still building and burning

For the past week or so, I’ve been furiously working on my MacWorld presentation, trying to find exactly what I want to say, and just the right way to say it. It’s been a lot more difficult than I had anticipated. This is going to be a very different type of experience than what people are used to at keynotes. I’m not going to talk about the future of anything, or pontificate about how Apple is doing this or not doing that . . . I’m strictly there to entertain the audience. I’m a little nervous about how they’ll respond, so I’ve thrown out everything and started over too many times to count. The entire time, I’ve watched the clock get closer and closer to 9:30 Thursday morning.
When I least expected it (around seven this morning as I packed lunches for Ryan and Nolan), the whole thing sprung into my head fully formed. What a relief! This is my favorite way to write: I can see the entire thing in my mind, like I’m looking down on a huge map. Because I know how the general landscape looks, I can zoom in on some areas and discover really interesting and unexpected details, then pull back to see the whole thing. The entire time, I know where I’m headed, so I’m not afraid to take some side trips as I transcribe what my brain’s come up with when I wasn’t paying attention.
I’m not going to publish all my remarks ahead of time like I usually do, because I think there will be a webcast, and I don’t want to give it all away . . . but it’s been so much fun to develop, I don’t want to wait two whole days to share it with an audience, so I’m going to preview a little bit of it right now:

I was twelve going on thirteen the first time I saw a Macintosh computer. It happened in the summer of 1984 — a long time ago; even longer if you measure according to Moore’s Law.
I was in a bookstore in the San Fernando Valley, looking for a magazine (I think it was called “Byte.”) My friend Brian told me that this magazine was filled with playable arcade games — all I had to do was copy the programs, written in BASIC, to my TI 99/4a.
“Wil, we’re late for dinner. We have to leave now.” It was my father. He held my brother’s hand, and my six year-old sister sat atop his shoulders.
I looked at the rack in front of me: the magazine I had hoped to find wasn’t there, and now I would have to leave empty-handed. I tried to stall him.
“Hey, did you see this, dad?” I took a book off the shelf. The picture on the cover showed that someone had written “hello” in cursive on a computer’s built-in monitor.
He took it from me and looked at it.
“That should keep him occupied for a minute, and I can find this maga—”
“Jeremy,” he said to my kid brother, “take this to mommy and tell her we’re ready to leave.”
Before I could protest, my brother ran the book across the store, my mother paid for it, and we were on our way to The Jolly Roger restaurant to celebrate my being cast in a movie called “The Body.”
In 1984, my family had almost achieved escape velocity from our white trash roots, but we were still poor. It was a big deal to go out to dinner, it was a big deal to buy a book, and I didn’t want to tell my dad that he’d paid for something I didn’t want. So I masked my disappointment and began to read.
“This is made by Apple? Oh, man! Kevin has that Apple ][, and it’s totally lame! It doesn’t play Pac Man like the arcade, and you can’t even hook it up to the television!”
To give this thought some context: in 1984 I thought that Thriller was “awesome” and letting my boxers hang out the bottom of my corduroy OP shorts was “rad,” so perhaps I wasn’t the best judge of what was and wasn’t lame.
It took less than fifteen minutes to drive from the bookstore to the restaurant, and I read that book the entire way. By the time we got out of the car, I had completely forgotten about my silly TI 99/4a. This “Macintosh” computer, I had decided, was the future.
“Dad! This is so cool!” I said as we got out of the car. “You use this thing called a ‘mouse’ to tell the computer what to do!”
My dad nodded politely while he helped my mom get my sister out of her car seat.
“Oh really?”
“Yeah! And it’s got this puzzle game built right into it, and you can use this mouse thing to draw pictures, and it’s got something called ‘MacWrite’ that I could use to write stories, and there’s a clock, and it makes a happy face when you turn it on, and . . .”
I took the book with me into the restaurant, and by the end of the meal I had convinced myself that I had to own one of these machines.
“Mom,” I said, in my most grown-up voice, as we finished dinner, “a lot of other kids at school have computers, and they use them for homework, and to learn math and stuff.”
“What about your Texas Instruments thing?” She said.
“Pish!” I said, “That thing? All that can do is play games! And it doesn’t have a mouse. I hear that all the new computers will have mouses. They’re very important.”
My parents looked at each other.
“We’ll think about it,” they said, in unison.
“Oh? Good. Because, you know, it has a built-in monitor, so I wouldn’t have to hook it up to the television when you guys want to watch TV.”
“Thank you for thinking of us,” my father said, dryly.
I beamed. This was going very well.
“And it’s portable, too! See?” I opened the book, and showed them a picture of the handle that was built into the top. “I could get a carrying case, and take it with me to Aunt Val’s when we go to visit. I could totally entertain myself, and I wouldn’t bother you guys at all.”
“That’s very thoughtful,” my mother said.
“Have you thought about selling cars?” my father asked.
“No. Why?”

