Datamation
Encyclopedia
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
between 1957 and 1998. When first published it wasn't clear there would be a significant market for a computer magazine given how few computer
Computer
A computer is a programmable machine designed to sequentially and automatically carry out a sequence of arithmetic or logical operations. The particular sequence of operations can be changed readily, allowing the computer to solve more than one kind of problem...
s there were. Today, Datamation is owned by QuinStreet
Quinstreet
QuinStreet, Inc. is a publicly traded online marketing company based in Foster City, CA with satellite offices worldwide. QuinStreet employs a performance-based advertising model with use of search engine marketing strategies to promote clients on Web sites in a number of verticals, including:...
and published as an online magazine at Datamation.com.
The idea for the magazine came from Donald Prell
Donald Prell
Donald B. Prell is a venture capitalist and futurist who created Datamation, the first magazine devoted solely to the computer hardware and software industry.-Early life:...
who was Vice President
Vice president
A vice president is an officer in government or business who is below a president in rank. The name comes from the Latin vice meaning 'in place of'. In some countries, the vice president is called the deputy president...
of Application Engineering at a Los Angeles computer input-output company. In 1957, the only place his company could advertise their products was in either Scientific American
Scientific American
Scientific American is a popular science magazine. It is notable for its long history of presenting science monthly to an educated but not necessarily scientific public, through its careful attention to the clarity of its text as well as the quality of its specially commissioned color graphics...
or Business Week. Prell had discussed the idea with John Diebold
John Diebold
John Theurer Diebold was an early champion of widespread use of computing and automated technology.-Early life:...
who started AUTOMATION magazine, and that was the inspiration for the name DATAMATION. Thompson Publications of Chicago
Chicago
Chicago is the largest city in the US state of Illinois. With nearly 2.7 million residents, it is the most populous city in the Midwestern United States and the third most populous in the US, after New York City and Los Angeles...
agreed to publish the magazine.
In 1995, working in partnership with Bolt Beranek and Newman (BBN), Datamation launched one of the first online publications, Datamation.com. In 1996, Datamation editors Bill Semich, Michael Lasell and April Blumenstiel, received the first-ever Jesse H. Neal Editorial Achievement Award for an online publication. The Neal Award is the highest award for business journalism in the U.S.
In 1998, when its publisher, Reed Business Information
Reed Business Information
Reed Business Information is a large business publisher in the United States, United Kingdom, continental Europe, Australia and Asia, often referred to as RBI...
, terminated print publication of Datamation 41 years after its first issue went to press, the online version, Datamation.com, became one of the first online-only magazines. In 2001, Internet.com (WebMediaBrands) acquired the still-profitable Datamation.com online publication. In 2009, Internet.com (and Datamation.com) were acquired by Quinstreet
Quinstreet
QuinStreet, Inc. is a publicly traded online marketing company based in Foster City, CA with satellite offices worldwide. QuinStreet employs a performance-based advertising model with use of search engine marketing strategies to promote clients on Web sites in a number of verticals, including:...
, Inc., and Datamation.com continues Datamation's 53-year tradition of in-depth IT reporting today.
Computer humor
Traditionally, an April issue of Datamation contained a number of spoof articles and humorous stories related to computers.However humor was not limited to April. For example, in a spoof Datamation article (December 1973), R. Lawrence Clark suggested that the GOTO
Goto
goto is a statement found in many computer programming languages. It is a combination of the English words go and to. It performs a one-way transfer of control to another line of code; in contrast a function call normally returns control...
statement
could be replaced by the COMEFROM
COMEFROM
In computer programming, COMEFROM is an obscure control flow structure used in some programming languages, originally as a joke....
statement, and provides some entertaining examples. This was actually implemented in the INTERCAL programming language, a language designed to make programs as obscure as possible.
Real Programmers Don't Use Pascal
Real Programmers Don't Use Pascal
"Real Programmers Don't Use Pascal" is an essay about computer programming written by Ed Post of Tektronix, Inc., and published in July 1983 as a letter to the editor in Datamation....
was a letter to the editor of Datamation, volume 29 number 7, July 1983, written by Ed Post, Tektronix
Tektronix
Tektronix, Inc. is an American company best known for its test and measurement equipment such as oscilloscopes, logic analyzers, and video and mobile test protocol equipment. In November 2007, Tektronix became a subsidiary of Danaher Corporation....
, Wilsonville, Oregon
Wilsonville, Oregon
Wilsonville is a city primarily in Clackamas County, Oregon, United States. A portion of the northern section of the city is in Washington County. Originally founded as Boones Landing due to the Boones Ferry which crossed the Willamette River at the location, the community became Wilsonville in...
, USA.
Some of BOFH were reprinted in Datamation.
The humor section was resurrected in 1996 by editor in chief Bill Semich with a two-page spread titled "Over the Edge" with material contributed by Annals of Improbable Research
Annals of Improbable Research
The Annals of Improbable Research is a bi-monthly magazine devoted to scientific humor, in the form of a satirical take on the standard academic journal...
editor Marc Abrahams
Marc Abrahams
Marc Abrahams is editor and co-founder of Annals of Improbable Research, and originator and emcee of the annual Ig Nobel Prize celebration. He was formerly editor of the Journal of Irreproducible Results....
and MISinformation editor Chris Miksanek. Semich also commissioned BOFH author Simon Travaglia
Simon Travaglia
Simon Travaglia is best known as the author of the Bastard Operator From Hell stories, about a rogue system administrator. He lives in Hautapu , New Zealand with his three cows, dog, cat and Massey Ferguson MF135...
to write humor columns for the magazine. Later that year, Miksanek became the sole humor contributor (though in 1998 "Over the Edge" was augmented with an online weblinks companion by Miksanek's alter-ego "The Duke of URL"). The column was dropped from the magazine in 2001 when it was acquired by Internet.com.
A collection of "Over the Edge" columns was published in 2008 under the title "Esc: 400 Years of Computer Humor" (ISBN 1434892484).