On Tue, 25 Jan 2011, limtc wrote:
Hi, Is there any books that showcase the history of Apple II? I am not referring to old books, but books that we can buy in bookstore that talks about Apple II - history, pictures, etc? I have seen a few books that relate to the Apple computer in general, Mac, arcade games, etc, but I have never seen any books that is dedicated to Apple II. Considered that this is one of the best selling computers at all time, there should be at least one such book.
The time has come and gone.There were plenty of books about the history of the early days of home computers, and even a fair number of books about Apple in the early days, but they date about 25 or so years ago.
There was "Fire in the Valley" that was about the whole scene, but covered Apple fairly well since it was a key player. It came out in more recent years as a second edition. "Hackers" by Steven Levy was more about what came before small computers, but it moves into the era. I think it wsa "The Little Kingdom" that was a history of Apple, it came out in the mid-eighties, I think I got my copy as a remaindered book. I seem to recall other similar books. There was even a pocket size paperback titled "Woz", a quickie biography about Steve Wozniak on the same level of quickie biographies of the latest rock star.
When the Mac came along Steven Levy had "Insanely Great" about that computer.
But the history has faded into the past. The period when people were looking back that far has come and gone, the history looks to more recent things.
Yes, the Apple II sold well, but computers have become much bigger since the II came and went, dwarfing all the early home computers, no matter how well they did at the time. There likely is only an incrementally larger number of people interested in the history of the early days of home computers than there were 25 years ago, since the masses that have all the computers and are so quick to jump on any bandwagon that comes along aren't interested.
Michael