After I tell the story of how I got my first Mac, and give a quick synopsis of my history from then until now:

“In 1988, I attended my first MacWorld, and after about an hour here, I realized that, even though I’d upgraded it to four megabytes of RAM, my MacPlus was woefully out of date. I was flush with cash from my weekly gig on Star Trek, so I went nuts: I bought a Macintosh IIx, a 30MB SCSI hard drive, a 2400 baud modem, and eight 1MB SIMMS. When I booted it the first time, I experienced a rush of excitement that I hadn’t felt since I first completed that cool built-in puzzle back in 1984: two hundred and fifty-six fabulous, vibrant, living colors splashed across my screen.”

Then, I plan to segue into Just A Geek. I’ll talk a bit about how I wrote my entire final draft on my iBook, and then I have this thing that I hope Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak will maybe hear someday: “Steve and Woz? Thank you for being such a big part of my life. Thank you for showing people like me that if you dream it, you can do it, even — especially — when nobody else believes in you.”
I’ll read two stories that I hope have a little bit of a universal appeal: The Trade, and Fireworks. If everything goes well, I’ll come in at just under an hour, and everyone will enjoy themselves.
And remember, if you’re in the area and are not coming to MacWorld, you can still come out to Borders in Union Square on Friday night, where I’ll be reading from and signing Just A Geek. I start at 7pm.

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142 thoughts on “still building and burning”

  1. Cool, Wil. I had a TI99/4a, too! I remember the long nights, playing Munchman and A-Maze-Ing. I never had Hunt the Wumpus, I’m sorry to report…but sometimes, I thought I was the only person ever to have one of those. Then again, it was 1991 when I started using them, so maybe we were just a touch behind in the times…

  2. Why only 2400 baud? In 1988, you could have gotten a 9600bps modem — but certainly not a NuBus one; it would have had to have been an external one. Also, you would have has to choose between the two competing 9600bps standards of the time. A v.32 modem would have cost you in the neighborhood of $1500, while an HST modem would have been considerably less expensive.

  3. Hey Wil,
    I have been thinking of you this morning as I know you have been nervous about todays speech. I am sure it is done by now, so, how did it go?

  4. Wil’s presentation at MacWorld was very funny and very well-received. Wil, you looked completely comfortable up there.
    Thanks for being so friendly and gracious in the book signing, and putting up with photo requests as well. It was a great honor to meet you, if only for a few seconds!!

  5. Great story… told in a way that you do best. Love it. Thanks. BTW, I had a Xerox 8088 with the biggest dot-matrix printer attached that you’ve ever seen. My upgrade included ADDing a hard drive and going from 56K of memory to 128K. I think I still have that RAM somewhere.

  7. Hehehe, the logic of kids! I love this 🙂
    —-
    “Have you thought about selling cars?” my father asked.
    —-
    I’m a PC girl myself, but all the best with the show! I’m sure they’ll love it! 🙂
    Oh, Wil, is the compulsory email address thingy really necessary? I have no problem with you having mine (and you already do), but I always seem to get extra spam whenever I post on a guestbook with my real email addy, especially one this popular. I completely understand if you need to keep it :), but I’ll just have to post a fakey address for now (my real one is python2004 at gmail.com )

  10. Ah, the Mac. It must have been 84 when I first saw one. My ex worked for a computer company and we would drag that thing home, or to visit family to show it off. We loved the MacPaint program.
    I remember going to the US Festival and Apple sponsoring a whole tent of technology and a satellite link with Russia?
    I did my first desktop publishing in maybe 85 or 86. It was very wow.
    I miss the old days. We now ALL have Paint even on Windows and it takes WAY more to jazz us.
    Good luck with a magnificent presentation and signing.

