CPU Wars

CPU Wars was an underground comic strip that circulated around Digital Equipment Corporation and other computer manufacturers starting in 1977. It described a hypothetical invasion of Digital's slightly-disguised Maynard, Massachusetts ex-woolen mill headquarters (now located in Barnyard, Mass) by troops from IPM, the Impossible to Program Machine Corporation in a rather-blunt-edged parody of IBM.^[1] The humor hinged on the differences in style and culture between the invading forces of IPM and the laid-back employees of the Human Equipment Corporation. For example, even at gunpoint, the employees were unable to lead the invading forces to their leaders because they had no specific leaders as a result their corporation's use of matrix management.

The comic was drawn by a DEC employee, initially anonymous and later self-revealed^{[citation needed]} to be Charles Andres. A compendium of the strips was finally published in 1980.

The most notable trace of the comic is the phrase Eat flaming death used in overblown expressions of hostility^[2]

References

1. ^ "CPU Wars"; in:Raymond, Eric S. (1996). The New Hacker's Dictionary. MIT Press, p. 129. ISBN 0262680920. 
2. ^ "Eat flaming death" entry of the Jargon File

External links

• The comic on-line

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