Software rental, "trusted computing", etc. (was Re: Is this for real -- a new C64/128) - test-drb@ccmp.vtda.org

16 May 2000

...
 I am sometimes asked 'what can that 20-year-old
machine do'. One correct
answer is 'Everything it did 20 years ago' (I was having this discussion
with Philip Belben the other day, so some ideas here may have come from
that). In other words, that 20-year-old CP/M box with Wordstar was doing
word processing back then. It can still do word processing. Maybe not
with all the fancy fonts and formatting tricks of a more modern machine.
But it can still print letters, books, etc. And quite honestly, that's
all I need (and if people can't accept a plain ascii file from me, I have
no intention of dealing with them!). 

I would have said the same.... save for now we know that even with
older hardware things like fonts and pretty printing are easily doable
on hardware like IMSAIs and PDP11s (and often done well!).

...
 It never fails to amaze me that computers are wonderful
machines
_because_ they can be programmed to do just about anything. And then
modern OSes/applications (and things like the TCPA) seem to be preventing
you from programmming them. Go figure. 

The only difference between a PDP-11 and a PIII/750 is how long you may
 wait for the same results.  Granted some software projects are only doable
in reasonable time scales as a result of speed.  For practical projects
I have a 386/16 that does run W95 so speed is not the absolute catalyst.

Remember:  Stable Mature systems we know how to use, applies here.

Allison