The Hobby Computer Culture

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The Hobby Computer Culture​

[This post is part of “A Bicycle for the Mind.” The complete series can be found here.]

From 1975 through early 1977, the use of personal computers remained almost exclusively the province of hobbyists who loved to play with computers and found them inherently fascinating. When BYTE magazine came out with its premier issue in 1975, the cover called computers “the world’s greatest toy.” When Bill Gates wrote about the value of good software in the spring of 1976, he framed his argument in terms of making the computer interesting, not useful: “…software makes the difference between a computer being a fascinating educational tool for years and being an exciting enigma for a few months and then gathering dust in the closet.”[1]

Even as late as 1978, an informed observer could still consider interest in personal computers to be exclusive to a self-limiting community of hobbyists. Jim Warren, editor of Dr. Dobb’s Journal of Computer Calisthenics and Orthodontia, predicted a maximum market of one million home computers, expecting them to be somewhat more popular than ham radio, which attracted about 300,000.[2]

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technicshistory.com

The Hobby Computer Culture

[This post is part of “A Bicycle for the Mind.” The complete series can be found here.] From 1975 through early 1977, the use of personal computers remained almost exclusively the province of …
technicshistory.com technicshistory.com
 
www.youtube.com

RI Computer Museum

The Rhode Island Computer Museum (RICM) is a non-profit 501(c)(3) organization established in 1999 in RI to preserve our rich vintage computer history.
www.youtube.com www.youtube.com
 
This had me smiling. Enjoy.

Computer Whiz Looks At His 12 yr Old Self 41 Years Later​

Jun 18, 2026
Jay Ehrlich was a 12-year-old kid in 1979 in Cedar Rapids Iowa. He was in a computer store with his dad looking to buy a new computer. Like most of us at that time, his dad didn't know anything about computers while Jay was something of an expert (we called them geeks) doing programming and creating early video games. I was making the documentary for television called The Information Society about the coming of the information age and the ending of the industrial age. At the time, more and more people were using computers for business activities that the public was not yet aware of. There were about 800,000 computers being used in the world at that time.
Of course, out in the Silicon Valley (it wasn't called that yet) Steve Jobs and Steve Woz had already founded Apple computers making home computers and they were for sale in this computer store. The local store manager knew what was coming and predicted it but just about everybody stepping into the store did not own a computer or really know what they were capable of (almost none of us did).
For many years after I posted the initial clip from my film on YouTube, I did not know the name of this boy and his dad because my archive had burned in a fire so I had no written information. After several years, a subscriber found Jay and I connected with him and asked him if I could interview his dad and him again all these years later to look back on that time and what they had said and what had changed in the intervening years.
I enjoy seeing people's lives over time and every once in a while get the chance to interview someone who I had interviewed many years before. The results are always interesting.
Thank you Jay and dad. I would like to interview you both again 40 years from now.


15:43
 
Chicken lips 64, long time no see, TI-55 programmable calculator, and the TI-99 computer, really wasn't good with them....
 
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