It's like a modern version of what computers with Williams-Kilburn tubes could do: https://www.computerhistory.org/revolution/memory-storage/8/308 https://www.

It's like a modern version of what computers with Williams-Kilburn tubes could do: https://www.computerhistory.org/revolution/memory-storage/8/308 https://www.computerhistory.org/revolution/memory-storage/8/... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Williams_tube https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Williams_tube > The Williams tube works by displaying a grid of dots on a cathode ray tube (CRT). Due to the way CRTs work, this creates a small charge of static electricity over each dot. The charge at the location of each of the dots is read by a thin metal sheet just in front of the display. [snip] > Some Williams tubes were made from radar-type cathode ray tubes with a phosphor coating that made the data visible, while other tubes were purpose-built without such a coating. The presence or absence of this coating had no effect on the operation of the tube, and was of no importance to the operators, since the face of the tube was covered by the pickup plate. If a visible output was needed, a second tube connected in parallel with the storage tube, with a phosphor coating, but without a pickup plate, was used as a display device. So the tube the users could see wasn't the memory, which was covered by a metal plate, but it showed exactly the same dots as the memory.