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October 20, 2004

We're fifty years into the future

On 18 October, 1954, this revolutionary device was announced in America. Fifty years later, it has been blamed for rock and roll, the death of the US consumer electronics industry, the relentless rise of IBM and the shocking state of modern manners. Not a bad score for a transistor radio.

It wasn't just a transistor radio, of course. It was the first. In fact, it was the first transistorised mass-market device, and it symbolised the central role that technology was taking in the post-war world. Never underestimate the power of such symbols – Thomas Watson Jr., head of IBM, gave his senior managers a TR-1 apiece to kick-start the company's transition from valves. That symbolism had a different flavour ten years later as outfits like Sony and Toshiba used the same technology to smoothly wrest control of the market from its inventors. Outsourcing fears are nothing new.

Complete Article

Posted by thinkingmachine at October 20, 2004 04:05 PM

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