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Grace Hopper Documentary Edges on Successful Crowdfunding

mikejuk (1801200) writes "Born With Curiosity is a proposed biopic about computer pioneer Grace Hopper. With a week to go before it closes on June 7, a crowdfunding campaign on Indigogo has so far raised 94% of its $45,000 target. Although there have been a couple of books devoted to Grace Hopper and she recently was the subject of a Google Doodle, her story hasn't made it to celluloid, which is something that Melissa Pierce finds anomalous, stating on the Born With Curiosity Indigogo page: 'Steve Jobs had 8 films made about him, with another in pre-production! Without Grace Hopper, Steve might have been a door to door calculator salesman! Even with that fact,there isn't one documentary about Grace and her legacy. It's time to change that.'"

65 comments

  1. Ob by Hognoxious · · Score: 0

    psot division

    01 pic x(5) ws-long-name-ordinal value "FRIST"

    --
    Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
    1. Re:Ob by K.+S.+Kyosuke · · Score: 1

      And now in FLOW-MATIC, please. ;-)

      --
      Ezekiel 23:20
    2. Re:Ob by flyingfsck · · Score: 0

      Grace who? She must have been extremely famous, since I have never heard of her...

      --
      Excuse me, but please get off my Pennisetum Clandestinum, eh!
    3. Re:Ob by SternisheFan · · Score: 1

      Grace who? She must have been extremely famous, since I have never heard of her...

      Well then, time to educate yourself...

      http://tech.slashdot.org/story...

    4. Re:Ob by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Of course not having a thorough knowledge of the history of computing makes one an idiot.

      Whatever, you pathetic douchebag moron.

    5. Re:Ob by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      He probably thinks we only have computers because of NASA.

    6. Re:Ob by Deadstick · · Score: 1

      I can sense your pride.

    7. Re:Ob by Degrees · · Score: 1

      This story was mildly interesting to me, because my COBOL teacher met Rear Admiral Hopper in person.

      Did you know she coined the term "debug", because that was how she fixed an errant program? Found the relay that wasn't connecting, and removed a moth? Taped it into the log book with "Debugged the computer".

      --
      "The most sensible request of government we make is not, "Do something!" But "Quit it!"
    8. Re:Ob by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I read it as a joke, because of the ironic hipsterish gag at the end.

      I think it's sad you took it so seriously.

    9. Re:Ob by cb88 · · Score: 1

      She is a legend that is what she is... there are videos over on on the late night shows online as well that are quite entertaining.

      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1-vcErOPofQ

  2. Crowfunding campaign for Grace Hopper by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    It was already started long ago, I was part of the operation and I hope this campaign will be as successful as expected.

    Here the previous operation : grace Hopper Crowfunding campaign

    1. Re:Crowfunding campaign for Grace Hopper by K.+S.+Kyosuke · · Score: 1

      Grace Hopper Lionfunding campaign

      FTFY

      --
      Ezekiel 23:20
  3. jesus, I knew someone would play the gender card by SuperBanana · · Score: 4, Insightful

    " her story hasn't made it to celluloid, which is something that Melissa Pierce finds anomalous, stating on the Born With Curiosity Indigogo page: 'Steve Jobs had 8 films made about him, with another in pre-production! Without Grace Hopper, Steve might have been a door to door calculator salesman! Most of history has been written by and about men. Our aim is to bring to life the untold and lost stories of women."

    Uh, her story has been told in the media, quite a bit. She was, for example, featured by 60 minutes. She's mentioned in nearly every CS textbook; I've seen her name pop up in movies and anime. Damn near any techie worth their salt has heard of Hopper. Any CS grad certainly has. She has a ship named after her; she was exempted from retirement guidelines, constantly promoted, to become one of the oldest and longest serving officers. She spent something like a decade, hired by DEC, to go around and lecture. She's in Arlington National Cemetery.

    Comparing her to Jobs's pop culture fame is idiotic. On one hand, the head of a major consumer electronics company who was a consummate showman and redefined PERSONAL computing, versus someone who worked on mainframes during+after WW2 on languages most of the population has never heard of, and died more than two decades ago, well before personal computers could be found in most homes? When she passed in 1992, I was one of a handful of kids in my town who had a personal computer in the house, and I lived in a pretty well-off suburb of a tech corridor.

  4. Was a programming language inevitable? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    It seems to be quite a stretch to claim that if Hopper had not invented the first programming language nobody else would have.

