Dr. Dobb’s Journal of Tiny BASIC Calisthenics & Orthodontia
Posted by: Ken in Digital Media, Internet, Lifestyle
Well, another one bites the dust. One more venerable magazine that started back when you needed to actually know something to build and use a computer has ceased its print operation and gone to a scaled-back digital version. It started with an e-mail a few months ago:
As a valued reader, we regret to inform you that Dr. Dobb’s Journal ceased its standalone monthly magazine with the February 2009 issue. The quality editorial coverage you have come to expect from Dr. Dobb’s Journal continues in its sister publication. InformationWeek will now include Dr. Dobb’s Report once a month.
Today, I received another e-mail that reads:
You may have noticed that you stopped receiving your print issues of Dr. Dobb’s Journal as of February this year. Well we are proud to announce that Dr. Dobb’s has gone Green! Going forward, Dr. Dobb’s will be available exclusively in digital format as Dr. Dobb’s Digest! Subscribe Now for your FREE digital subscription!
I still fondly recall the days of BYTE, Creative Computing, and Kilobaud. The personal computer grew up at the same time that I did, and I was happy to be a part of it. I was entering programs into a simple computer one byte at a time in binary using nothing but switches and lights when I was in middle school. My next computer ran BASIC, but the interface was an noisy, mechanical teletype machine with paper tape storage. FORTRAN on punch cards, batch processed on the downtown mainframe was the norm in high school. I was always the most popular guy in my college dorm on snowy, windy nights when people could access the school’s mainframe using my Apple ][ and 300-baud modem from my room instead of trudging down to the computing center to hunt out a terminal.
I know everything, including magazines and newspapers, is going digital these days. I’m the first to sign up for on-line bill delivery and payment so I can stop all that paper from invading our mailbox. But there will always be a place in my heart for page after page of program listings that you had to hand type into your PC, and those back-of-the-book ads showing all the newest gadgets and toys and endless lists of prices.
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