and other professionals.
_Then_, Kay said, he had heard of the Osborne. Modifying their original
plans somewhat, his people at Non-Linear Systems had homed in on their
rival’s weaknesses, giving their own computer a better screen and a
better keyboard and the ability to store more data. Adam Osborne had
struck back with a jazzed-up version of his first machine. By 1983, many
other companies were in the fray, including Seequa Computer Corporation,
a Maryland manufacturer whose computer sold for less than $2,000 and ran
most IBM-style programs.
In mid-1983 an industry expert was saying Kay and Osborne might together
enjoy $200 million a year in micro sales at the retail level. That was
just a fraction of the $5-billion-a-year market for business micros, but
the two firms then seemed the largest makers of portables in the
$1,000-$2,000 range.[8] Their fight was pivotal. Lines were fuzzing
between economy business computers and the home machines; the winner of
the portable battle might go on to fight Apple and IBM, provided it
survived the onslaught of $1,000 computers that Japan was expected to
unleash. By the end of the decade, powerful portables with a quarter the
bulk of the Kaypro II might jam the shelves of the discount stores.
Footnote 8:
The $200-million and $5-billion estimates came to me from Chris
Christiansen of the Yankee Group, who said the latter figure might be
very conservative. _InfoWorld_ quoted another research firm, InfoCorp,
as saying that 527,000 portable computers were sold in 1982—and that
5.1 million would be sold by 1987.
Kay waged his marketing war from several hillside buildings in Solana
Beach, a small town near San Diego, hundreds of miles south of Osborne
and the rest of Silicon Valley. His was a family business. Kay’s
personal housekeeper served salads and fruit juice in the corporate
lunch room, and his eighty-six-year-old father, known around the plant
as “Grandpa,” repaired electronic equipment and ran a forklift. Andy
Kay’s wife was secretary of the company. One son, David, was the
vice-president for marketing and had helped develop the Kaypro; a second
son worked in personnel, and a third ran the print shop; and Andy Kay’s
daughter and her husband had designed the buildings—which were now the
same light blue as the “KAYPRO II” lettering on the computer.
Altogether, some 450 people worked for Kay’s company by mid-1983. That
was more than twice the number a year earlier when the Kaypro II was
just hitting the market and Kay was counting on a mere $10 million in
sales.
Bulldozers were growling away amid the expansion, and the company
newspaper said equipment-cluttered grounds resembled a scene from a bad
disaster movie.
No longer was Kay a semiobscure maker of voltmeters and oscilloscopes
and other test equipment. Sales, once $4 or $5 million annually, were
barreling along toward $100 million. Even his company name soon
changed—from Non-Linear Systems to Kaypro—in recognition of the success
of the division making his hot new computer.
Wall Street and Andy Kay were getting to know each other. That summer
four million shares of common stock hit the market at $10 each; and the
prospectus said Arthur B. Laffer, the “Laffer Curve” economist, would
serve on the board of directors. Kay still owned most of the company
personally. And now, with the new money, he could give IBM and Apple a
better fight. “After 30 years in business,” _San Diego Magazine_ had
said, “he’s suddenly the new kid on the block, clutching under his arms
a couple of excellent bags of marbles.”[9]
Footnote 9:
The _San Diego Magazine_ article appeared in May 1983.
Before the Kaypro, Kay hadn’t exactly been on the verge of starvation—he
owned an art-filled home overlooking the Pacific and gave to the local
symphony and other cultural causes—but now he’d reached the point where
his admirers were depicting him as a silicon-age Horatio Alger
character.
That’s a little exaggerated. Kay, though poor in his New Jersey days,
was never an orphaned newsboy toughing it alone.
“Grandpa” prodded Andy. Frank Kopischiansky—an Eastern European
immigrant and an ex-coal miner—worked in silk mills and wool factories
and as a chauffeur. Frank had come to the United States from what is now
Poland. Andy Kopischiansky would later become Andy Kay after his
original name baffled some colleagues at work and they kept calling him
“Kay” for short.
The Kopischiansky home lacked a bathtub. “But,” Andy recalled, “we
always had food, and I always had a nickel in my pocket.” Frank enjoyed
fixing broken-down cars and tinkering with electrical equipment, and
Andy himself built a shortwave radio when he was only twelve years old.
Math was another love. Andy even considered a career as an actuary after
Prudential Life told him he could eventually make $15,000 a year. “I
flipped out,” Andy said, “because it was a lot of money in 1935.” Frank
shrugged off the $15,000, however. “That’s not very much,” he said. The
words, incredibly, came from a man who seldom made more than $1,000 a
year during Andy’s youth and who sometimes earned just $15 a week.
Andy, growing up in Clifton, New Jersey, took it for granted he could
never afford college, but then the letters M.I.T. came up in a drafting
class.
“What’s that?” Andy asked. “I’ve never heard of the place.”