  5. Indiegogo Campaign Link by SeanDS · · Score: 1
    1. Re:Indiegogo Campaign Link by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      uh, what was wrong with the one in the summary?

    2. Re:Indiegogo Campaign Link by Jmc23 · · Score: 1

      It wasn't earning him any Karma!

      --
      Don't complain about syntax, grammar, or spelling. There is no.hell like input on android.
    3. Re:Indiegogo Campaign Link by SeanDS · · Score: 1

      Oops, I didn't notice that!

  6. Show the real truth by JustNiz · · Score: 2

    I hope they are careful to show her life story as it was, warts and all, instead of Hollywood-izing it into some overdramatized biopic of a saint.

    1. Re:Show the real truth by Brett+Buck · · Score: 2

      Starring Angelina Jolie!

    2. Re:Show the real truth by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I hope they are careful to show her life story as it was, warts and all, instead of Hollywood-izing it into some overdramatized biopic of a saint.

      Indeed. And with the right actress, Catherine Bell, I think the authenticity of the film would benefit.

    3. Re:Show the real truth by TeknoHog · · Score: 1

      Even better, Natalie Portman. With hot grits.

      --
      Escher was the first MC and Giger invented the HR department.
    4. Re:Show the real truth by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      They could re-imagine her life as an action-adventure flick, starring Sigourney Weaver:

      Ensign RedShirt: "Oh no! Evil mutant giant moths have taken over the WOPR and they're about to nuke D.C.!"

      Adm. Hopper: [Cocks shotgun] "Then it's time to *debug* the system!"

  7. Re:jesus, I knew someone would play the gender car by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    Everyone and everything in computing is compared to St Jobs without whom nothing would ever have been invented. In fact, didn't you know that Steve invented Flowmatic and Cobol and Fortran and, well, you name it...

  8. Re:jesus, I knew someone would play the gender car by K.+S.+Kyosuke · · Score: 3, Funny

    Most of history has been written by and about men.

    Which is why Alan Kay had thirteen movies made about him! Oh, wait...

    --
    Ezekiel 23:20
  9. Re:jesus, I knew someone would play the gender car by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Didn't you know... women cannot communicate with the world on equal terms. Everything has to be couched in victimhood and oppression.

    In other words Grace Hopper suddenly becomes part of the battle against male oppression... even though her story is actually proof that capable women had success and achievement without a lot of feminist whining and tantrum throwing.

  10. Re:jesus, I knew someone would play the gender car by rubycodez · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Steve did not redefine personal computing, just a designer who sponged off other's engineering accomplishments. He invented nothing, conceived nothing other than perhaps artistic case and keyboard designs.

  11. Re:jesus, I knew someone would play the gender car by I'm+New+Around+Here · · Score: 1

    How do you view his activities from the late 1970s, when Apple was first started?

    --
    If you think I voted for Trump because of this post, you're wrong. I voted for Dr. Jill Stein of the Green Party. Again.
  12. Re:jesus, I knew someone would play the gender car by rubycodez · · Score: 3, Informative

    Sponging off his engineering friend, and avoiding paying for or acknowledging his daughter. In short, perfecting his Human Turd technique

  13. "born with curiosity"? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    No, that's impossible. You see, everything else humans beings invented was because we're smart. But computers, we had to wait for NASA to put test pilots in rubber suits to invent those.

  14. Re:jesus, I knew someone would play the gender car by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Rear Admiral Grace Hopper, PhD. [ http://www.cs.yale.edu/homes/tap/Files/hopper-story.html ] is an iconic figure in the history of computing and computer science. How anyone could not be aware of her achievements baffles me. Yep, comparing Grace Hopper to Steve Jobs is tantamount to heresy for anyone earning a degree in mathematics, computer science, or engineering.

  15. That's funny, because... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    ...*I* knew someone would play the "I knew someone would play the gender card" card.

  16. 112% 100% ?? by GNious · · Score: 1

    Edges on successful? It is currently at 112%...

    1. Re: 112% 100% ?? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      When the story was posted out stood at 98% funded. A New kind of /. Effect me thinks

  17. Re:jesus, I knew someone would play the gender car by mean+pun · · Score: 0

    Steve did not redefine personal computing, just a designer who sponged off other's engineering accomplishments. He invented nothing, conceived nothing other than perhaps artistic case and keyboard designs.

