Lecture 6

Question 1

Differences between US and Europe

Answer 1

Between the 80s and 90s, European culture was opposed to American influence
Europe thought of “1984” as a novel about a society under constant surveillance while the US viewed it as an anti-Cold War book
Squatter movement was very popular in Europe, not at all in the US
Homebrew Computer Club stood against software piracy, European Hobby Computer Club kept pirating software

Question 2

Hacktivism

Answer 2

Hacking as a political statement

Question 3

Demoscenes

Answer 3

European phenomenon in the 1980s
People started tinkering with the machines, trying to do things with it like ASCII art, grafitti, music

Question 4

Free software movement

Answer 4

1983 at MIT as well as squatter culture
Once bought, user was free to use, tinker with, and understand the software
The open source software movement originated from this (1998)

Question 5

PCs

Answer 5

Home computer projects made owning a computer at home more affordable

Question 6

What % of the Dutch population owned PCs in 1980 and 1995?

Answer 6

30% and 60%, respectively

Question 7

What 3 “wishes” led to the rise of the Internet?

Answer 7

Worldwide encyclopaedia, fault tolerant network, and connecting different networks

Question 8

Viditel

Answer 8

1980 in the Netherlands
quite expensive
the project failed

Question 9

Teletekst

Answer 9

1980 in the Netherlands
state-owned network
came with a television set so anyone with a television could receive Teletekst messages

Question 10

PTT

Answer 10

1978 in the Netherlands
state-owned telecommunications company established a network using circuit switching electronics
1978-1981 they switched to packet switching on the X25 protocol
cost hundreds of euros per month
using datanet and the telephone simultaneously was not possible as they shared lines

Question 11

Games (important dates/events)

Answer 11

1952 Alan Turing chess algorithm
1960 Nimbus by Regnecentralen (a program to match a human player)
1961 Spacewar
1972 first game tournament took place

Question 12

What was novel about Pacman’s release?

Answer 12

It was released as software that you could buy on a cassette and play on your own computer. Completely different concept from selling a whole computer

Question 13

When did CS departments start being formed in France?

Answer 13

1980s

Question 14

What happened in the Netherlands with regards to CS departments?

Answer 14

Government had to be convinced to fund these departments. CS departments appeared in 1981, Information Sciences only showed up in 1984

Question 15

CS Education in Belgium and the UK

Answer 15

Part of management sciences while informatics/AI was part of the medicine department

Question 16

Three traditions

Answer 16

Administration => Information Sciences
Process Control => Artificial Intelligence
Science => Computer Science

Question 17

When did the three traditions merge?

Answer 17

After the war, there was significant overlap which established a connection between the three.