I remember reading "Computing Across America" on Compuserve back in the eighties, as it was happening. At first I wasn't sure whether it was a true story or an elaborate fiction. Reading the stories written in raw ASCII code on an 8-switch handlebar chording keyboard, and downloaded through my 1200-bps modem with its flickering red LEDs, as the words appeared on a slow-phosphor amber monitor, I really felt like I was living in the future, and everything was possible.
Fantastic! As an avid cyclist (though usually not with laptop) and traveller in the same tradition, currently getting back in to sailing (just did 30km on a catamaran yesterday[1]), this was a real eye opener. Thanks for sharing jacquesm!
One thing that stood out to me was the mental gymnastics people used to put up with doing re: input in the early days of computing. Really shocking by today's standards.
I'm sitting here smiling, but I don't even know what to think. That was such an insane and amusing story. It raises some interesting questions about technology and how it relates to freedom, and the pursuit of a happy life.
> ...neither cost nor weight nor even sanity were allowed to interfere with the development of a state-of-the art technomadic adventure platform.