  11. Hey Wil!
    I had the pleasure of attending your keynote this morning at MacWorld and was just blown away. You rock!
    Unfortunately, even though you and I are but a year apart in age, I wasn’t fortunate enough to own anything but an Atari 5200 growing up. Pong was the best game in the world and we had to hook the thing up to our huge console tv. Still, we had the coolest thing on the block at the time.
    I didn’t find out about my geekiness until my early 20s when my husband told me I was some sort of computer savant. I seem to have this knowledge and have no clue where it came from. Hmmm, still don’t know.
    Anyhow, you were awesome and it was a pleasure to meet you. Thanks for sharing you.
    Vicki

  12. I missed your talk at MacWorld today. But I did come in at the end and I bought Just a Geek. Started reading a couple hours ago. I know I am in for a good time. I identify with geeks and working stiffs. You are one who can write.
    I did not get your autograph; there was big line, and I HAD to prioritize and see AppleScripting the iApps (I paid for User Conference).
    I gave the polite guy at your autograph table a copy of my still-unpublished comic book; a little gift for you that cost me nearly nothing. I thought you would be interested because I have a STNG satire in it.
    I like your book. You should try reading “If Chins Could Kill,” by Bruce Campbell. Another working stiff in the acting biz.
    P.S. A teenage crush on Troi? When I was that age, it was a crush on Uhura.
    P.P.S. Macs are WONDERFUL, WONDERFUL, WONDERFUL. I heart my iBook.

  13. It was a pleasure to see your Macworld presentation today. You’re a fine storyteller, and you brought back a lot of memories of my early Mac days. I used to have a HAL 9000 beep sound, too (I’m afraid I can’t do that, Dave…)!
    I’d love to see you get into fiction. And I hope you can come to Chicago…you have my card.

  15. At 13, I’d ride my bike to Computer Mart to and annoy their tech Rick Inatome with stupid questions, and touch the wood-sided Sol-20 and the elegant, visionary Digital Group. But by the time I actually had money to buy a computer, the Apple II was it!
    About that time, my dad was selling TI 990 minicomputers. Those had a TMS 9900 microprocessor, just like the TI 99/4!
    I recall games in BYTE were pretty dull. The only fun one I remember was Mike Mayfield’s ubiquitous Space War/Star Trek text game, Doom of the 1970s.

  17. Boy was I mad when I heard a few days after booking my flight for Thursday morning out of Oakland that even though I was at MacWorld I was going to miss your talk. I almost stayed and took a later flight, but I had to be at work by noon. Oh well, some day maybe I’ll be lucky enough to hear you speak live!
    So, what did you think of the new toys? 🙂

  18. My first experience with computers was in the early 1970’s. At work we had this hugh IBM punch card processor. You programmed it by physically plugging wires into holes on this 12″ x 18″ board; the finished program looked like a big bowl of spaghetti. There was a 6 foot long card sorting machine that sorted the cards alpha/numerically and a 6 foot long printer that weighed at least a ton. Every time we called a repair man he said he would pay us to throw this machine in the river.
    Freeman

  19. circa 1986 Apple IIc – fav. game: Taipan (precursor to CIV, SIMS et al.), although I’d done an Apple intro. at night school a few years earlier. Aaah …. the good ole days, insert floppy, load program, eject floppy, insert floppy … save …

  20. “”Thank you for thinking of us,” my father said, dryly.
    I beamed. This was going very well.”
    that. was. too. funny. XD
    ~Milla

