[ih] Early IoT: anyone remember The Internet Toaster and Crane? :D

Thu Jul 9 15:39:40 PDT 2020

yes, Hsi Nan  - thanks for clearing up that annoying lapse.

v

On Thu, Jul 9, 2020 at 6:38 PM the keyboard of geoff goodfellow via
Internet-history <internet-history at elists.isoc.org> wrote:

> Vint, The Prancing Pony was stocked with Potstickers from Hsi Nan (Louie's)
> in the Town and Country Shopping Center at El Camino and Embarcadero.   It
> was also stocked with Empanada's.
>
> yours truly was a frequent visitor/hanger out there on the weekend and one
> of the features of The Prancing Pony billing/accounting sw system was that
> it allowed non-employee SAIL members to establish a "prepaid"/"debt"
> account -- so as be able to be a Pony customer (which i did).
>
> btw, in the nearby lounge area you may recall there was a TV with a
> "phaser" gun remote control that Hans Moravec made.  there was a "TV Guide"
> process on the PDP-10 that updated a screen that the TV could tune to with
> the phaser gun remote control.
>
> Recall being there one late Saturday night when the PDP-10 crashed
> during *Saturday
> Night Live* and it was left down/unattended to until there was a commercial
> break... :D
>
> On Thu, Jul 9, 2020 at 12:15 PM vinton cerf <vgcerf at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > thanks for that lovely historical summary, Geoff.
> >
> > The Elvish script was the Tengwar.
> >
> > The Prancing Pony was also stocked with fresh Chinese food. I can't
> > remember whether it was from Chef Chu's or one of the restaurants in the
> > Town and Country Shopping Center. I think it was the latter because one
> of
> > the students did part time work at the restaurant and kept the Prancing
> > Pony stocked.
> >
> > v
> >
> >
> > v
> >
> >
> > On Thu, Jul 9, 2020 at 4:46 PM the keyboard of geoff goodfellow via
> > Internet-history <internet-history at elists.isoc.org> wrote:
> >
> >> vis-a-vis "Stanford AI Lab had a vending machine for food and other
> stuff
> >> and it knew
> >> whether you were old enough for alcoholic beverages..."
> >>
> >> yours truly recalls the SAIL vending machine was connected to the labs
> >> PDP-10 via an RS-232 line.  The vending machine customers used a model
> 33
> >> Teletype next to it that was later replaced by a Lear Siegler ADM CRT
> >> display terminal... more details from Les Earnest in this EXCERPT at
> >> https://web.stanford.edu/~learnest/spin/sagas.htm:
> >>
> >> *Prancing Pony vending machine*
> >>
> >> The Prancing Pony Vending Machine was evidently the first computer
> >> controlled vending machine anywhere in the world. It was created to fill
> >> an
> >> unmet need.
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> Given that SAIL was about five miles off-campus and the nearest food
> >> source
> >> was a beer garden (Zotts) about a mile away, I initially set up a coffee
> >> and food room near the center of our facility and it subsequently got
> >> named
> >> after a pub in Tolkien's "Lord of the Rings". In fact all rooms in our
> >> facility were named after places in Middle Earth and had signs posted on
> >> the doors showing their names in both Latin and Elvish alphabets. At
> some
> >> point the Stanford Buildings folks asked me to number our rooms and give
> >> them a map. Instead we gave them a map showing room names in both
> >> alphabets. Their response was to send out a carpenter with numbered
> tags,
> >> which he nailed on each door.
> >>
> >> Meanwhile we took turns buying coffee and food, which was offered for
> sale
> >> on an honor system basis. That worked well for awhile but it suddenly
> >> started losing money big time. We then negotiated with Canteen, which
> had
> >> an exclusive contract with Stanford, to put in a couple of vending
> >> machines. However we found that they were not restocked often enough and
> >> broke rather frequently.
> >>
> >> I finally negotiated to rent a machine from Canteen that we could
> restock.
> >> They seemed to like this idea since it would relieve them of making
> >> frequent trips out to our distant facility. In fact they never billed us
> >> for the rental even though I repeatedly called it to their attention.
> >> Meanwhile I got Ted Panofsky to make a connection to our computer so
