Accidental empires : how the boys of Silicon Valley make their millions, battle foreign competition, and still can't get a date

My version was printed in 1996. It was a set book for an Open University course which I was taking, and is Cringely's own account of how the personal computing industry started up. I was concerned that it would be stuffed with jargon and concepts beyond my understanding, but it wasn't. I found it informative, entertaining, and most importantly, it was easy to read. At times, I found myself laughing out loud- my favourite tale was about dust contaminating silicon wafers used by Intel to make their microprocessors. Despite every precaution being taken by the supplier and Intel, Intel were receiving a high proportion of duff wafers. An investigation showed that an Intel shipping clerk had been opening the hermetically sealed boxes as they show more arrived to count each item inside, which naturally spoiled the product. Cringely tells the story so much better, and he left me with a comic vision which still comes to mind today. show less

Great history of the early days of the computer history, though very dated. I read this in 1994 or so. The end prophesies dark days for the world because of the Y2K bug...

Accidental Empires: How the Boys of Silicon Valley Make Their Millions, Battle Foreign Competition and Still Can't Get a Date by Robert X. Cringely is a book dealing with the rise of silicon valley. It covers microsoft, Apple, Adobe and IBM. Cringely also brought us the excellent Triumph of Nerds which covers this book. Although the book was written in 1996, and dated, its amusing, insightful and covers all area's of the rise of the personal computer well, FROM A USA PERSPECTIVE (no mention of Sir clive Sinclair). Cringely also talks about the mainstream companies, both from a hardware and software perspective. Unfortunately, he neglects how many people got into computers (well me); Gaming. I mean why not discuss ID software (well its show more better discussed in Masters of Doom: How Two Guys Created an Empire and Transformed Pop Culture. But I digress. Cringely calling the chapter on Steve Jobs THE PROPHET, really struck a cord. I would really recommend this book if you want to know about silicon valley. I just hope the guys who did in search of the valley read this book. 8 out of 10. show less

This book was the basis for "Triumph of the Nerds", the popular PBS series. It is the definitive history of the personal computer era from the mid 1970's to 1995. I showed this video series to every beginning computer science class section. The book is very entertaining and informative. Anyone interested in technology, business, and the clash of egos will enjoy this work.

This was enormously entertaining when I read it after it was first published. No doubt it will feel dated now, but perhaps it might be worth a re-read.

Describes the rise of Silicon Valley. Having done some work in that area, I found it all too true. The book is a bit dated now, but still amusing.

This book tells the stories of how the great PC software companies got started - Apple, Microsoft, Lotus, and other. Several of Cringley's archetypes have resonated with me, in particular: "hippies and nerds" (it takes both to build a great product), and "de facto standard" (why the 'best' engineered product is unlikely to win)