Description
Book SynopsisThis fascinating cultural history of the personal computer explains how user-friendly design allows tech companies to build systems that we cannot understand. Modern personal computers are easy to use, and their welcoming, user-friendly interfaces encourage us to see them as designed for our individual benefit. Rarely, however, do these interfaces invite us to consider how our individual uses support the broader political and economic strategies of their designers. In Transparent Designs, Michael L. Black revisits early debates from hobbyist newsletters, computing magazines, user manuals, and advertisements about how personal computers could be seen as usable and useful by the average person. Black examines how early personal computers from the Tandy TRS-80 and Commodore PET to the IBM PC and Apple Macintosh were marketed to an American public that was high on the bold promises of the computing revolution but also skeptical about their ability to participate in it. Through this car
Table of ContentsAcknowledgments
Introduction. The Politics of User-Friendliness
Chapter 1. On the Origins of User-Friendliness
Chapter 2: The Sources of the Personal Computer Revolution
Chapter 3: Appliance Computing: The Revolution Comes Home
Chapter 4: IBM, Apple, and a Computer Literacy Crisis
Chapter 5: The Human Factor
Coda: Imagining an Unfriendly Future
Notes
Index