  23. Hey Wil,
    I got a chance to see you speak at MWSF05. I really enjoyed it, and I hope to see you speak again. I bought your book the day before (hoping that you’d sign it, and you did!) but I stayed up until 3 in the morning reading it Wednesday night. I swear, I couldn’t put it down. I’m looking forward to reading your book of fiction.
    Incidently, my first computer was a Commodore VIC-20 on which I wrote my very first computer program. It didn’t do much, but I was only 6.
    Shawn

  24. Did a quick Google for Wil at MacWorld, hoping that someone had pics or a recording of his talk. Well, only found one picture, really. And all I have to say is – Wil. Best. Shirt. EVER. Nice choice!
    Click Here to see the one and only pic I found of Wil on the big screen at MacWorld SanFran
    For the HTML Impaired:
    http://macworld.nathos.com/

  26. Great entry, Wil. Wish I could have been there to hear your speech in person. Such a tantalizing tidbit. Love that red and black shirt you wore while being interviewed by yourmacworld. And, to be totally trivial, your hair looked excellent.
    Your memory for childhood events is amazing. You were definitely destined to be a writer. I

  27. sorry for being off topic, but I would like to alert Wil’s Canadian monkies that the World Poker Tour Hollywood Home game is airing right now on StarTV in Canada. This is not the episode with Wil in it, but hey, we gotta watch them all right! This is the one with Norm MacDonald, Lou Diamond Phillips, Richard Kines (sp?), Lolita whatshername, Fred Willard, and Camryn Manheim.

  31. I have been randomly selected as a 2005 Bloggie panelist, and have thereby become drunk with power:
    Bow down, oh thou celebrity nerd, and repent!

  32. I fully admit that the first computer I had access to was an IBM (and as a result it’s just what I’ve always used). I remember one of the very fist computer games I played… Castle. A Text-based… yet graphical game. God how ancient that thing is now. Heck… I still remember playing with Calico and Atari. 😛
    Good luck with your presentation, Wil! I know programming can be a bitch. I’ve been discovering the delights and horrors that is Macromedia Flash. 😛

  33. I don’t have an interesting/amusing computer story. I’m only 25. I don’t know what a Commodore 64 is! Lol. I bought my first computer 4 years ago, it was a Compaq from Radio Shack. The 128 memory isn’t good for much nowadays so I bought a new Dell last week. It rocks.

  34. Just wondering if Wil died. Last time he was dissappointed no one inquired. I’m a regular reader and I’m jonesing for some “Wheaties”. Damn cold in florida today. Someone should really kick the body on the floor maybe he is not asleep.

  35. Wil–
    I caught your MacWorld presentation and very much enjoyed what you had to say. Unfortunatelly I had to dash off to the MacIT conference or I would have stuck around for your book signing. Great job fellow Mac geek! Love your blog…keep up the great work!

  36. i realize this has nothing to do with what is written here…but wil, you need to check out this album. steve earle the revolution starts…now. right up your alley. at least i think it is.

  37. Great entry Jen Z, you captured the night great. If anyone would like to read another synopsis of the Borders chat, you can check out [my thoughts]

  38. Great entry Wil! I love the story. I remember the very first time I saw a Mac too – in the computer lab at school where the entire lab was filled with PCs (386’s), except for on the lab monitor’s desk, there was a Mac sitting there: his own personal Mac – he couldn’t stand being away from it all day, so he brought it in with him every day.
    Any chance of getting a video download of your presentation somewhere? Wish I could have been there in person.

  39. >If you have a Gmail invite, why not donate it to gmail4troops.com and help a soldier feel a little bit closer to home?
    What kind of sick world do we live in where American troops would have to use free email services like hotmail and yahoo? Jesus Christ it is awful.
    flyhive.blogspot.com

  40. Will, I thought your presentation at MacWolrd was great and so was the reading at Boarders. I am glad I got a chance to see both and the book is great!

  42. wow, my first computer was a commadore vic 20, then a c-64…i actually miss the tape drive..and being able to edit the source to cheat on the old games…anyone remember “Blue Meanies From Outer Space” ? taught myself how to read so i could ‘hack’ that game when i was 4.

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