Go2: The Guardian OnLine online, September 18, 1996
"Keep death off the codes: Everything that can go wrong, will go wrong, says Gregory Rawlins""Did you hear the one about the computer industry's progress?" one programmer says to another.
"No, how does it go?"
"If the car industry was anything like the computer industry," the first programmer says, "a Rolls-Royce would cost a penny, would get a million kilometres per gallon . . ." ". . . and would crash once a week, killing all passengers," the other programmer finishes.
When dealing with sensitive systems, the most terrifying word in the world is "Oops". As computers control more and more things, system reliability becomes a problem.
"This extract is taken from Moths to the Flame: The Seductions of Computer Technology, by Gregory JE Rawlins, published last week by the MIT Press..."
The Guardian (London), March 24, 1994
"Books Enter a New Chapter""Today, books are fixed, finite things contained between covers. The electronic online book is different: it is kinetic, distributed, constantly changing, almost alive. Thanks to the Internet--the global network of computer networks--an online book can not only refer to things outside itself, it can enable the reader to link to them...
"The first electronic, online book of this type is Bless This Food: Amazing Graces In Praise Of Food by Adrian Butash... published by the Online BookStore, founded by Laura Fillmore. She demonstrated it in London at the Electronic Books International conference last week, and at the London International Bookfair earlier this week...
"Fillmore says "the thinking is in the linking...
"Fillmore sees five ways to charge for books: by copy, by site licence (e.g. to a university), by subscription, by 'shareword' and by sponsored publication...
"...when the texts of books have been distributed free over the Internet, sales of printed versions have boomed. The on-screen version provides a taster, and people who really want a book will still buy it...
"'What you're really selling is people's attention,' Fillmore says. 'I'm richer because you're paying attention to what I say.'"