Bill Gates Owes His Career To Steven Spielberg's Dad; You May, Too

theodp writes: On the 51st birthday of the BASIC programing language, GE Reports decided it was finally time to give-credit-where-credit-was-long-overdue, reporting that Arnold Spielberg, the 98-year-old father of Hollywood director Steven Spielberg, helped revolutionize computing when he designed the GE-225 mainframe computer. The machine allowed a team of Dartmouth University students and researchers to develop BASIC, which quickly spread and ushered in the era of personal computers. BASIC helped kickstart many computing careers, include those of Bill Gates and Paul Allen, as well as Steve Wozniak and Steve Jobs.

Comments

Re:Responsible for Apple and Microsoft both?

[Stormwatch]

Can we blame him for "Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull" as well?

Re:What about the farmers who grew their food?

[Hognoxious]

So by this line of thinking, Microsoft and Apple are both owe their existence to half-apes who crawled out of the jungles of Africa some 1.8 million years ago.

That explains quite a lot.

P.S. Over a dozen posts and nothing about systemd?

Re: More like to his own parents

[Anonymous Coward]

Q: Why doesn't the UK have a computer industry?

A: Because they haven't figured out how to build a computer that leaks oil.

(An oldie, but perhaps some of the young n's here haven't heard it yet. I just hope they get it.)