Another Boring Topic

In this closing episode we take a look at IBM's two pronged assault on the clone market with the launch of the the OS/2 operating system and PS/2 line of computers. Success with OS/2 would ensure that Microsoft no longer controlled the dominant operating system while success with the PS/2 line of computers would ensure that those pesky cloners would no longer be a thorn in IBM's side. But could IBM successfully develop a new operating system that would supersede MS-DOS while also creating a successful new hardware standard that was totally incompatible with existing IBM computers AND uncloneable?

The War of 1812 (June 1812-February 1815) saw a deeply divided United States fight with Great Britain just 29 years after the end of the Revolutionary War. This conflict was fought in the shadow of the Napoleonic Wars that were raging across Europe, and this frequently results in it being overlooked. However the War of 1812 was deeply impactful for the United States, which was still a very young nation, and was the first indicator to the world that the former 13 colonies were growing into a powerful new nation.

In 1979 a small company released the world's first "killer app" for the then tiny personal computer market. VisiCalc was like nothing that had been seen before, the very first spreadsheet for personal computers. People bought a computer just to get VisiCalc and its sales skyrocketed, even after multiple price increases. Exclusively available on the Apple II for the first year on the market, its powerful sales made Apple Computer a front runner in the personal computer wars of the 1980s. And then, after over a million copies had been sold across multiple computer platforms...VisiCalc faded from the computer scene and was ignominiously discontinued in 1985, after being bought out by the very company whose flagship product had killed it.

20 years ago the options for affordable, professional quality 3D modeling/animation software were very limited. Blender was still early in its career (and wouldn't go open source until October of 2002) and was fiendishly difficult to use and lacked a number of professional features. Learning professional 3D was and is difficult, but in 2001 the barriers to entry were considerably higher than today, with professional 3D software packages retailing for thousands of dollars and good, systematic training being far harder to come by. There was definitely a need in the indie and fanfilm market for a powerful 3D modeling/animation piece of software that was affordable, had top quality training taught by an industry veteran, and used the same software that the professionals used. The 3D Toolkit from dvgarage attempted to fill this need, giving its users acess to an an almost full version of a slightly older version of the veteran 3D software Electric Image Universe for anywhere from 80-90%