Click photo for higher definition.
The text under the picture is rather difficult to read so I transcribed it.
Scientists from the RAND Corporation have created this model to illustrate how a “home computer” could look like in the year 2004. However, the needed technology will not be economically feasible for the average home. Also the scientists readily admit that the computer will require not invented technology to actually work, but 50 years from now, scientific progress is expected to solve these problems. With teletype interface and the Fortran language, the computer will be easey to use.
Absolutely unbelievable! They didn’t have a clue. I wonder what the giant wheels on the left are for?
Update: Thanks to reader Dr. K. for discovering that this is a fake from an image modification competition.
Thanks BubbaRay.
snopes
“I wonder what the giant wheels on the left are for?”
Dive planes.
This turns up every couple of years and it is actually the control panel for a General Electric S5W submarine reactor with a television thrown in for effect, not anything to do with computers.
List of things that the picture could be:
1. The recipe Master 1960. Every kitchen should have one!
2. The prototype for the Microsoft Zune.
3. AT&T’s first design of a cell phone.
#3 – Rats.
Here I was thinking the wheel was a mouse prototype.
At least give credit for the fake computer mashup !
http://www.fark.com photo contest.
Observations in hindsight:
Why so many analog dials for a digital computer?
Why the calf-height plexiglass barrier around the controls of the “computer”?
We’ll need to choose one of us to officially razz BubbaRay on this one. ;^)
RBG
#6 – Mark – I posted a link to the competition on the site in my update.
We probably don’t have a clue regarding what we’ll be using 50 years from now….
I’m officially awarding BubbRay the UKKMA for sending me this picture!
#10 ROTFL
#8, ah, the problem of TinyUrl
Don’t you guys ever go to snopes before you post something? Doesn’t it occur to you that when you repeat well-known urban legends that it might detract from the overall veracity of your site?
At least you got rid of the boobage.
Wasn’t there a twilight zone where a computer was in love with a guy and it had a giant handwheel like the one in the picture?
Ugh. The physical boobage has been replaced with the mental type.
I was wondering about the floating TV and the lack of a “LUNCH” button.
This reminds me of the people who still post the “GRY” question to message boards.
#7, RBG, nice try but #0, hhopper beat you to it.
#10, hhopper, You are hereby officially awarded the Über BubbaRayDipDork Award for posting something without waiting for the article. But you’ve got to admit, the steering wheel is very cool and thus I understand your eagerness to post.
I am proud to be the latest recipient of the UKKMA. Although the award is somewhat diminished since it has already been given this week, I promise to cherish it always. Heck, I’ve installed a new state of the art track-lit trophy room with auto gator feeder (controlled by the Rand Corporation 1954 PC).
This is one of those hysterical days — a complete swap of the most prestigious DU Awards! After carefully checking the original charter and by-laws, there is nothing to prevent an historical award swap.
#10 and #17 Hey, I want in the action too!
Just for #12, here’s a great link to an The Onion Video.
http://tinyurl.com/3bh6uu
So no secret, The Onion only does good quality reporting 🙂
And Hop? It’s BubbaRay, not BubbRay, so maybe this whole deal was caused by a really bad tuna fish sandwich. 😆
Funny, I thought it was he new Zune.
Ahh… Bubbray, grammer… it’s all the same. [inside joke]
#21, hhopper, I sit corrected!
A year or two ago I believe the CEO of Sun Microsystems used this picture in a speech repeating the text above. He too believed it. The picture had already been around the internet and known as a fake for sometime. Right after that I put the “doctored” picture and the real picture of the mock submarine control room on my web site which is why I remember it. Imagine, giving a speech to a bunch of techies who know the picture is fake while repeating that garbage!
I love this one.
What the picture really is… A Nuclear Submarine “Maneuvering Area.” The wheels open valves on turbines that make the propeller turn. Big wheel, forward. Small wheel, Reverse. The center panel is the Reactor Plant Control Panel, and the Electric Plant Control Panel is on the right.
I think this is, or was, in the Smithsonian.
I was in the navy, on a submarine. I sat at the RPCP (middle) for the better part of 8 years.
Anybody that’s worked with second generation computers, like the Univacs the Navy used to use in the 80’s still, would have seen right throught the farce. The tractor fed printer was a dead giveaway, The old TTY’s used a roll of yellow paper, made alot of noise, and came with exciting accessories like a 300 baud accoustic coupler modem for high speed telephone communications, or a paper tape reader/writer for quick transportable data storage. No punch card machine either.
wgleason is right. This is an S5W submarine reactor control console.
The wheels are the ahead (big) and astern (small) throttles.
The “L” shaped switch in the center is the “shim” switch, which moves rods in and out of the reactor.
It IS a cool picture though, and only a small segment of society (like me and wgleason, who was probably a naval nuke like me), would catch it.
i wish my current computer had a huge wheel & more chrome!