    By that standard the Wright brothers were not inventors either, because all they did was sponge of real inventors, and bolt a lightweight combustion engine to some pieces of wood and cloth. By any sensible definition, Apple invented the tablet. Yes, there had been attempts at tablets before the iPad, but they were just as effective as airplanes before the Wright brothers. You're still allowed to hate Apple and Jobs all you want, but fair is fair: they did invent the tablet.

  18. Re:jesus, I knew someone would play the gender car by osu-neko · · Score: 1

    She's mentioned in nearly every CS textbook...

    Yes, but that's often where many aspiring software engineers first learn of her, or Ada Lovelace. Ask how many aeronautical engineers first heard of the Wright Brothers from a college textbook on aeronautical engineering.

    --
    "Convictions are more dangerous enemies of truth than lies."
  19. Pop culture exposure by bscott · · Score: 1

    Here's Rear Admiral Grace Hopper on Letterman - probably in '82 or '83 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v...

    --
    Perfectly Normal Industries
    1. Re:Pop culture exposure by haruchai · · Score: 1

      It's been about 30 yrs since I heard about her probably around the time of that video although I've never seen it before.

      She's definitely a pioneer and very accomplished but the woman gave us COBOL for fuck's sake!!

      --
      Pain is merely failure leaving the body
    2. Re:Pop culture exposure by bscott · · Score: 1

      Yeah, how awful that the first-ever high level language isn't as good as the ones that came after! Booooo!!!

      --
      Perfectly Normal Industries
    3. Re:Pop culture exposure by haruchai · · Score: 1

      Fortran & Lisp are both slightly older than COBOL; arguably Algol as well.
      COBOL as implemented is probably better than Plankalkul. :-D

      --
      Pain is merely failure leaving the body
  20. Re:jesus, I knew someone would play the gender car by Intrepid+imaginaut · · Score: 2

    That's the thing though isn't it. I respect the shit out of Grace Hopper, just like I respect any man or woman that just says, hey, I'm going to do this - then buckles down and gets it done. They earn that respect instead of expecting it on account of genitalia or highly suspect historical-cultural narratives. This is unfortunately the exact opposite of the kind of woman that feminism's eternal victimhood and collectivised pressure creates.

    As a kid I loved Aliens and have watched it many times since, but women like Ripley are thinner on the ground than ever before, to my lasting disappointment.

  21. Invented COBOL by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I can't believe there is so much love for the person who invented COBOL.

    No, I don't care about gender, I care about that monstrosity that was inflicted upon the world.

    And yes; I do have plenty of room to complain, I had that crap inflicted upon me back in the 1990s. Unlike the whiny little fuckers using ROR + MySQL/NoSQL; who have never had to use JCL to actually compile their application or file a DBA request to have their SQL rebuilt or had to deal with IMS.

    You a Grace Hopper fans need to work in COBOL applications for a few years; then see how big a fan you are.

    1. Re:Invented COBOL by westlake · · Score: 1

      I can't believe there is so much love for the person who invented COBOL.

      The transition to a first generation computerized accounting system is much easier if your accountants can read and audit the code.

  22. Re:jesus, I knew someone would play the gender car by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    When she passed in 1992, I was one of a handful of kids in my town who had a personal computer in the house, and I lived in a pretty well-off suburb of a tech corridor.

    So was I. Except it was college and I was in CS. You know what we did? We mourned her passage because we were sad that nobody else would. I'm glad that this documentary was funded. I'd sorry that it was funded 22 years too late.

  23. Needed, but... by Kazoo+the+Clown · · Score: 1

    I absolutely agree Grace Hopper needs a good documentary. But $45,000? that won't even pay for the trailer...

  24. Re:jesus, I knew someone would play the gender car by dave420 · · Score: 1

    So because one woman was able to rise to the top of her field, it instantly makes it impossible for any other women to be denied their due? Even when massive amounts of evidence point to that being a daily occurrence? Your logic is part of the problem, sunshine. You might as well travel back to the civil rights movement, point to a free black person (in another country if you have to), and claim slavery doesn't exist. As Aristotle said: "One swallow does not a summer make".

  25. Re:jesus, I knew someone would play the gender car by dave420 · · Score: 1

    Well, apart from the Wright brothers' plane not being the first (just the first heavily-publicised), there were working tablets before Apple created the iPad. So no. Not even close. They might have brought the first massively-popular tablet to market, but to claim they invented it is pretty bizarre.

