Good Job, Brain! – Episode 283: Gettin' Personal with the Computer

Release Date: December 18, 2024
Hosts: Karen, Colin, Chris
Theme: A nostalgic and trivia-packed deep dive into the history, quirks, and pop culture of personal computers—with quizzes, game show banter, and classic Good Job, Brain! teamwork.

Episode Overview

In this episode, the GJB crew gets "personal" with the computer—exploring personal computer history, infamous tech flops, the home computing boom, and how computers have shaped pop culture. There’s a signature blend of rapid-fire trivia, hilarious stories, and a movie AI voice quiz. Plus, Colin leads a nerdy-yet-fascinating quiz on computer and tech basics, and Chris closes it all with a surprise off-topic music round where the common thread is only revealed at the very end.

Key Discussion Points & Highlights

1. Opening Warm-Up: The Medical Conditions Snack Game

[00:42 – 02:51]

• Listener Douglas writes in about eating Pringles after being diagnosed with shingles, starting off the classic "medical conditions/snack" rhyming game.
• The crew and listeners share favorites:
  • "I have Tourette's and I'm eating courgettes."
  • "I have bunions, so I'm eating Funyuns."
  • Karen: “Next time you're on a road trip... start with the diseases you already have!” [02:57]

2. Pop Quiz! Random Trivial Pursuit Segment

[03:05 – 06:44]

• Karen pulls a random card, with a mix of serious and silly teamwork.
• States ending with "O": Idaho, Ohio, Colorado, New Mexico
• Fashion designer of 1920s suits: Coco Chanel
• Space Station undergarments: Koichi Wakata wore antibacterial odor-eliminating “J-Wear” underwear for a month.
  • Chris: "And you are correct: underwear. Says a new kind of antibacterial odor eliminating undies." [05:48]
• First Woman NBA All-Star Assistant Coach: Becky Hammond (San Antonio Spurs)
  • Colin: “Is it Becky Hammond?”
  • Karen: “Ding ding ding!” [06:27]

3. Main Story: The Personal Computer That Sunk a Toy Giant

[07:23 – 22:21]
Chris’s in-depth story about the Coleco Adam

• Context: The early 1980s “Video Game Crash” partly due to computers entering homes.
• Home computers grew from the late 1970s: Commodore PET, Apple II, TRS-80 (“the holy trinity”). By 1982, personal computers outsold game consoles.
• Coleco’s plan: Leverage their ColecoVision success by introducing the Adam, a home computer selling for $700 (c. $2,000 today), bundled with printer, keyboard, and dual tape drives.
• Major design flaw: All power routed through the printer (“pass-through” design). If the printer broke, nothing worked.
• Electromagnetic disaster: Turning on the Adam generated a huge electromagnetic pulse that wiped out magnetic media nearby—essentially erasing the bundled cassette tapes (software, games) and even nearby audio cassettes.
  • Chris: “When the atom is switched on... it generates a massive electromagnetic surge... it immediately erases everything around it.” [18:12]
• Result: Massive returns, angry customers, endless store exchanges; Coleco could not recover financially—even the Cabbage Patch Kid craze couldn’t save them.
• Karen: “Imagine having a product so bad that the Cabbage Patch Kids couldn’t bail you out.” [22:11]

4. Home PC Nostalgia & Printing Memories

[22:21 – 23:28]

• Karen and Colin reminisce about early PC use:
  • “For games and printing. That’s what it was. Literally, why we got it.”
  • Banner-printing with Print Shop, spending fortunes on paper and ink: “That costs $20!” [23:07]
  • “Do you have any color? No, no, no—it’s black and white.” [23:21]

5. Quiz: Movie AI Voices

[24:17 – 36:39]
Karen delivers an audio quiz on famous AI/computer characters in film.

