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

Dan Lynch dan at lynch.com
Sun Jul 12 17:28:40 PDT 2020 

Ah yes, Hsi Nan. I remember taking someone to dinner there in the late 70s and I was having a technical discussion about the Foonly (PDP-10 clone) and our waiter overheard us and offered some additional technical details that were spot on!  We were amazed, but after all we were next to Stanford and anyone could be a genius just trying to make a living 👍👏❗️Probably that same person. 

Dan

Cell 650-776-7313

> On Jul 9, 2020, at 3:40 PM, Vint Cerf via Internet-history <internet-history at elists.isoc.org> wrote:
> 
> 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
> -- 
> Internet-history mailing list
> Internet-history at elists.isoc.org
> https://elists.isoc.org/mailman/listinfo/internet-history

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