How Computers Transformed Baby Boomers

theodp writes "Newsweek's Steven Levy takes a look at how the baby boomer generation formed our tech landscape. Many of the realities boomers grew up with are today's metaphors, including cut-and-paste, the origin of which the 56-year-old Levy had to explain to 20-something Google employees. Levy cites two texts as crucial in pushing the boomers' vision toward power-to-the-people computing — Ted Nelson's Computer Lib/Dream Machines, which inspired Mitch Kapor, and the January 1975 Popular Electronics, which got Bill Gates jazzed. You kids might want to check out Dad's bookshelf — used copies of Computer Lib are going for $130-$225 at Amazon."

Scrollbars

[jesser]

Did baby boomers use scrolls [squarefree.com], too?

Re:Scrollbars

[Harmonious Botch]

Only the ones with rich parents. The rest of us had to make do with clay tablets.

Re:As a member of "GenX" let me say ...

[Shaitan Apistos]

I can't wait until they all go on medicare/social security so I can pick up a second job to pay for it.

Re:Scrollbars

[__aaclcg7560]

Yeah, if you're middle class. The rest of us had to draw on cave walls. :P

This Just In--

[Anonymous Coward]

Apparently the Boomers were responsible for everything, including all technology! Nevermind that your parents don't know the first thing about computers.

Re:The title is reversed... Sheesh, editors.

[antifoidulus]

I don't know, after the cyborg revolution the computers will need something to feed on, and what better than old people, the same people who invented computers to begin with?

In other news

[nutshell42]

Many 19th century inventions invented by 19th century inventors. Film at 11.

Time to feed Mr Fusion...

[toby]

And hop in the DeLorean... we're going back to 1975 to make sure Popular Electronics never prints that issue...

Re:As a member of "GenX" let me say ...

[foreverpuppy]

If only there was a way to harness the boomers' power of nostalgia and put it to good use. Like banks of boomers chasing after 12" GI Joes, or copies of "The Big Chill" on treadmills running generators.

Re:Scrollbars

[darkmeridian]

Forget scrolls. I misread the summary as "which got Bill Gates jizzed" and almost puked. I was thinking how pathetic life was before Internet porn.

Re:As a member of "GenX" let me say ...

[m0nkyman]

That's cause Baby Boomers lie about their age, and us Gen-X'ers are starting to too. ;) I'm the same age I was ten years ago, honest. :)

lucky you!

[Anonymous Coward]

You had nice comfy caves! We had to make do with the overhead shade of traveling mammoths, and plait their hair into crude runes which others had to read whilst avoiding getting trampled! And it was in the snow, all the time, and dammit if they didn't look for every hill to climb they could find!

Re:This Just In--

[Octorian]

I still remember the 90's when that generation would boast how they didn't even know those things, and seemed proud of it.

Re:Baby Boomers & middle age

[Anonymous Coward]

We all have an indefinite lifespan ... unless your birth certificate came with an expiration date.

Re:Baby Boomers/Bummers - a Useless Generation

[Anonymous Coward]

How could you not have an unhappy childhood, growing up parented by the generation behind us and surrounded by the current generation?

Re:I've got a copy

[Cuppa 'Joe' Black]

"I wonder why it's so expensive?"

Because scarcity is like heroin to booksellers. We are cutthroat savages every last one of us.

Re:I call "B.S." on the "cut-and-paste" example...

[heinousjay]

Because you can't properly appreciate how easy you have it unless old people know that you understand it used to be harder. It's the stage before you chase kids off your lawn.

Re:I call "B.S." on the "cut-and-paste" example...

[Bluesman]

Well, before there was fork(), Unix (well, Multics) had to make do with chopsticks(), which worked fine, but didn't check if there was enough memory to actually create the new process, so a lot of brand new processes would get dropped almost instantly, especially if the user wasn't adept at using chopsticks() and didn't realize what was going on. Another drawback was that you had to start a new version of chopsticks() every time you rebooted and type in all of the required command line arguments.

Fortunately, fork() came along and fixed all of this, so there are now very few dropped processes and fork() boots automatically with the system.

Apparently, Irix used an advanced version of fork() called spork(), which was even more stable and performed the functions of fork() AND bind() at the same time.