MSFC Aggie said:

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Definitely hotter

And where is she running off to? Switzerland?? I'm guessing she's going to cause trouble next season.

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Yeh she is going to visit CERN, presumably to swoop in and undercut Cameron, Joe, and Gordon.

The episode where they were trying to figure out what to do with the web perfectly captured what it was like to be in leadershipa dot com start up in 1998.

Having a vision thst no one could grasp much less understand and trying to flesh it out.

So are they basically going to build their own Giant version of Google, Yahoo, AOL, etc?

The whole concept of how we went from a secure government control network used by colleges to a World Wide Web is still mind boggling to me.

Muy said:

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So are they basically going to build their own Giant version of Google, Yahoo, AOL, etc?

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Not so much those companies (they even mentioned AOL in their strategy session - as a company that's part of the equation, but not the whole picture).

I'd say its closer to Netscape. Or there was an earlier version called Mosiac, if you remember that. They are essentially building the first popularized internet browser.

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They are essentially building the first popularized internet browser

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Ok.....I was asking myself...."are they trying to build a browser?"

I wonder if Joe is going to realize that porn is the killer app of the early 14.4 dial up non-ssl net.

MSFC Aggie said:

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Quote:

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They are essentially building the first popularized internet browser

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Ok.....I was asking myself...."are they trying to build a browser?"

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Yup. It sounds kind of silly in retrospect, like... isn't that really easy and obvious?

Well Joe pointed out how easy it was - he wrote out the whole code on the whiteboard.

But as to obvious - not really. Not until someone really thought about and came up with it. Before the first browsers, people viewed the internet in a way similar to the way people used computers before Windows. They had to type in complicated technical commands to a prompt using something like Lynx which was the online equivalent of DOS. Or they had to use something like AOL or CompuServ (or Mutiny) which was completely proprietary, couldn't speak with anything else besides itself, and therefore was kind of kept "inside a box" like they were describing in their meeting.

Just FYI, and maybe this is obvious, but I didn't quite "get it" until this season... this show is, according to the creators, about the guys who DIDN'T make it. About the guys who were there at the forefront, and if one lucky break would have gone their way they'd have been the next Gates, Jobs, etc., but weren't. So while I'm sure Joe, Gordon, Cameron and co. will do something groundbreaking next season, they're likely not going to invent THE first internet browser and become billionaires. Yes, this is a slightly alternate universe, but not that alternative, unless the show-runners really decide to deviate in their last go around.

TCTTS said:

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Just FYI, and maybe this is obvious, but I didn't quite "get it" until this season... this show is, according to the creators, about the guys who DIDN'T make it. About the guys who were there at the forefront, and if one lucky break would have gone their way they'd have been the next Gates, Jobs, etc., but weren't. So while I'm sure Joe, Gordon, Cameron and co. will do something groundbreaking next season, they're likely not going to invent THE first internet browser and become billionaires. Yes, this is a slightly alternate universe, but not that alternative, unless the show-runners really decide to deviate in their last go around.

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Oh yeh I definitely agree. But that's essentially what they are trying to do.

Right. I'm just saying that they'll likely make one, but for whatever reason it probably won't be successful.

TCTTS said:

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Right. I'm just saying that they'll likely make one, but for whatever reason it probably won't be successful.

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Yeh, like Gordon kept warning they were too early, so I could see it flopping, and another company releasing a spruced up, better version that becomes the real deal.

TCTTS said:

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Right. I'm just saying that they'll likely make one, but for whatever reason it probably won't be successful.

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And as someone that was part of a company like that, I find the near misses and almost made it stories to be more interesting than the accidental empire stories.

https://www.amazon.com/Accidental-Empires-Silicon-Millions-Competition/dp/0887308554

Ironically, The politics, drama and infighting between founders are a lot more intense and intriguing when the stakes are smaller.

Just finished the most recent season today and loved it. Really can't wait for the next season. I like that they made the hard jump four years in the future, but also kind of wonder about the details that lead to Mutiny's downfall. Donna and Cam are definitely hotter

The actors on the show seem to have great chemistry and really play their characters well. Big fan of the show and sad it is ending, but glad that it will be sent off right.

