That awful show on TNT

From: Fred Cisin <cisin_at_xenosoft.com>
Date: Mon Jun 21 18:44:46 1999

On Mon, 21 Jun 1999, Tony Duell wrote:
> For the benefit of those of us who don't get American TV, could you
> please explain what this programme (show?) was and what it got wrong?

It was a made-for-TV movie that purported to be a history of personal
computers, although any resemblance between it and any persons or events
in the real world was strictly coincidental.

It had billg and Jobs as the two primary characters. Wozniak, Ballmer and
Allen had supporting roles. Ed Roberts, Makkula, Scully, Jobs' girlfriend
and daughter were the only other named characters. The Microsoft staff in
Albuquerque (Letwin, Wallace, etc.) were referred to as student workers.
Some of the narration was purportedly by Ballmer and some by Woz. Did
they have any say in content?

It started by saying that they were going to "rewrite history", but that
was probably merely referring to the making of the Apple 1984 ad, rather
than the more accurate application to the movie. The bizarre scene of the
meeting with IBM even had Ballmer turning to the camera and saying that it
should be taught that way in history classes!

It had scenes of Woz and Jobs in Berkeley with blue boxes, Gates, Allen
and Ballmer in Gates' Harvard dorm room, Microsoft in Albuquerque, then
without a transition, they seem to have placed Microsoft in Silicon
Valley. They show Microsoft approaching IBM to interest them in having an
OS ("It's called DOS"), shows Gates as ruthless, and shows Jobs having a
lot of tantrums.

> and what it got wrong?

I don't know. Anybody want to address what it got right? SOME parts were
credible.
Received on Mon Jun 21 1999 - 18:44:46 BST