4-9-18

Pong: Al Acorn and Nolan Bushnell

why would Pong be a success in competition with pinball games?

• easy to learn
• exciting because it was new technology
• being able to control something on TV
• direct competition rather than just taking turns
  

business patterns:

• come out with new products as quickly as possible
• get on the market quickly: get known, see how people react, make money to build a factory
• economic booms and recessions have a big impact
• these people were willing to take a lot of career risks
• not of not worrying about following the rules or even telling the truth going on
  

what is the culture here?

• laid back business culture--hot tubs after hours, beer tap in the office
• young men behaving badly culture but also nonconformist (hippie, anti-war)
  
• less room for women here than in big companies like IBM
  

competitors quickly appeared selling similar arcade games for a lower price
Atari was in financial trouble
the solution was a home version of Pong to hook up to your TV in 1975
key to this is the game could be on a single integrated circuit, so harder to copy



Niels Reimers and genetic engineering

the scientific discovery was being able to clip out a section from a strand of DNA and insert it elsewhere
this is the first possibility of genetically modified organisms

• can the process or the resulting organisms be patented
• the culture in universities was not about making money, scientists were more interested in the public good and discovery
• fears about whether the research was too risky
  

turning that into a patent was difficult
the scientists were uncertain about patenting
was it even patentable?
different scientists and universities working together

meanwhile, fears of genetic engineering were developing
Asilomar conference in Feb. 1975

back to Mike Markkula:
Intel kept up, developing new kinds of chips, but the industry was up and down
Markkula retired but did some consulting