I feel like this is a show that is underrated now, but people will really appreciate in the future.

just found this show - I had heard about it for a while but finally decided to try it.

I'm about 8 episodes in now....interesting. Mirrors Compaq from that time which of course was Houston not Dallas, but it is interesting. I think they just wanted the close TI and Cardiff relation for simplicity.

Enjoying the period piece aspect of it and I was very much into computers at my "young" age of 16ish at the time of this - I would go into CS at TAMU in 1984.

Nice. Seasons two and three are so much better, too. Almost a different show entirely.

The fourth and final season premieres later this year.

TCTTS said:

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Nice. Just wait, though. Seasons two and three are so much better. Almost a different show entirely.

The fourth and final season premieres later this year.

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yeah i've heard that too....i'll stick with it.

It is amazing it has even persisted this long though - not that it is bad - I think for whatever reason it just isn't that interesting to non techies. But the ratings have been really really low even for AMC.

Oh well. Fun kind of nostalgia trip for me.

I owned ( well my dad did) the first IBM PC - upgraded with 2 disk drives, 256K of memory, an amber display, and a dot matrix printer. It cost $7500 in 1981 with all of that and the software. I got handed down that PC when I had an apartment in CS in 1986-88 and used it through graduation for Wordstar and a FORTRAN compiler and also had a modem I could connect into the university labs for terminal access (at 2400 baud - lol).

Looking forward to some of the other advances in technology shown on here.

This has been one of my favorite shows the past few years. I really like at the actors in it and enjoy them in things outside the show. Bos is my favorite. I like that it is set in the 80s and in Texas and every once in a while you hear Texan things like Whataburger in it. I'm looking forward to the last season in a few months.

OK I just finished binge watching seasons 1-3. just my two cents.....

I really really loved a lot of things - the mood, the period aspet, the style, the characters, the acting, the Dallas easter eggs, the tech concepts, the language, they had all that down. Great writing to for the most part.

However a couple of downsides for me:

- Cameron was just WAAAY to much of a hysterical female shrew, it was just almost stereotypical in a blatant way that she was so overly invested emotionally she couldn't see clearly or relinquish any control. And at that time there is almost no way 2 women really would be so powerful in a tech landscape. But I do understand just sort of modernizing that because it would be boring with all men and also playing to a modern audience. I'm glad they allowed her to finally change some in season 3 especially. She was much more mature finally.

- The tech itself at least after the first development at Cardiff of the Giant (which mirrored Compaq) was just too far ahead of the actual time. 1985-1986 there just were not online presences like that and the terminology they used was 5 years early. I get they were supposed to be cutting edge but having been in the middle of the tech scene in Dallas at that time it just wasn't realistic. But it was mostly just setting a framework for the drama to play off of so it is not a huge deal.


Thats it....everything else is great. And they did a great thing with the bigger time jump forward in season 3. Jumping to 1990 post Berners-Lee and getting them in the early phases of the WWW works really well.

Looking forward to season 4. I enjoy the show quite a bit an can ignore little tech jargon liberties etc.

All of the actors are really really good, Mackenzie Philips is perfect for Cameron - my issues are with how the character was written not acted. He wide eyed doe-like incredulity is amazing actually, all her emotion is right there. Lee Pace is very strong in a odd role (modeled on Jobs obviously) although I didn't care for the gay/HIV angle that much but I'm sure it happened more out there than here in Dallas. The two playing Gordon and Donna play off each other really well and are more realistic characters - i knew many Gordons. The guy playing Jon Bosworth is awesome- I also knew hundreds of guys like him.

My fiance and I just started the series Friday night. During one of the early scenes where Boz is supposed to still be more of an antagonist, he goes berserk yelling in a meeting, and I couldn't help but show her the video of Joe Jamail going nuts on some guys during a deposition. I said "Apparently, this is how meetings were held in TX during the 80s!"