Revenge of the nerd

I spent much of the holiday weekend watching old episodes of "Computer Chronicles," a PBS series that covered the PC industry from 1982 to 2002. The show is archived extensively at archive.org. (Don't worry; I got out in that fabulous weather, too!) I stumbled across the show in looking for information on my newest distraction, an old Apple IIc I somehow acquired. Anyone got any Apple II software they're not using?

This history fascinates me. PCs are thoroughly mainstream now, but it was only about 25 years ago that Left Coast counterculture types founded microcomputer companies with names like Kentucky Fried Computers, Intergalactic Digital Research--and Apple, supposedly so named because its cofounder Steve Jobs was experimenting with fruititarianism.

Back in the day, acquiring a personal computer--like the Apple I--meant buying a circuit board and some parts and cobbling the thing together with a soldering iron. And once it was assembled, there wasn't much to do with it. (Instant messaging was still a few years away.)

The industry had matured, some, by the time "Computer Chronicles" first aired in 1982, a year after the first IBM PC came out. I was 11 that year, and although I thought computers were pretty fabulous, I wasn't quite sure what they were good for. Sometimes I feel that way now.