19 Sep
2011
19 Sep
'11
9:58 a.m.
Amazing, I
didn't realize any were still running. Last time I saw
PLATO was in the 1970s. The terminals were touch screens, they blew .>
everyone's minds. .
With plasma screens yet. I understood that the screen was much of the
cost of one of those terminals. CDC had a difficult time marketing the thing. I
remember one year at
NCC, the folks at the CDC booth looking bored with the attendees sort of
shuffling through. I noted that they had a PLATO terminal, so I asked
one of the booth jockeys if I could try it. I brought up Airfight and
immediately collected a crowd. The folks at the booth were a little
upset at the idea of playing a game, when they were tasked with selling
"serious" stuff and eventually they put a stop to it.
Talk about not seeing the forest for the trees.
That's a good story. They really shanked that one, they probably should
have offered you a job on the spot.
The PLATO system I saw was at a university. I don't know whether it was
donated or they bought it "with your tax dollars". They had a bunch of
those touch screen terminals lined up on conference tables. As I remember,
it wasn't even in the data center but the Social Sciences building and I'm
almost certain the CDC machine wasn't in the data center either. That was
an expensive setup to have stuff spread out all over the campus like that.
I don't know what they used it for aside from some AI research. I guess
stuff like that was always a hard sell. I wonder how many 4051 Tektronix
sold by demoing that old golf game. It was a hoot and probably more of an
eyecatcher than whatever the salesmen used.
Sorry if this is a duplicate, I emailed earlier but did not see it posted.