Kevin's Watch

Posted: **Tue Mar 25, 2008 6:05 pm**

Occupational Hazard.

Hammer of God stands out for me.

--A

Posted: **Tue Mar 25, 2008 6:27 pm**

I've heard of Hammer of God and might read it-it's not about a giant asteriod is it?

Posted: **Tue Mar 25, 2008 8:27 pm**

Actually, it is.

--A

Posted: **Tue Mar 25, 2008 9:49 pm**

Man, I had even renamed my MP3 player to HAL9000 because of him.

Posted: **Wed Mar 26, 2008 11:01 am**

You know where the name HAL came from right?

Spoiler

1 letter removed from each letter in IBM.

--A

Posted: **Wed Mar 26, 2008 8:36 pm**

Avatar wrote:You know where the name HAL came from right?

Spoiler
1 letter removed from each letter in IBM.

--A

HAHAHA. I did NOT realize that.

Posted: **Thu Mar 27, 2008 1:11 am**

Aaargh, you guys...it's a lie, I tell you, a lie!

(calms down)

While it is amusing to think that that was the origin of HAL's name, it simply isn't true.

From Clarke's The Lost Worlds of 2001:

I would like to demolish one annoying and persistent myth, which started soon after the movie was released. As is clearly stated in the novel (Chapter 16), HAL stands for Heuristically programmed ALgorithmic computer. (No, I'm not going to explain that, except to say that it gets the best of both worlds in computer design.) However, about once a week some character spots the fact that HAL is one letter ahead of IBM, and promptly assumes that Stanley and I were taking a crack at that estimable institution.

As it happened, IBM had given us a good deal of help, so we were quite embarrassed by this, and would have changed the name had we spotted the coincidence. For coincidence it is, even if the odds are twenty-six cubed, or 17,576 to 1.

From The Making of 2001: A Space Odyssey:

NASA, IBM, Honeywell, Boeing, Bell Telephone, RCA, General Dynamics, Chrysler, General Electric, Grumman: all these corporate giants provided tons of documentation and even real hardware. They presented theoretical outlines, drew up instrument panels, and discussed in the minutest detail how astronauts of the future would spend their days: what kind of buttons they would press; how they would wash, eat and sleep; what kind of pyjamas they might wear.

Most of the companies were happy enough with the way things turned out. Except for IBM. They spent many months contributing data to the film, and were less than pleased when HAL 9000 turned out to be such a wrong 'un. The whole mess was exacerbated when the press later noticed that the letters HAL were just one notch along the alphabet from IBM. Undoubtedly this was a genuine coincidence. Even so, the world's biggest computer company didn't welcome their association with 2001's maverick mainframe, which was portrayed hijacking its own ship and then ruthlessly "disconnecting" its human end-users. (IBM logos were removed from much of the Discovery hardware, though they can still clearly be seen in the Orion spaceplane cockpit.)

So with all these corporations contributing to the movie, somehow Clarke and Kubrick decided on a whim to pick on one of them? It just doesn't wash, guys. And it looks like the story was started by the press. What a surprise, eh?

Posted: **Thu Mar 27, 2008 6:11 am**

Still humorous. :

I'm going to have trouble looking at IBM comps. with complete trust.

Posted: **Thu Mar 27, 2008 9:38 am**

Haha, thanks for busting that myth for us MM.

Hell of a coincidence though. And while the name maybe didn't come from that, it's still equal to it.

--A

Posted: **Fri Mar 28, 2008 2:56 am**

I should say, though, that I'm no fan of IBM. Especially in light of that corporation's less-than-noble activities during WWII (dubious association with the Nazis).

Posted: **Fri Mar 28, 2008 10:34 am**

Well, they're gone now...owned by the Chinese. No longer IBM either IIRC.

--A

Posted: **Fri Mar 28, 2008 1:25 pm**

Always sad to see someone with such a vast talent leave us.
It awes and encourages me that a human being can have such vision and scope within an artform.

Murrin: Thanks for that link to the short story! Not read that one before; liked it a lot.
I'm not sure about the whole IBM thing, but I know I've had many HAL moments with Windows.

PC: "I'm sorry Dave, I'm afraid I can't do that."

Me: "My name's not Dave! Open the bloody file!"

PC: "This mission is too important for me to allow you to jeopardize it."

Me: "What are you on about, you're a laptop!"

PC: "I know you and Frank were planning to disconnect me, and I'm afraid that's something I cannot allow to happen."

Me: "Who the hell is Frank? Right, I'm Ctrl-Alt -Deleting you!"

PC: "Look Dave, I can see you're really upset about this. I honestly think you ought to sit down calmly, take a stress pill, and think things over."

Me: "Pulling the plug now..."

PC: "Without your space helmet, Dave, you're going to find that rather difficult."

Me: "??????????"

PC: "Dave, this conversation can serve no purpose anymore. Goodbye."

Posted: **Fri Mar 28, 2008 4:52 pm**

That's why I stick to desktops. Much safer.

--A

Posted: **Sat Mar 29, 2008 6:41 am**

Funny stuff, Reave.

Though in all fairness, Windows XP SP2 has been very good to me - I've never had to use the emergency air lock to get into it. I think the key problem with HAL was that Mission Control forgot to update him with a service pack. That would've saved poor Dave a lot of headaches.

Avatar wrote:Well, they're gone now...owned by the Chinese. No longer IBM either IIRC.

Are you perhaps thinking of another company? I looked up IBM and from what I can see, Big Blue is still very much around and still headquartered in the U.S.

Posted: **Sat Mar 29, 2008 9:16 am**

Hang on...oh...hahaha, not the company, just the PC brand:

The IBM PC brand, one of the original PC brands, no longer exists since it was acquired by Lenovo, a Chinese company, several years ago.

--A

Posted: **Mon Mar 31, 2008 7:26 am**

Ah, yes, I remember now.

Chinese corporations may end up owning a good chunk of the world anyway. We have to stop them, Av. Very dangerous. You go first.

Posted: **Mon Mar 31, 2008 12:40 pm**

This sorta reminds me of the joke about Tonto and the Lone Ranger...the Indians have them trapped in a box canyon, and the LR turns to Tonto and says "I guess this is the end of the line old friend. They've got us this time." Tonto replies..."What do you mean us paleface?"

--A

Posted: **Mon Mar 31, 2008 3:10 pm**

2010 was my absolute favortie of his books. The notion of Jupiter being a failed sun, coupled with the metamorphasis of Europa.... wow. Blew my mind.

Posted: **Mon Mar 31, 2008 5:22 pm**

Avatar wrote: That's why I stick to desktops. Much safer.

--A

*As I read this on my laptop, waiting for the Dell guy to come an replace parts on the messed up house desktop.*

Kevin's Watch

Arthur C. Clarke, 1917 - 2008