

Jerome Svigals doing an AMA on Reddit right now - Peroni
http://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/h5kby/my_name_is_jerome_svigals_in_1950_i_became_one_of/
Who is he?<p>Born in 1926 in the Bronx, New York, Jerome Svigals attended City College of New York. In 1950, as second lieutenant in the U.S. Army, he worked on developing the first electronic computer, becoming one of the world’s first digital programmers. Starting with IBM in 1954, Svigals was the company’s first employee hired for marketing the professional computer. He devised the strategy of selling computer support services and eventually ran IBM’s global marketing system. In the mid-1960s, he conducted initial research on a machine-readable storage medium and became project manager for magnetic stripe cards. Regarded as the “father of mag-stripe cards,” Svigals brought the technology to the air transport, mass transit and banking industries. Thereafter he became the key figure in establishing national and global standards for magnetic stripe data storage. He has authored 25 books on card technology and banking, and is a leading consultant to the financial industry.
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Peroni
He worked on developing the first electronic computer, becoming one of the
world’s first digital programmers. Starting with IBM in 1954, Svigals was the
company’s first employee hired for marketing the professional computer. He
devised the strategy of selling computer support services and eventually ran
IBM’s global marketing system. In the mid-1960s, he conducted initial research
on a machine-readable storage medium and became project manager for magnetic
stripe cards. Regarded as the father of mag-stripe cards, Svigals brought the
technology to the air transport, mass transit and banking industries.
Thereafter he became the key figure in establishing national and global
standards for magnetic stripe data storage. He has authored 25 books on card
technology and banking, and is a leading consultant to the financial industry.

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thinkcomp
Mr. Svigals called me out of the blue about FaceCash a few months ago. He
introduced himself as the father of the plastic payment card, which he
developed at IBM. It sounded to me like he wanted a seat on our Board of
Directors. This seemed strange because he hadn't even signed up for the
product, but I decided to give him the benefit of the doubt and at least meet
with him.

After meeting Mr. Svigals, who was quite dismissive of everything we were
doing, I did some more research into his claims. He may have authored 25 books
(Amazon.com lists 17 of them), but none of them are available for purchase in
stores, and many are no longer in print. The vast majority are more like
updated pamphlets than books, and they are mostly about smart cards. See
[http://www.amazon.com/gp/search/ref=sr_nr_seeall_2?rh=k%3ASv...](http://www.amazon.com/gp/search/ref=sr_nr_seeall_2?rh=k%3ASvigals%2Ci%3Astripbooks&keywords=Svigals&ie=UTF8&qid=1304700061),
which have not become prevalent in the U.S. despite his predictions (which
seem to go back years).

Mr. Svigals also did not single-handedly invent the plastic payment card,
though I'm sure he played a supportive role at IBM. He has edited the
Wikipedia entry on the subject to insert himself into the card's history, but
it's very hard to tell if his description is accurate without independent
verification from someone else at IBM at the time. As best I can tell he
worked in the Asia Pacific division but was not on the core team developing
the technology.

I wish him well, but would warn people that he has a tendency to inflate his
claims, which shouldn't be necessary given all that he knows anyhow.

------
alecco
In 3 hours after submission he didn't answer a single question. But he was
confirmed by a mod/admin.

~~~
tzs
Or the comments are getting lost. Reddit seems to be having some database
corruption problem right now.

In a thread in /r/linux, I replied to a comment. Then I submitted a new
comment. Then I deleted the new comment.

A little later, checking my overview, the comment I had NOT deleted was
missing--and a comment from a different user (properly attributed to that
user) was listed in its place. Going manually to the /r/linux thread and
finding where my comment was supposed to be, I find that it has indeed been
replaced by that other person's comment.

Back in my overview, if I click his comment to be taken to it in context, I'm
taken to a /r/sports thread, where that user has several comments and where
his comment that is now in /r/linux would make sense.

I submitted a ticket to let them know about this.