  26. Re:jesus, I knew someone would play the gender car by serviscope_minor · · Score: 1

    By that standard the Wright brothers were not inventors either, because all they did was sponge of real inventors, and bolt a lightweight combustion engine to some pieces of wood and cloth. By any sensible definition, Apple invented the tablet.

    No, by your standard the Wright Brothers didn't invent the aeroplane, because theirs was useless and it was, in fact, invented several years later. The first person to do something gets hailed as the inventor. Others may perfect it but you don't get to claim they are the inventors because that's not what the word means.

    Apple did not invent the tablet.

    Seriously I do not get the attitude people like you have. Apple are very good at polishing tech stuff, and as a result are often the first to get a big consumer success with a piece of tech. They are particularly good at selecting pieces of tech which haven't yet made it into the mainstream and wrapping a decent UI and solid hardware around them. Like the tablet, MP3 and multitouch, for example. Those are fine achievements in and of themselves and if you like they can be celebrated for it. I still don't understand why people like you keep insisting mindless that Apple invented a bunch of stuff they demonstrably did not invent.

    --
    SJW n. One who posts facts.
  27. Re:jesus, I knew someone would play the gender car by mean+pun · · Score: 1

    For sufficiently loose definitions of "working tablet", you are of course right. Like those Microsoft thingies that everyone stayed away from in droves. Or Apple's own Newton.

    So why was the iPad the first massively popular one? Because Apple produced one that was actually useful rather than started people cursing in the first few minutes. That took them years of experimentation and polishing; there is a reason there had been rumours about an Apple tablet for years before it was actually introduced.

    It's easy to think up the concept of a tablet, and even to build some vaguely functional prototypes, but until Apple came up with hardware that was light and sturdy enough to be practical, and software that made the limited environment useful, tablets were something you only used if you absolutely had to. And Apple had nobody to `sponge off', this was Apple's effort only.

    As far as I'm concerned this effort deserves the word 'invented', but by all means go for `reinvented' if it makes you feel better.

  28. Jobs is not a good comparison by T.E.D. · · Score: 1

    Steve Jobs' gifts were mostly in the areas of industrial design and marketing. He was not really all that much of a techie.

    A much better comparison would be with Steve Wozniak. He's an actual techie who designed important things. How many moves have been made of that guy (not counting supporting parts in those 8 Steve Jobs movies)? Or perhaps Jay Miner, who was central to the design of both the old Atari video game system (the machine that popularized home gaming), their 8-bit computer line, and the Amiga. Not a lot of folks I knew growing up had Apple II's (I think I knew of one), but all my friends had Atari's and Amigas. So how many movies have been made about that guy? None that I know of.

    There is an issue here, but its that techies like Grace Hopper aren't nearly as interesting to the general public as charasmatic salesmen like Jobs.

  29. Oh, the Mondays! by jjbenz · · Score: 1

    When I first looked at that headline I thought it said "Grass Hopper", I must be losing my mind.

  30. Discrimination by McFly777 · · Score: 1

    So because one woman was able to rise to the top of her field, it instantly makes it impossible for any other women to be denied their due?

    The problem is that just because there doesn't happen to be equality of outcome, doesn't mean that there is not equality of opportunity. And the constant whining and victimization just gives everyone a bad taste which can become self-fulfilling (in the negative sense).

    I will use my wife as a good example, When we began our carreers, she made more than me for essentially equivalent jobs (engineering). She then proceeded to make a number of promotional moves and was just short of some significant management opportunities (hard work pays off). At this point we decided to have children, and she decided that she wanted to stay home. I emphasize that because I was actually more comfortable with her continued paycheck, but was willing to support her in her desire to be a stay-at-home mom.

    Now, twelve years later, our kids are in juniior-high school and high school. My wife was feeling less needed at home, and wanted to return to work. In the last decade, my pay has increased significantly. However, due to her time out-of-work, and a change in industry due to an economicly-forced relocation, she has had to re-start at a much lower pay then what she was making when she left.

    Does this mean my wife has been discriminated against? No, she is being paid based on her experience, or lack thereof, in the industry which is prevalent in our new home area. Is she societally disadvantaged because she was expected to stay home with the kids? Maybe, but still no; many of her peers in similar situations chose to keep working and now are managers with a consumate pay level. The pay-gap in this case is due entirely to life-decisions which she made (and she would be the first to tell you this).

