David L. Farquhar on technology old and new, computer security, and more
30 years ago today, on October 16, 1995, Roland Vossen accidentally invented spyware in a Usenet post. Well, not exactly. He didn’t invent spyware so much as he invented the term. His Usenet post contained the first recorded use of the word “spyware.”
It was 16 years ago today on October 14, 2009, that SCO fired its CEO, Darl McBride. And it was about 13 months ago, on September 16, 2024, that McBride died at the age of 64 of complications from ALS.
His termination from SCO ended his time as the most hated man in technology. McBride architected SCO’s Business strategy of suing companies for contributing code to Linux, or even for using Linux.
Microsoft Access didn’t exist in the MS-DOS era. Microsoft wasn’t even a player in databases until relatively late in the MS-DOS era. The dominant database during most of the DOS era was a company called Ashton-Tate. They had a product called dBase II that ran on CP/M machines and dominated that era. It ported over to the IBM PC and dominated there as well. Ashton-Tate’s dBase II and its successor, dBase III, became the de facto standard for databases on microcomputers. On October 12, 1991, Borland acquired Ashton-Tate for $439 million. It was a colossal mistake.
When Commodore released its VIC-20 computer in 1981, one of the peripherals it also released was a matching joystick. Cast in white plastic like the VIC-20, the Commodore VIC-1311 looked like an albino Atari joystick from the same time period. The resemblance was uncanny, and Atari took notice. On October 11, 1982, Atari sued.
On October 9, 1991, Apple Records settled one of its many lawsuits with Apple Computer. It wasn’t the first time the two companies tangled. Nor would it be the last. Apple Records was the Beatles’ record label. Apple Computer was, of course, a maker of computers. It was the nature of one of those computers that got Apple Computer into trouble.
As someone who lived through the dotcom bubble, experiencing the breakthrough of the Internet in the early 1990s and worked in technology during the boom later in the decade, I’ve been asked what I think of the AI phenomenon going on in the mid 2020s. Yes, I chose that wording for a reason. Time will tell if it’s best called an AI boom, an AI bubble, or something worse like an AI scam.
41 years ago this week, on October 6, 1983, Lotus Development held its very successful IPO worth $5.5 billion. Founded by Mitch Kapor and Jonathan Sachs in 1982, Lotus was the publisher of a spreadsheet called Lotus 1-2-3, and two months after their IPO, they were the second largest software company in the world.
On October 5, 1992, IBM released its first three Thinkpad models. IBM had portable computers before, starting with its luggable Portable PC from 1984 and PC Convertible from 1986. But none of them had the lasting success of the Thinkpad, which IBM designed to compete head to head with Compaq’s LTE, Apple’s Powerbook, and Toshiba’s Dynabook.
35 years ago, a young system administrator named Cliff Stoll shared a story on Nova, a PBS documentary program. Stoll introduced his audience to a brave and unfamiliar world of computers, networks, and hackers. Movies about computers and hackers were nothing new, but this wasn’t a movie, and I wasn’t the target audience. This was real, and the target audience was middle-aged people like my dad.
Activision was the first independent third-party publisher of console video games, founded October 1, 1979 by a group of former Atari developers. Activision proved successful, becoming the largest and most enduring publisher of video games for both game consoles and computers of its era. What happened to Activision was its successor company, Activision Blizzard, was acquired by Microsoft on October 13, 2023, ending a 44-year run.