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After heavy criticism for a decade, the government ceased all support for the ICON in 1994 and ordered all ICON hardware to be sent to landfill and software to
by brynet 2y ago
After heavy criticism for a decade, the government ceased all support for the ICON in 1994 and ordered all ICON hardware to be sent to landfill and software to be destroyed.
This is a sad part of history, I vividly remember hearing this had happened. Growing up in Ontario with computer labs full of these up until the mid to late 90's, graph paper hanging on the walls with LOGO programs, and games, so many games (Oregon trail, Cross Country Canada), and then they started getting replaced with PC's in classrooms. I remember missing a local auction or something that had a bunch of these Burroughs (later Unisys) ICONs for $5/$10, but without the LEXICON server they were functionally useless, I still regret not picking one up.
Always happy whenever someone else remembers them.
- cloudsec9 2y agoIt's disappointing. I'm sure the rationale at the time was that it was an under-powered and obsolete machine, but many schools in Ontario were far behind and having these machines go to other places would have been helpful. But that might have meant software and support costs, and can't have that. I too am glad they are remembered.