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1969 and 1970 at Bell Labs

larryluckham.com

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Re: 1969 and 1970 at Bell Labs

#41

Post by newnewpdro »

Latteland wrote: post #39
caymanjim wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not only that, but everyone's got some fashion sense here, while still dressing professionally. Today, there'd be nothing but grey and beige. The office is also colorful and better-decorated than most these days.

It was the end of the 60s, people! My personal experience of that time was that my dad was in his heyday, he worked at IBM as an engineer. I remember seeing equipment like that in the early 70s when I visited him at work. People dressed in flamboyant clothes, had long hair, a lot more counter-cultural acceptance, in certain circles at least.

Yep, ~1969 seems like peak USA in a number of ways. Music, psychedelics, muscle cars / car styling in general, clothing, journalism, what else?

Re: 1969 and 1970 at Bell Labs

#42

Post by naniwaduni »

newnewpdro wrote: post #41
Latteland wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It was the end of the 60s, people! My personal experience of that time was that my dad was in his heyday, he worked at IBM as an engineer. I remember seeing equipment like that in the early 70s when I visited him at work. People dressed in flamboyant clothes, had long hair, a lot more counter-cultural acceptance, in certain circles at least.

Yep, ~1969 seems like peak USA in a number of ways. Music, psychedelics, muscle cars / car styling in general, clothing, journalism, what else?

Moon?

Re: 1969 and 1970 at Bell Labs

#43

Post by antt »

peteradio wrote: post #25

All these comments on the number of women in the photographs and "what happened to all the women in tech?" ... I'm just thinking the photographer was a man with a plan. Anyway heres Wonderwall https://web.archive.org/web/20190202185041/http://www.larryl...

What happened to the women in tech is that the clerical jobs were all replaced by computers.

I'm still not clear how office work has improved by me not having a secretary. The two hours a day I waste on email, meeting planning etc would pay someone a comfortable wage and mean I don't have to be bothered all the time by emails that I probably don't need to answer, unless it's from those two people.

In my current gig we have an actual full time office manager and it's fucking amazing.

Re: 1969 and 1970 at Bell Labs

#44

Post by antt »

codemac wrote: post #22
greggyb wrote: post #4

What happened to all the women? This office would make diversity/inclusion officers salivate.

There are great essays on the topic, but basically - they were kicked out when the position started to earn money for the business. Programmed Inequality by Marie Hicks [0] is a great introduction to some of the history. As my mother was a software engineer in the 70s, it's so incredibly upsetting to hear folks describe how it's just an inherently male interest, forgetting the history of sexism that just happened. [0…

>Programmed Inequality by Marie Hicks [0] is a great introduction to some of the history.

That's largely bullshit.

The position of 'programmer' today would be that of a systems architect from 1960. The position of 'programmer' of 1960 is the linker/assembler program of today. The jobs where women used to be a majority of the staff were simply automated away.

Before you cry sexism the position of CNC programmer, a largely male dominated profession, has suffered from the same. With the job going from being a hugely skilled profession in the 1960s to being something you press a button in a cam package, with the pay dropping correspondingly from the 60s to today.

Re: 1969 and 1970 at Bell Labs

#45

Post by Latteland »

naniwaduni wrote: post #42
newnewpdro wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yep, ~1969 seems like peak USA in a number of ways. Music, psychedelics, muscle cars / car styling in general, clothing, journalism, what else?

Moon?

My whole adult life I wished I was living in a repeat of the 60s. Not because of the war or turmoil, sexism, racism, murder of people like MLK (sounds bad when you put it that way), but because of the freedom, the sense that america was moving forward. We didn't have our best days behind us. I never had that in my adult life.

Re: 1969 and 1970 at Bell Labs

#46

Post by cm2012 »

Latteland wrote: post #45
naniwaduni wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Moon?

My whole adult life I wished I was living in a repeat of the 60s. Not because of the war or turmoil, sexism, racism, murder of people like MLK (sounds bad when you put it that way), but because of the freedom, the sense that america was moving forward. We didn't have our best days behind us. I never had that in my adult life.

Rose colored glasses. The 60s had the most terrifying increase in crime in living memory (one of many graphs: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crime_in_the_United_States#/...). Until MLKs death he and other civil rights movement leaders were incredibly unpopular (check polling of time). By most measures, now is less of a time when the best days are behind us.

Re: 1969 and 1970 at Bell Labs

#47

Post by Latteland »

cm2012 wrote: post #46
Latteland wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My whole adult life I wished I was living in a repeat of the 60s. Not because of the war or turmoil, sexism, racism, murder of people like MLK (sounds bad when you put it that way), but because of the freedom, the sense that america was moving forward. We didn't have our best days behind us. I never had that in my adult life.

Rose colored glasses. The 60s had the most terrifying increase in crime in living memory (one of many graphs: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crime_in_the_United_States#/... ). Until MLKs death he and other civil rights movement leaders were incredibly unpopular (check polling of time). By most measures, now is less of a time when the best days are behind us.

That may be true, but I missed out on wild sex, drugs, rock and roll. And woodstock. :-)

Re: 1969 and 1970 at Bell Labs

#48

Post by TomK32 »

peteradio wrote: post #25

All these comments on the number of women in the photographs and "what happened to all the women in tech?" ... I'm just thinking the photographer was a man with a plan. Anyway heres Wonderwall https://web.archive.org/web/20190202185041/http://www.larryl...

Home computers and male nerds suddenly having an advantage when they start at Uni is what happened.

Re: 1969 and 1970 at Bell Labs

#49

Post by nostrademons »

antt wrote: post #43
peteradio wrote: post #25

All these comments on the number of women in the photographs and "what happened to all the women in tech?" ... I'm just thinking the photographer was a man with a plan. Anyway heres Wonderwall https://web.archive.org/web/20190202185041/http://www.larryl...

What happened to the women in tech is that the clerical jobs were all replaced by computers. I'm still not clear how office work has improved by me not having a secretary. The two hours a day I waste on email, meeting planning etc would pay someone a comfortable wage and mean I don't have to be bothered all the time by emails that I probably don't need to answer, unless it's from those two people. In my current gig w…

The women who used to be secretaries (some subset of them, at least) are now lawyers, doctors, investors, managers, engineers, etc.

That's always been the point of eliminating jobs: it frees up the people who used to do those jobs to do other things.

Re: 1969 and 1970 at Bell Labs

#50

Post by antt »

nostrademons wrote: post #49
antt wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What happened to the women in tech is that the clerical jobs were all replaced by computers. I'm still not clear how office work has improved by me not having a secretary. The two hours a day I waste on email, meeting planning etc would pay someone a comfortable wage and mean I don't have to be bothered all the time by emails that I probably don't need to answer, unless it's from those two people. In my current gig w…

The women who used to be secretaries (some subset of them, at least) are now lawyers, doctors, investors, managers, engineers, etc. That's always been the point of eliminating jobs: it frees up the people who used to do those jobs to do other things.

The jobs created in the last 20 years have been worse paid and less secure than the jobs that were destroyed. The granddaughters of the 60s secretaries are baristas, nurses, cleaners, retail workers and other jobs with terrible working conditions and security.

That's the problem of the current system, losing jobs is fine as long as they are replaced by better jobs. When they are replaced by worse jobs you have a broken system. And we have a very broken system.

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