EMR reviewed DEC Is Dead, Long Live DEC by Edgar H. Schein
Review of 'DEC Is Dead, Long Live DEC' on 'Goodreads'
2 stars
DEC is the kind of company that left a lasting impact on the world. Hacker lore, especially the really old tomes that date way back, speak of DEC's PDP series of computers with reverence. They where the system that Unix was built on! VAX machines are a subject you'll hear about when reading old web stuff. David Cutler, the frequent subject of Showstopper, was a bigshot at DEC before he moved to microsoft. So how did a company so influental end up in a state of non-existence while leaving such a large shadow? What happened to DEC was always one of those questions I had. I went into this book hoping to find the answer. I also wanted something like Soul Of A New Machine or ShowStopper, but I always want that.
The first half of the book is heavy on dated managament-speak and light on human or technical narrative. …
DEC is the kind of company that left a lasting impact on the world. Hacker lore, especially the really old tomes that date way back, speak of DEC's PDP series of computers with reverence. They where the system that Unix was built on! VAX machines are a subject you'll hear about when reading old web stuff. David Cutler, the frequent subject of Showstopper, was a bigshot at DEC before he moved to microsoft. So how did a company so influental end up in a state of non-existence while leaving such a large shadow? What happened to DEC was always one of those questions I had. I went into this book hoping to find the answer. I also wanted something like Soul Of A New Machine or ShowStopper, but I always want that.
The first half of the book is heavy on dated managament-speak and light on human or technical narrative. It is focused on the culture if DEC and what factors created it, but it gives responsibilty almost entirely to Ken Olson as though it emerged entirely from the specific actions of the founder, and had nothing to do with time, place, or subject matter. as a result, instead of a rich tapestry we get dry repitition. Fanatical devotion to employees caused fanatical devotion to the company was said at least five different ways. Job security. Felt like a family. Maybe this all feels very rinsed out, though, because a lot of DEC's values are also the values of Startup Culture, SV, Hacker culture, etc. It is hard to pick up what DEC con tributed from this very limited and very inward-looking portrait.
The second half focuses more on the actual events. We get some textbook explanations of why a vertically integrated company was a mistake in the PC era, and such. There are some blinding errors mentioned, to be sure, but the best chapter is the last one. In it, Gordon Bell (not the primary author) is not convinced about the 'money gene' theory. Instead he lays blame at the feet of managament for missing opportunities, lacking strategic vision, and what would now be called 'not invented here syndrome.' Fabbing their own chips, ignoring Unix even though everyone was installing it on their machines, and losing the type of talent (Bell and Cutler) that was driving the successful stuff to political failures.
