I Love Reading 1980s Computer Magazines, and So Should You (2021)

As a startup founder back then I got to know a lot of the editors, staff writers and regular columnists at many of the bigger magazines because I'd meet with them regularly during trade shows and editorial visits and sometimes hang out after hours. Outside of a few exceptions like Byte, very early computer pubs were mostly zines written by computer enthusiasts. Due to the success of those early leaders a real publishing industry emerged which attracted writers with journalism degrees (or at least serious writing skills) who also loved tech. A surprising number of them were really insightful about tech trends and where the industry was going. I learned stuff and gained useful perspective that helped me be a better startup guy. While industry scuttlebutt and first-hand stories of Gates, Jobs and Grove could be interesting, I also picked up more subtly valuable things like ways of thinking through evolving tech trends and emerging market analysis.

I got the feeling some of them understood we were living through a revolutionary period that would be historically Important. By the mid and late 90s the tech publishing industry was finally losing the last vestiges of the computer enthusiast era and becoming an IT focused 'Big Industry'. The major magazines were being bought and rolled into New Media conglomerates like IDG and Ziff Davis. Articles were re-imagined as "Content" able to attract page views and ad clicks with web-inflated valuations. At one 90s Comdex, IDG threw a massive party that occupied an entire 15,000 seat sports arena and the top of the arena was lined with 90 six-foot tall blow-ups of magazine covers - one from each of IDG's 90+ IDG tech magazines around the world. The Temptations (I think) performed live and during a break, the founder of IDG was presented with a white stallion horse on stage. I was sitting with an IDG group publisher I'd known since he was the lowly publisher of a pre-IDG backwater magazine. As the white stallion exited the stage, he leaned over to me and whispered "Remember this moment... because it has to be the peak." And he was right. I also fondly recall several 90s Comdex dinners in Vegas with John Dvorak (PC Magazine's long-time top columnist) which often turned into all-night bar crawls. Great guy, good times.