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> If you missed it, the tiny section on ITS has some gems: I was there a few years later in the early 80s, and I wouldn't romanticize ITS. There were reasons

> If you missed it, the tiny section on ITS has some gems: I was there a few years later in the early 80s, and I wouldn't romanticize ITS. There were reasons it didn't live on. However, one of the more hilarious inventions in the system: It used to be a pastime to try and crash a system. This was of course a huge PITA for anyone else on the system, but for whatever reason of target fixation, you couldn't stop people from trying. So ITS had an explicit command to crash the system (KILL SYSTEM iirc), and it was well published. By removing the challenge, the system stayed up. There's some deep statement about hacker psychology in there somewhere. Edit: Just saw your username. You weren't by any chance the same gumby from the 80s?

mixmastamyk 8y ago
> Just saw your username. You weren't by any chance the same gumby from the 80s? Eddie Murphy on SNL? ;-)
- gumby 8y ago
  Yes, I am the same gumby at the MIT AI lab from late 70s to mid 80s. Never saw the SNL thing though have heard about it.
  - mixmastamyk 8y ago
    :D https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dpq40ug7-RM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dpq40ug7-RM
  - jpmattia 8y ago
    > Yes, I am the same gumby at the MIT AI lab from late 70s to mid 80s. Apparently you have a pretty memorable username, because I don't think we ever interacted. I was a mere UROP. (I worked on a robot named TARDIS (tea and ravioli delivery service) for Jon Taft (tfat) and John [can't remember his last name], ultimately under tk. Nobody would remember me, being just a peon and then leaving to do hardware, but it was a great environment to cut your teeth, and a real privilege to have delved into LMs at that time.) Hope things went well for you and the rest of that bunch, it was an incredible place.