Dealers of Lightning

by Wojciech Adam Koszek   ⋅   Jan 17, 2013   ⋅   Menlo Park, CA

Terribly long take on Xerox. Corporate history.


Man, that’s amazing, but it’s like an N-th book on “Building a computer” story.

Probably slightly different given how special XEROX PARC and their Alto computer was.

Interesting business point was raised in the book:

“If you get a contract for $100k installation of printing services and you worry you won’t be able to keep up, it’s better to refuse the deal. Sending people to fix the printers might be more expensive than $100k and you’ll be loosing money.”

Lots of names and terminology got developed at PARC, which was interesting now that I operate with this names on a daily basis. But same (and mostly) it was used for technologies deployed all over the place nowadays.

It’s a pretty good book for people interested in history of computing – lots of digging in the history of computer projects.

Good reading for people interested in roots of Silicon Valley.


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About the author: I'm Wojciech Adam Koszek. I like software, business and design. Poland native. In Bay Area since 2010.   More about me