My very first PC was a Xerox 820 with a cabled IBM selectric as a printer and (2) 8" floppy drives.
davew On Wed, Sep 14, 2022, at 9:58 AM, Steve Smith wrote: > When Mary moved here she had a collection of 3.5" floppies with her > early poetry on them... she wasn't sure what she had and hadn't had a > floppy drive to look at them with since the 90s. As it turned out I > had a USB floppy reader I had bought to help someone else recover their > history and she copied everything onto her hard drive... a few of the > floppies were unreadable... I don't remember the details (5 years ago?) > I believe that deep in my shed there is a mid 80s PC with a 5.25" > internal floppy drive... <sigh>. I also had a "core memory" artifact > from one of the earlyish LASL machines in my office for decades but I > can't remember when/where I let it go. > > I remember a Sandia? Engineer who I would occasionally encounter on > flights in/out of ABQ and layovers. He would carry a small stack of > punch cards that he used to take notes on and when anyone would ask him > about them, he would tell them about the history of such items and > offer to sell them one for $1, and apparently many, many people took him > up on that deal... a good deal by some measure for everyone. I saw him > sell at least 5 or 6 in the times I was in his presence (on the plane, > waiting for a flight, etc). and I wonder where all those strange little > artifacts ended up? Ed or someone else on the same flight paths I was on > in those days might know who he is? Sandia Engineers (and Scientists) > were easy to spot in airports, esp. ABQ... maybe LANL too, but Sandia > had a particular signature "look"? The cards were probably Sandia > property and there is probably a waste/fraud/abuse scandal to be had in > there somewhere... gak! > > I also used to collect exposed 35mm film from garage sales and friends > going digital? Why would anyone have *exposed* film? Nobody knows > exactly... I assume the transition time when someone would deprecate an > old camera (after going digital) would lead to at least *one* roll of > film in the old camera half-exposed. I kept them in a ziplock freezer > bag, thinking that *someday* I would (hand) process them all as a sort > of performance-art experience. Instead I encountered someone about 5 > years ago who was doing a similar thing and I simply gave my collection > (20 or more) of exposed rolls to them (along with a similar number of > frozen unexposed rolls). > > I also expect that abandoned USB sticks and micro/mini/SD/??? cards will > also be an interesting Archeological find someday. I have a 4" > diameter metal pipe core to my spiral staircase with an open (capped) > top which I have come to use as a "time capsule". Every few weeks I have > a small collection of artifacts that have no proper use but are > entertaining in their own right that I drop down there. I have at least > 3 or 4 USB sticks layered in there. I don't know exactly how deep my > collection is... I've been doing this casually for years but only with > small and acutely (at the moment) interesting items... Maybe 1 foot > deep more or less? The presumption is that decades from now the house > (owner-built in the early 80s) will burn down or be bulldozed to put in > some ultra-modern thing and the spiral staircase will be the last thing > standing and *maybe* someone will notice as 1000 tiny bits of gak flow > out of the pipe as they haul it off. Or not. I've been tempted to cut > a tiny "door" in the bottom to provide access, but that would ruin the > conceit I think. Maybe paint a "fairy door" in the same location to > suggest to a curious person to do so? MMmmmMM? > > I would drop the old floppy and a (newer) DVD-USB drive down the hole as > a "bootstrap", but they are both too big. > > > > On 9/14/22 10:09 AM, Tom Johnson wrote: >> https://eyeondesign.aiga.org/we-spoke-with-the-last-person-standing-in-the-floppy-disk-business/#:post_86454 >> >> ======================= >> Tom Johnson >> Inst. for Analytic Journalism >> Santa Fe, New Mexico >> 505-577-6482 >> ======================= >> >> -. --- - / ...- .- .-.. .. -.. / -- --- .-. ... . / -.-. --- -.. . >> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv >> Fridays 9a-12p Friday St. Johns Cafe / Thursdays 9a-12p Zoom >> https://bit.ly/virtualfriam >> to (un)subscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com >> FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ >> archives: 5/2017 thru present >> https://redfish.com/pipermail/friam_redfish.com/ >> 1/2003 thru 6/2021 http://friam.383.s1.nabble.com/ > > -. --- - / ...- .- .-.. .. -.. / -- --- .-. ... . / -.-. --- -.. . > FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv > Fridays 9a-12p Friday St. Johns Cafe / Thursdays 9a-12p Zoom > https://bit.ly/virtualfriam > to (un)subscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com > FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ > archives: 5/2017 thru present > https://redfish.com/pipermail/friam_redfish.com/ > 1/2003 thru 6/2021 http://friam.383.s1.nabble.com/ -. --- - / ...- .- .-.. .. -.. / -- --- .-. ... . / -.-. --- -.. . FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Fridays 9a-12p Friday St. Johns Cafe / Thursdays 9a-12p Zoom https://bit.ly/virtualfriam to (un)subscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ archives: 5/2017 thru present https://redfish.com/pipermail/friam_redfish.com/ 1/2003 thru 6/2021 http://friam.383.s1.nabble.com/
