Ti Point Tork

Some Things Don’t Change

In this internal 1972 DEC memo (PDF) about the PDP-16 re-release, modern tech companies should find plenty of familiar territory:

While the PDP-16 has been marginally successful to date,
some problems have been noted.
1. Since the product, in its present form, is relatively
   complex, it is difficult to train salesmen.
2. Since the product is currently offered as a set of options
   uniquely configured for each situation, the salesman does
   not have the feeling of security of a predefined box that
   he can see and feel.
3. Although the PDP-16 has been well received by computernicks,
   it is still somewhat of a mystery to neophytes.
All of these hang-ups can be traced to a single source,
namely, inadequate product identification.

There’s also a chart that goes up and to the right, hand-drawn grids that would eventually be spreadsheets, and an org-chart.  Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose.