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"I think there is a world market for five...maybe six computers." - Thomas Watson, president of IBM, 1943 "Too big to fail" - Titanic, and some banks, 1912 -
by graderjs 5y ago
"I think there is a world market for five...maybe six computers."
- Thomas Watson, president of IBM, 1943
"Too big to fail"
- Titanic, and some banks, 1912 - 2008
"Don't worry, the software labor market is safe" - 2021
- rank0 5y agoWhat a low effort comment. I could replace the last quote with any statement and it still reads the same.
- graderjs 5y agoLess low effort than yours? Yeah it was pretty easy to do, but low effort not really. You know it's like Picasso, the 30 second sketch contains 25 years of experience. Reads the same? With a different meaning tho. Meaning's important. That's what we're doing here: meaning.
- verall 5y agoThe significance of the first quote, is that in 1943, "computers" were people who did math by hand. His point was that 5 or 6 electronic computers could replace the whole world's market for "computers".
- graderjs 5y agoIs that right? Seems the common take is that this guy underestimated computers. Like the guy who cashed out his Apple investment for 800 (Ronald Wayne).
- hwayne 5y agoI started looking up the provenance of the quote, then stopped, because there's an entire wikipedia section on how it never happened: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_J._Watson#Famous_attribution https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_J._Watson#Famous_attrib...