So what was technology like when we first started recruiting in 1980?

Osborne PC

In April 1981, the first portable PC was launched in the form of the Osborn. Suitcase-sized, equipped with a built-in 5" monitor and packed with 4MHz of pure processing horsepower, it set computer nerds free forever. It was possible to carry it on an aircraft, but at twenty-four pounds, the Osborne was awfully hard on the seat-back tables. By contrast, the MacBook Air, at less than three-quarters of an inch in thickness, can be carried in an envelope.

Microwave

The microwave oven was actually patented in 1945, but it took until the 80’s for the phenomenon to become mainstream. Cooking food by using microwaves to excite water, oil, fat and other polarized molecules within the food was, to say the least, a unique concept for most people. So cooking classes were launched, and housewives were encouraged to cook entire dinners with the new device, resulting in an entirely new definition for rubber chicken.

Satellite TV

Satellites were first launched in the 50's, and began to be used for TV in 1978. Images were broadcast from a building, to space, to a home. But the real home satellite TV experience began in the 80's, with the appearance of the ‘BUD’, or Big Ugly Dish, used to receive signals from FSS-type satellites on the C-band. It wasn’t long before rampant piracy prompted the invention of the decoder. Which prompted the invention of the pirate decoder-decoder. And so on. Now you can get digital satellite dishes small enough to install on your Volkswagen beetle.

Compact Disc

In 1979, Sony and Phillips Consumer Electronics set up a joint task force of engineers to design a new digital audio disc. The first Compact Disc for commercial release rolled off the assembly line on August 17, 1982. The first title released? ABBA’s The Visitors (1981). CD data is stored as a series of tiny indentations (pits), encoded in a tightly packed spiral track molded into the top of the polycarbonate layer. Consumers were promised that scratches would not affect the music quality, but soon learned this was a fa-fa-fa-false claim. Regardless, for the next 20 years the CD revolutionized the computing and music industry. Now, peer-to-peer file sharing networks and the iPod have largely made CD’s useful for little more than beer coasters.

Pac-man TV show

'Pac-man', the arcade game character starred in his own show during the 80's. He lived in 'Pac-land' with his wife Mrs. Pac', son 'Baby Pac', Dog 'Chomp Chomp', and cat 'Sour Puss'. The bad guy, 'Mezmaron' tries to make the land's economy collapse by stealing the mystical 'power pellets' away with the help of four ghosts, 'Inky', 'Blinky', 'Sue',and 'Clyde'. The show even had a holiday special: ‘Christmas comes to Pac-Land’. Chilling.

Portable Video Camera

The 1980's was the decade of the portable video camera. In 1983, Sony released the Betamax-based Betamovie, the first consumer camcorder. The unit was bulky by today's standards, and since it could not be held in one hand, was typically used resting on a shoulder. Within a short time JVC released its own camcorder using its pre-existing VHS-C format, the first model of which can be seen in the 80’s classic movie, Back to the Future.
Little did these early pioneers know they would be setting the stage for such media innovations as web-cams, YouTube and the Paris Hilton tapes.

Cell phones

Mobile phones started to appear around 1989. While their proportions are positively brick-like by modern standards, they were a significant improvement on previous briefcase-sized models. Back then cell phones were used mainly for work. Unlike today’s web-enabled-hand-held-PC-video-camera-mp3-player-devices.

When the Gameboy© was released in 1989, It sold 100,000,000 consoles in 4 years. It ran on a Custom 8-bit Sharp x80 core at 4.19 MHz - enough power to run Tetris, Pacman, Pong and Space Invaders – one at a time, of course. Not bad for $89.95. A new Nintendo DS is around $160, for which you get two ARM processors (running at clock speeds of 67 MHz and 33 MHz respectively) and a staggering 560+ games to choose from.

« Return

© 2008 Corporate Recruiters Ltd.
490-1140 West Pender St., Vancouver, BC, Canada, V6E 4G1
Phone: 604-687-5993 | Toll Free: 1-877-687-5993