On this day in 1981, IBM released the first personal computer.
Bill Gates and his company Microsoft were there, helping IBM to develop the operating system and software for their first personal computers.
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A Desktop Revolution
On this day in 1981, IBM released the first personal computer.
Bill Gates and his company Microsoft were there, helping IBM to develop the operating system and software for their first personal computers.
In an interview with the National Museum of American History, Bill Gates shares the optimism of those heady, early days.
"Well, Paul [Allen, cofounder of Microsoft] had talked about the microprocessor and where that would go and so we had formulated this idea that everybody would have kind of a computer as a tool somehow. Not just for business, but also for something they would play around with as a home device. We knew that however it got started, that there would be certain standards built-up around it, about how you programmed things. We wanted to be part of that excitement. And so we saw this machine as just the beginning of an era."
Thus, a revolution in office equipment and home computing began! Clinton Adams printed today's artwork in 1960, long before the first personal computer. Part of his "Window" series, the artwork anticipates the metaphor that Microsoft developed for its ubiquitous operating system.
Source: Smithsonian National Museum of American History, Behring Center. Computer History Collection. "Interview with Bill Gates" at http://americanhistory.si.edu/csr/comphist/gates.htm#tc13.
Pictured: Clinton Adams, born 1918, Window Series IX, 1960, lithograph on paper, 13 1/16 x 9 1/2 in., Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of the Tamarind Lithography Workshop, Inc.