Home Computers
100 Icons that Defined a Digital Generation
Will be published approx. on 16. April 2020
Book
Hardback
256 pages
978-0-500-02216-0 (ISBN)
Description
Home Computers showcases the quirky and characterful beginnings of a commercial product that would come to unite the globe: the personal computer.
As so much technology is forgotten once it is superseded, this is a celebration of machines, industrial design and techno-utopianism of an era in the not-so-distant past. Conceived as a visual sourcebook of the most popular, most powerful and most idiosyncratic computers to grace our workspaces, this timely publication offers a reflection on how far we've come and a nostalgic look at a time when digital worlds could be contained in a box and turned off, rather than ever-present in our lives.
Home Computers opens with a scene-setting retrospective by computer and gaming writer Alex Wiltshire. The book's heart is a series of specially commissioned photographs that capture details of switches and early user-interface design, letterforms and logos, and the quirks that set one computer off from another. Images are complemented by a potted history of each device, the inventors or personalities behind it, and its innovations and influences.
As so much technology is forgotten once it is superseded, this is a celebration of machines, industrial design and techno-utopianism of an era in the not-so-distant past. Conceived as a visual sourcebook of the most popular, most powerful and most idiosyncratic computers to grace our workspaces, this timely publication offers a reflection on how far we've come and a nostalgic look at a time when digital worlds could be contained in a box and turned off, rather than ever-present in our lives.
Home Computers opens with a scene-setting retrospective by computer and gaming writer Alex Wiltshire. The book's heart is a series of specially commissioned photographs that capture details of switches and early user-interface design, letterforms and logos, and the quirks that set one computer off from another. Images are complemented by a potted history of each device, the inventors or personalities behind it, and its innovations and influences.
Reviews / Votes
'A world away from the devices used today, the computers in the book illustrate the rapid march of technology' - Observer 'A definite page-turner' - Custom PCMore details
Language
English
Place of publication
London
United Kingdom
Illustrations
25 Illustrations, black and white; 376 Illustrations, color
Dimensions
Height: 246 mm
Width: 210 mm
Weight
1280 gr
ISBN-13
978-0-500-02216-0 (9780500022160)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Persons
Alex Wiltshire is a writer and consultant for videogames, design and technology. He is the author of the bestselling book Minecraft Blockopedia, and the editor of Britsoft: An Oral History. Previously editor of Edge, he has also written for Rock, Paper, Shotgun, PC Gamer and Eurogamer.