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IBM Apologizes for Firing Computer Pioneer for Being Transgender 52 Years Later

27 points by wilsonfiifi 6y ago

rmk 6y ago
Yeah... This is the same company that gutted the careers of thousands (possibly tens of thousands) of employees because they had grown too old (and thus too expensive) to make room for a cadre of young, cheap and very pliant employees in India. It's easy to apologize to Lynn Conway but it takes real guts to make amends for the horrible ageism IBM has perpetrated.
- ncmncm 6y ago
  IBM also has not, to my knowledge, apologized for their very active role in organizing and supporting the Nazis' attempt at exterminating the entire Jewish population of the territories occupied by the Third Reich. They kept all the money, too. Blighting the career of one brilliant engineer seems to pale, by comparison, but it is really all of a piece.
haltingproblem 6y ago
Conway seems like a class act who in addition to being a mind of the highest intellect and immense work ethic does not seem to hold the slightest grudge on what befell her, her career and her family due to IBM's actions. One virtual event, a heartfelt apology by the HR flack, an award to Conway and all is good? I dunno. This feels like a day late, a dollar short. IBM should do a lot more. A lot lot more.
musicale 6y ago
Forget IBM - PARC was clearly the place to be in the 1970s! It's astonishing how many amazing things came out of PARC in that era - basically the blueprints some 40+ years of modern computing, short of the internet. And where would we be without (Mead &) Conway's pioneering VLSI textbook (and associated courses using it) that fueled the chip revolutions of the 1980s?
ncmncm 6y ago
I understand that Butler Lampson, in the '80s, was firmly opposed to propagating Conway's VLSI design methods, but have not been able to discover why. Fortunately his opposition did not carry the day, and they turned that world upside down very quickly. But I still would like to know; he hasn't often been wrong.
rasz 6y ago
>Thomas J. Watson, Jr., who fired Conway like father, like son. Thomas J. Watson senior received Merit Cross of the German Eagle with Star from Hitler for helping with the holocaust. https://www.hbs.edu/faculty/Pages/item.aspx?num=34689 https://www.hbs.edu/faculty/Pages/item.aspx?num=34689 Here chilling with Hitler https://www.computerhistory.org/revolution/punched-cards/2/15/109 https://www.computerhistory.org/revolution/punched-cards/2/1...

27 points by wilsonfiifi 6y ago

rmk 6y ago

Yeah... This is the same company that gutted the careers of thousands (possibly tens of thousands) of employees because they had grown too old (and thus too expensive) to make room for a cadre of young, cheap and very pliant employees in India. It's easy to apologize to Lynn Conway but it takes real guts to make amends for the horrible ageism IBM has perpetrated.

ncmncm 6y ago
IBM also has not, to my knowledge, apologized for their very active role in organizing and supporting the Nazis' attempt at exterminating the entire Jewish population of the territories occupied by the Third Reich. They kept all the money, too. Blighting the career of one brilliant engineer seems to pale, by comparison, but it is really all of a piece.

haltingproblem 6y ago

Conway seems like a class act who in addition to being a mind of the highest intellect and immense work ethic does not seem to hold the slightest grudge on what befell her, her career and her family due to IBM's actions. One virtual event, a heartfelt apology by the HR flack, an award to Conway and all is good? I dunno. This feels like a day late, a dollar short. IBM should do a lot more. A lot lot more.

musicale 6y ago

Forget IBM - PARC was clearly the place to be in the 1970s! It's astonishing how many amazing things came out of PARC in that era - basically the blueprints some 40+ years of modern computing, short of the internet. And where would we be without (Mead &) Conway's pioneering VLSI textbook (and associated courses using it) that fueled the chip revolutions of the 1980s?

ncmncm 6y ago

I understand that Butler Lampson, in the '80s, was firmly opposed to propagating Conway's VLSI design methods, but have not been able to discover why. Fortunately his opposition did not carry the day, and they turned that world upside down very quickly. But I still would like to know; he hasn't often been wrong.

rasz 6y ago

>Thomas J. Watson, Jr., who fired Conway like father, like son. Thomas J. Watson senior received Merit Cross of the German Eagle with Star from Hitler for helping with the holocaust. https://www.hbs.edu/faculty/Pages/item.aspx?num=34689 https://www.hbs.edu/faculty/Pages/item.aspx?num=34689 Here chilling with Hitler https://www.computerhistory.org/revolution/punched-cards/2/15/109 https://www.computerhistory.org/revolution/punched-cards/2/1...