> that
> >> it could release the doors on the vending machine, thus making it
> possible
> >> to buy either for cash or, though a computer terminal, on credit. I then
> >> wrote a program that let people buy under password control and that
> billed
> >> them on a monthly basis via email. It was set up to randomly give away
> >> whatever was purchased on 1/128th of the purchases and offered a "double
> >> or
> >> nothing" option, which had an honest 50:50 outcome. I noticed a cultural
> >> difference in that almost none of the computer science students gambled,
> >> knowing that they would win 1/128th of the time if they didn't, whereas
> >> many of the music students did gamble. In both cases the Prancing Pony
> >> vending machine, having taken on the name of the room, seemed quite
> >> popular
> >> and we organized a team of volunteers to acquire the needed supplies and
> >> restock the machine at least twice a day.
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> The Prancing Pony also sold beer but only on credit and only to people
> >> over
> >> 21, since it knew everyone’s age. If a youngster attempted to buy beer
> it
> >> responded “Sorry, kid.”
> >>
> >> Some years later I found out why the honor system had failed in the
> Pony.
> >> I
> >> was the founding President of Imagen Corp., which made the first desktop
> >> publishing systems using laser printers, and after awhile there a young
> >> woman employee felt obligated to confess that when she was a
> teenybopper,
> >> she and her girlfriends used to ride their horses up to SAIL, then went
> in
> >> and stole candy from the Prancing Pony. Thus, her misconduct contributed
> >> to
> >> a technological advancement.
> >>
> >> On Thu, Jul 9, 2020 at 3:05 AM *Vint Cerf via Internet-history
> >> <internet-history at elists.isoc.org <internet-history at elists.isoc.org>>
> >> wrote:*
> >>
> >> > Stanford AI Lab had a vending machine for food and other stuff and it
> >> knew
> >> > whether you were old enough for alcoholic beverages...
> >> >
> >> > v
> >> >
> >> >
> >> > On Thu, Jul 9, 2020 at 8:18 AM Jorge Amodio via Internet-history <
> >> > internet-history at elists.isoc.org> wrote:
> >> >
> >> > > As far as I remember there was a wired coke machine at MIT
> >> > >
> >> > > Jorge
> >> > >
> >> > >
> >> > > On Thu, Jul 9, 2020 at 3:05 AM Lars Brinkhoff via Internet-history <
> >> > > internet-history at elists.isoc.org> wrote:
> >> > >
> >> > > > How about Arpanet of Things?
> >> > > >
> >> > > > Danny Hillis connected elevator buttons to MIT's Chaosnet, and by
> >> > > > extension Arpanet.  Users could type a special key combination on
> >> their
> >> > > > keyboards to call the elevator to Tech Square floors 8 or 9.
> >> Another
> >> > > > key would buzz open the door to the machine room on the 9th floor.
> >> > > > Source code for this is available.
> >> > > > --
> >> > > > Internet-history mailing list
> >> > > > Internet-history at elists.isoc.org
> >> > > > https://elists.isoc.org/mailman/listinfo/internet-history
> >> > > >
> >> > > --
> >> > > Internet-history mailing list
> >> > > Internet-history at elists.isoc.org
> >> > > https://elists.isoc.org/mailman/listinfo/internet-history
> >> > >
> >> >
> >> >
> >> > --
> >> > current postal address:
> >> > Google, LLC
> >> > 1875 Explorer Street, 10th Floor
> >> > Reston, VA 20190
> >> >
> >> > After July 1, 2020:
> >> > Google, LLC
> >> > 1900 Reston Metro Plaza, Suite 1400
> >> > Reston, VA 20190
> >> > --
> >> > Internet-history mailing list
> >> > Internet-history at elists.isoc.org
> >> > https://elists.isoc.org/mailman/listinfo/internet-history
> >> >
> >>
> >>
> >> --
> >> Geoff.Goodfellow at iconia.com
> >> living as The Truth is True
> >> --
> >> Internet-history mailing list
> >> Internet-history at elists.isoc.org
> >> https://elists.isoc.org/mailman/listinfo/internet-history
> >>
> >
>
> --
> Geoff.Goodfellow at iconia.com
> living as The Truth is True
> --
> Internet-history mailing list
> Internet-history at elists.isoc.org
> https://elists.isoc.org/mailman/listinfo/internet-history
>

-- 
current postal address:
Google, LLC
1875 Explorer Street, 10th Floor
Reston, VA 20190

After July 1, 2020:
Google, LLC
1900 Reston Metro Plaza, Suite 1400
Reston, VA 20190