From: Rich Morin <rdm@cfcl.com>
To: The Eunuchs Hysterical Society <tuhs@tuhs.org>
Subject: Re: [TUHS] AT&T 3B1 - Emulation available
Date: Sun, 31 Jan 2021 00:41:55 -0800 [thread overview]
Message-ID: <CABF9FF5-5FB7-417F-8F33-D0B822EC5994@cfcl.com> (raw)
In-Reply-To: <202101310757.10V7v3Tv004164@freefriends.org>
> On Jan 30, 2021, at 23:57, arnold@skeeve.com wrote:
>
> ... An instructor there referred to the 3B20s as white elephants,
> and explained it to me (since I didn't know):
> A white elephant is something obviously rare and valuable,
> but what exactly do you do with it? :-)
Actually, it's a bit worse than that:
> The term white elephant refers to an extravagant, impractical gift that cannot be easily disposed of. The phrase is said to come from the historic practice of the King of Siam (now Thailand) giving rare albino elephants to courtiers who had displeased him, so that they might be ruined by the animals' upkeep costs.
> -- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_elephant_gift_exchange
On a related note, I recall that Dick Karpinski won an IBM (?) minicomputer at a Usenix conference. Problem was, if he accepted it the taxes would be far more than any value it might have for him. So, he ended up doing some sort of dance that allowed the machine to go to someone else...
-r
next prev parent reply other threads:[~2021-01-31 8:42 UTC|newest]
Thread overview: 50+ messages / expand[flat|nested] mbox.gz Atom feed top
2021-01-29 10:49 Arnold Robbins
2021-01-29 13:49 ` Ronald Natalie
2021-01-29 14:37 ` Clem Cole
2021-01-31 7:57 ` arnold
2021-01-31 8:41 ` Rich Morin [this message]
2021-02-03 7:53 ` emanuel stiebler
2021-02-03 7:59 ` arnold
2021-02-03 8:53 ` Ed Bradford
2021-02-03 8:58 ` arnold
2021-02-03 10:13 ` Ed Bradford
2021-02-03 14:58 ` Clem Cole
2021-02-03 15:33 ` Henry Bent
2021-02-03 16:53 ` Clem Cole
2021-02-04 0:41 ` [TUHS] 68k prototypes & microcode John Gilmore
2021-02-04 0:52 ` Al Kossow
2021-02-04 1:10 ` Arthur Krewat
2021-02-04 1:33 ` Larry McVoy
2021-02-04 1:47 ` Al Kossow
2021-02-04 1:57 ` Al Kossow
2021-02-04 7:23 ` Arno Griffioen
2021-02-04 11:28 ` Toby Thain
2021-02-04 15:47 ` Arthur Krewat
2021-02-04 16:03 ` emanuel stiebler
2021-02-04 21:55 ` Dave Horsfall
2021-02-04 22:11 ` Steve Nickolas
2021-02-04 22:39 ` Adam Thornton
2021-02-04 22:47 ` Henry Bent
2021-02-05 14:42 ` Michael Parson
2021-02-04 22:56 ` Richard Salz
2021-02-04 23:14 ` Steve Nickolas
2021-02-04 1:35 ` Clem Cole
2021-02-04 2:18 ` Dave Horsfall
2021-02-04 15:53 ` Arthur Krewat
2021-02-05 2:16 ` Dave Horsfall
2021-02-05 2:53 ` Larry McVoy
2021-02-04 1:14 ` Clem Cole
2021-02-04 1:20 ` Clem Cole
2021-02-04 14:56 ` John Cowan
2021-02-03 15:20 ` [TUHS] AT&T 3B1 - Emulation available emanuel stiebler
2021-02-03 16:48 ` Doug McIntyre
2021-02-03 10:46 ` emanuel stiebler
2021-02-03 11:13 ` arnold
2021-02-05 12:44 ` Sergio Pedraja
2021-02-07 7:32 ` arnold
2021-02-17 16:07 ` emanuel stiebler
2021-02-17 22:00 ` Ed Carp
2021-02-17 22:14 ` Larry McVoy
2021-02-18 1:30 ` Ed Carp
2021-02-18 7:59 ` arnold
2021-02-18 18:07 ` Brad Spencer
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