Computers and Thought—The Back Story

This issue of Anecdotes gives a some of the back story behind the classic computer science and AI text Computers and Thought. One of the book's coeditors, Julian Feldman, describes some of their reasons for publishing the book and some of the challenges involved in its actually publication. This Anecdotes installment also gives a brief history of the first business-to-business and business-to-consumer applications in the UK in the 1980s, which presaged today's Internet-based home shopping industry.