3 ms·
Ask HN: What are some great shows/movies about computing and computing history?
The Imitation Game and the General Magic documentary come to mind.
- giantg2 6y agoI found Halt and Catch Fire to be entertaining. It's not really historical or technical, but shows the politics of a fictional company (based loosely on Compaq) related to technology. Keri Bishe is also very attractive with auburn hair. There have been a couple movies about Steve Jobs. I think netflix has some stuff about Microsoft and Bill Gates. I think there's also a BBC produced film about algorithms on Netflix, although it's very basic.
- kbr2000 6y agoI've found many good (mostly black-n-white) historical snippets by searching on YT for persons related to computer history (for example Von Neumann, Hopper, Feynman, ...). A lot is related to wartime efforts, as there seemed to be a real need there.. But there's certainly no shortage of books [0] about the subject, and I'd recommend to start there to get a list of names and key events first. If you're looking for entertainment (although there's multiple good documentaries listed there too): [1] HCF is something I'm planning to check out soon! [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22907211 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22907211 [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_films_about_computers https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_films_about_computers
- kbr2000 6y agoAnd here's a new one that seems very interesting, just out: Bit Player [0] (about Claude Shannon and his work) [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D7WmMSAxq8s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D7WmMSAxq8s
- vlz 6y agoThere is a german film "23" about two hackers in the 80s. It is said to give a good impression of the hacker culture of that time, but also has cold war and conspiracy theory themes. It is based on real events, though it took some license apparently. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/23_(film) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/23_(film)