Frank had lost most of his savings in a bank crash, but his wife somehow
scraped up enough money to help Andy reach M.I.T. on a partial
scholarship. Andy graduated in 1940 with a bachelors degree in chemical
engineering, mathematics, and premedicine and worked for the Bendix
Corporation and several other companies before founding Non-Linear
Systems in 1953. Kay reached California through a job, although for
years he’d been hoping to enjoy the warm climate there. He started his
company in Solana Beach rather than Silicon Valley because he was
already working in the area. Osborne himself would found his own firm
while living in Berkeley—he’d locate it in Hayward, a medium-sized city
within twenty miles of the Valley proper, the Palo Alto-San Jose area
southeast of San Francisco.
For Non-Linear Systems Kay developed the world’s first commercially
successful digital voltmeter. It was the result of some memories from
World War II, when unskilled workers were constantly damaging
voltmeters and having trouble reading them accurately. Kay’s new
machine easily survived the careless. The instrument displayed numbers
and didn’t require workers to make a reading off the thin needle of a
conventional meter adjusted for the right voltage. “I don’t look at
myself particularly as an inventor,” Kay said. “I’m a solver of
problems. There are inventors who have many, many more ideas than I
get.” Instead, he tried to refine ideas in “ways that make sense from
an industrial-engineering standpoint and a customer standpoint.”
Kay’s digital voltmeter was perfect for the military and for the
National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) and their
contractors; unskilled people could help test thousands of voltages on
American missiles. “The silos are full of our instruments,” he said. But
the NASA cutbacks of the Nixon era hit Non-Linear Systems hard.
“The seven vice-presidents went,” recalled a trade publication, “as did
their white Cadillacs.” Frank Kopischiansky was willing to help see
Non-Linear Systems through bad times, loaning thousands of dollars of
painfully saved money. But that was hardly enough to sustain a
corporation. What about the future? How to avoid the boom-and-bust cycle
of government spending?
Kay decided to carve out a niche as a maker of rugged portable test gear
for private industry. He wanted to offer many of the same wrinkles found
in costly, bench-bound equipment, and one of those features was a
microprocessor in a voltmeter: a miniature electronic brain that would
make it easier to use. The idea came from an old friend, Bill McDonald,
whom Kay had met decades earlier at M.I.T. Their gym lockers were next
to each other’s there; both men had loved handball and hated team
sports. McDonald, a husky man of basketball-player height, had worked
for Non-Linear Systems in the early 1950s, then had returned East, where
he had acquired a computer background. Then, in the late 1970s, he’d
rejoined Non-Linear Systems, where his friend Kay hoped he would help
develop a computer. Correctly or not, Kay believed that “ninety percent
of the electronics business was computer and ten percent was test
equipment, hi-fi, stereo, and stuff like that.” Non-Linear Systems had
offered other companies’ minicomputers in systems it packaged for
military contractors, but still wasn’t making machines of its own. Maybe
a small business machine would be one way to enter computerdom.
“Two months after Bill came to work for me,” Kay recalled, “he showed
me some microprocessor-based computers for doing accounts
payable-receivable at the local computer dealer’s place.
“They were very reasonable, so I bought some and was very intrigued with
them. And I wondered: ‘Why not make this stuff? I could make a better
disk drive. And look at this: this connector doesn’t work too well.’ And
Bill said, ‘We could make them, all right, but I don’t know where you’d
sell them.’ This was in late 1979. I said okay and dropped the idea.”
Two years later, however, Kay watched his architect son-in-law, Michael
Batter, struggling with an Apple and knew the time was ripe for an
easier-to-tote portable.
Kay tried VisiCalc, the electronic spreadsheet, on the Apple and came
away thinking the machine was too complicated, beyond being a hassle to
move from home to office. So Kay told Bill McDonald, “Listen, we’re
selling instruments to engineers. Let’s make a computer that we can walk
in to an engineer and set on his desk and say, ‘Hey, look at this. You
can use it.’”
Still, Kay worried about the new technology. “It’s a fairly stylized
dance,” McDonald reassured him in spring 1981. “You buy the chips, and
there is black magic in getting them to work—but not in how they work.”
“Okay,” came the reply, “that’s it. We’ll get rid of the disadvantages
of the Apple and cram our computer into one box without cables all over
the place.” In ads the Apple looked incredibly compact. Actually,
though, serious computer users needed disk drives to store large amounts
of information for quick retrieval. They also needed a TV-like monitor
to see the letters and numbers they typed out on the computer. And Kay
wisely wanted everything squeezed into one box. If you bought his
machine, you’d get the whole works except perhaps for the printer, which
spewed out your calculations or typed up your letter. Also, it would
cost you less than a full Apple system. Kay could bring down the cost of
a complete machine if he planned on every computer being one.
All this was the logical culmination of Kay’s skill in shrinking gear
for the military and aerospace industry. For years he had been making
printed circuit boards and filling them with components. And he could
order the disk drives, keyboards, and other special computer-type parts
from outside suppliers.