Sample Clips & Answers:

• Vin Diesel as the Iron Giant (“You stay. I go. No following.”) [24:50]
• Scarlett Johansson as “Her” (Samantha): “The DNA of who I am is based on... programmers.” [26:01]
• James Corden as Super Intelligence in “Superintelligence” (Melissa McCarthy)
• Alan Rickman as Marvin the Paranoid Android, “Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy”
• Trevor Noah as Guri, Black Panther’s AI
• Alan Tudyk as Sonny in “I, Robot”
• Jennifer Connelly as Spider-Man’s suit AI; married to Paul Bettany (Jarvis/Vision):
  • Karen: “It is Jennifer Connelly… married to Paul Bettany… it’s cute they’re a real life actor couple.” [32:41]
• Bill Irwin (TARS) in “Interstellar”—Irwin also puppeted the physical robot!
• Scott Adsit (Baymax) in “Big Hero 6”

6. Deep Dive Quiz: Computer History and Fundamentals

[39:18 – 55:02]
Colin’s walk through Palo Alto inspires a computer geek’s trivia stew.

• HP’s origin in a garage: First product a frequency oscillator for Disney’s “Fantasia.”
• 56k in dial-up modems: “What did ‘k’ stand for?” – Kilobits per second.
• Internet speed evolution: 56 kbps modem vs. today’s gigabit speeds.
• Storage increments: after petabyte comes exabyte—“There's a very oblique pattern to these names that I learned…all from Greek.” [47:09]
• USB: Universal Serial Bus.
• Palm Pilot writing system: “Graffiti.”
  • Karen: “Graffito?”
  • Colin: “Graffiti. Every letter was basically a single stroke… but it was great.” [52:06]
• First literal computer ‘bug’: Grace Hopper logs the discovery of a moth in a Harvard computer—word “bug” not original, but the legend’s real.

7. Off-Topic Surprise Music Round: The Bernie Taupin Connection

[55:31 – 68:50] Chris hosts a lightning music quiz with a mystery theme—pop songs, classic rock, soundtracks.

Notable tracks/artists:

• Rod Stewart – “Never Give Up on a Dream”
• Peter Cetera – “Dip Your Wings”
• Olivia Newton-John – “The Rumor”
• Red Hot Chili Peppers – “Sick Love”
• Heart – “These Dreams”
• Alice Cooper, Emmylou Harris, Ringo Starr, Starship – “We Built This City,” Elton John (“Scarecrow”)

Reveal:
All songs featured lyrics by legendary songwriter Bernie Taupin (best known for his partnership with Elton John, but also wrote hits for many others).

• Chris: “Every song in this had lyrics written by Bernie Taupin…” [66:46]

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On the doomed Coleco Adam:
  Chris [18:12]: “When the atom is switched on... massive electromagnetic surge… erases everything around it.”
• On kid printing mayhem:
  Colin [23:07]: “That costs $20!” (on the price of an endless printed birthday banner)
• On the AI voices in movies:
  Karen [26:48]: “What she described was completely…like, normal now.”
• On the Palm Pilot’s writing system:
  Colin [52:06]: “Graffiti. Every letter was basically a single stroke.”
• On the first computer bug:
  Colin [53:09]: “A bug. A moth, to be precise...taped into the book.”

Timestamps for Key Segments

• 00:42 – Medical condition/snack warmup game
• 03:05 – Trivial Pursuit pop quiz
• 07:23 – The Coleco Adam saga
• 22:21 – PC nostalgia (printing banners, games)
• 24:17 – AI movie quiz
• 39:18 – Palo Alto/HP/computer history trivia
• 55:31 – Off-topic music round (Bernie Taupin reveal)

Episode Tone & Takeaway

From genuinely hilarious trivia banter to deep, geeky dives into the history of computing, this ep exemplifies the show’s love of knowledge, team play, and good-humored nostalgia. Whether you ever bricked your own family computer, recognize a 90s modem screech, or just try to beat friends at pub quiz, you’ll find plenty to love—and impress your own nerdy crew with new facts.

Find more episodes at: goodjobbrain.com

Next time, bring your own trivia!