    Now, where we have seen discrimination was the senior-year summer in college, where we both volunteered to be "camp counselors" for a high-school level "future-engineers camp" at our college. We were involved in the review of applicants. The way that the university chose to "encourage diversity" was as follows:

    1. Create two stacks of applications. Place all white-males in stack B.
    2. Review applicants in stack A, choosing the best applicants.
    3. Place pins on the state map to determine where the chosen applicants were from. Noticing that there were none selected from the Upper Peninsula (this is Michigan, by the way.)
    4. Dig through stack B (white-males) to find the two applicants from the U.P. and put them in the accepted list.
    5. Pat eachother on the back for achieving an un-biased result.

    I was obviously disturbed by the process, despite my best attempts not to show it, because the admissions director commented to me as we were leaving, "See, we got some white males in there." Frankly, the comment just disturbed me more. I really was not concerned with the numbers of whatever groups. I was bothered that there was a group of students who were not even considered, based only on race/gender. What was wrong in the process was that there was no equality of opportunity.

    --

    McFly777
    - - -
    "What do people mean when they say the computer went down on them?" -Marilyn Pittman
  31. Invention vs. innovation by McFly777 · · Score: 1

    I think the word that this conversation is looking for is "innovation" rather than "invention". Innovation does not require one to be the first to do something, just the first to do it right, or to make a significant improvement.

    Apple's contribution (lately) is mostly innovation. Although the original iPhone was enough of a break away from existing phone/PDA combo devices that it could come close to invention.

    (and if you believe Woz, the early Apple would count as invention as well, on several counts. But that is another story... literally.)

    --

    McFly777
    - - -
    "What do people mean when they say the computer went down on them?" -Marilyn Pittman
  32. Re:jesus, I knew someone would play the gender car by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Didn't you know... women cannot communicate with the world on equal terms. Everything has to be couched in victimhood and oppression.

    In other words Grace Hopper suddenly becomes part of the battle against male oppression... even though her story is actually proof that capable women had success and achievement without a lot of feminist whining and tantrum throwing.

    Oh goody. Another privileged white guy telling everyone else who isn't that they need to STFU.

  33. Calculator Salesman by McFly777 · · Score: 1

    Hmmm.... Without Grace Hopper would there even have been a calculator as we know it? Perhaps Steve would have been a sliderule salesman, instead?

    --

    McFly777
    - - -
    "What do people mean when they say the computer went down on them?" -Marilyn Pittman
  34. Re:jesus, I knew someone would play the gender car by MooseMiester · · Score: 1

    Who invented these things?

    Detachable Keyboard

    Software based interrupts

    Kernel mode .vs. User Mode, meaning that a user program couldn't crash the whole machine

    Mouse

    The Command Line

    Using a language to program a computer with

    Hint - Not Steve Jobs. Apple, like Microsoft, invented very little. What they did was take the inventions of others, and package them in different ways. The Apple ][ was an S-100 bus computer with a cheaper processor (A Motorola 6809 if I remember properly) that ran a re-hacked version of CP/M. MS-DOS was CP/M with a BASIC interpreter and a new name. etc.

    --
    Murphy was an optimist
  35. Re:jesus, I knew someone would play the gender car by K.+S.+Kyosuke · · Score: 1

    The notion of a tablet computer was actually invented by Alan Kay in 1968. The problem was, for a long time, available technology was unable to match the implementation requirements. Even the tablet devices from 1990s and very early 2000s were inadequate in this respect. With the advent of color active-matrix screens with efficient backlight (LED) and CPUs with power saving features, the notion finally became viable. Apple merely built their tablet at the right time. That's all there is to it. Stop looking for Apple magic, there isn't any.

    --
    Ezekiel 23:20
  36. Looks amazing. Hop to it! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    $45k isn't a lot to get started, but Hopper seems far more amazing than I had realized from my intro to her in high school. I hope this succeeds.

  37. hello by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    hello

  38. Re:jesus, I knew someone would play the gender car by Draugo · · Score: 1

    Oh good, another victimhood feminist telling everyone else who isn't that they need to STFU

  39. Re:jesus, I knew someone would play the gender car by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    >Even when massive amounts of evidence point to that being a daily occurrence?

    What evidence woudl that be "sunshine"... do tell.

  40. About Grace Hopper Documentary Edges by arvindattri · · Score: 1

    Yeah. Its fantastic.its amazing