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Altair 8800, the first personal computer to make it big
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My first computer was an Altair.
It was a machine from a time when personal computers were a hopeful symbol of a better future for the whole of humanity. Tech bro sumbitches monetized that hope away, and now our future is an adversarial billionaire-feeding dystopia, promising more billionaires and more dystopia.
I'm old enough to retire soon, and I constantly feel someone took away the future I was promised as a teen. As a frustrated gen-Xer who generally had it good despite everything, I can't imagine the kind of despair young people today are going through. At least I can remember the Altair, and that's something.
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Yeah, I realized the computer world was going down the drain when Scott McNealy inadvertently spill the beans on the industry's true intentions in 1999, and a few years later, I quit programming entirely and changed career.
I still use computers because I have to, and I maintain a few open-source projects of little importance so I can say I've done my part. But mostly I'm busy avoiding computers and trying to maintain whatever shred of privacy I have left.
😞