Edwin Blacks: Timeline of the Holocaust - Essay Example

?Edwin Black’s: Timeline of the Holocaust The is 30th January, 1933 when Adolf Hitler comes to power. This period marks the turning point when carefully organized information becomes the ideal tool for mass destruction of millions of Jews across Europe. Adolf Hitler for his passion for dictatorial leadership and personal hatred for the Jews as suggested by Edwin Black was the ironic turning point for this historical intellectual technology undertaking. In every aspect, this historical undertaking was only made possible by the innovativeness and genius ability of one American company, the International Business Machines (IBM) and its Chairman, Thomas J. Watson. Black argues that in a unique web of organized technologies and direction of its ultimate goal and capabilities in business, IBM designed and implemented in what would be later regarded as the massive human destruction ever to be aided by a computer. Inspired by the commercial mantra that “if it can be done, it should be done,” IBM’s technological achievement was inspired more by the huge profits it made at a time when cash lines spread world over. (Black, 2001) When Hitler ascended to power, the Nazis started planning how they can kill and destroy all the Jews that lived across Europe. Their concern was to find a way in which they would categorize and catalogue their subjects. IBM’s Dehomag branch equipped with Hollerith punch card technology came in handy to offer assistance. Over the years of operation, the company upgraded its identification and catalogue technology to enable an automated system of persecution and extermination of the Jews. The Holocaust timeline provides a detailed timeline of major events that finally culminated in the mass murdering of Jews across Europe by Adolf Hitler soon after he took over power. This process began way back in 1933 when at the time when the Nazis took over German’s leadership mantle. The sama year saw Adolf Hitler becoming the Chancellor of Germany, immediately all civil liberties were suspended in Germany. A year later in 1934, Hitler combined his Chancellor’s position with that of the country’s president becoming the most powerful person who was commonly referred to as “Fuhrer” with banning of selling of Jewish based newspapers. It is important to note also that, a year before, Hitler had already set up concentration camps at Dachau rounding about 200 communists and subsequent burning of books and publications that were thought to champion ant-nazi’s ideologies. The years between 1935-1936 saw an intensified campaign by the Nazis to persecute personalities that were against Nazi’s ideologies. Similarly, Jews were denied their rightful citizenship including that of voting. When the world Olympics were held in Germany during the same year, all advertorials and placards that were thought to be owned by the Nazis were put off the streets until the completion of the games. Two years after 1936, there was a mass arrest of Jews by the Nazis in Austria rounding about 30,000 of the Jews in what has been historically described as the “Night of the Broken Glass.” During this period the Jews no longer had the right to own businesses nor to participate in any social gatherings and all had an identification card that bore a letter “J” at the beginning. The Jews’ life was so concentrated that even the law provided where they ought to be at any provided time, and all their children were segregated in Jewish schools. This high end technology was not only found useful in the identification and isolation of the Jews but also in broad areas that included people and asset registration, food distribution based on databases, management and tracking of slave labor and operations of the trains and identification of the carrier passengers. 1940 saw more Jews being confined in concentration camps and in ghettos and their subsequent deportation to Poland. In Poland, this year would mark the first major mass murder of the Jews. 1941 was a year that was associated with more restrictions to the Jewish. During the same year, the Germans also attacked the Soviet Union and subsequent confining of all Jewish throughout western Europe in ghettos. Additionally, the Jews had to leave their houses only after notifying the police and subsequent ban for them in using public telephones. In 1942, the final solution to eliminate the Jews was concluded by the Nazis. This plan involved a massive plan for killing all the Jews in Europe. All sorts of restrictions and denial of any form of right had been enforced on the Jews at this point. The German based subsidiary invented what would later be called “racial census” being able to register people and categorically trace someone along a lineage path. A dream come true for the Nazis who were not only interested in listing and counting the Jews but largely to categorize them. IBM made custom specific applications and run data applications and data testing to ensure that all the data that they collected complied with their partner’s core mission, much as what the current software developer would undertake. IBM’s punch cards were only available for purchase at one point: IBM offices Intensive use of IBM’s technology would be further exploited by the Nazis to murder around 85% of the Jewish in a single year alone. Some authors contend that by 1944 Hitler had already taken over Hungary and participated in mass deportation of close to 12,000 Jews per day to Austria for mass murder. The making of a modern computer: A Darwinian approach to computing evolution as posited by Steve Jobs The story of the birth of the personal computing technology can be traced back to 1975 when Steve Wonziak as working for a calculator manufacturing firm referred to as Hewlett Packard. During his period, Wonziak used to learn the basics of basic computer kits including the Altair, and would later team up with Steve Jobs to explore the possibility of making their own personal computer. After several failed attempts, Steven Wonziak and Steve Jobs finally realized their dream of owning a personal computer with their first release of Apple I computer and subsequent formation of Apple computers in 1976. Perhaps what Darwin would call elementary stages of development, Apple I computers was based on a first single circuit board computer, with a video interface and an insignificant 8kb of Random Access Memory and a keyboard. Being in the first stage of development, this creation as put forward by Steve Jobs and Steven Wonziak was mounted on a plywood and exposing all the computer components, this they would later show off to a local meeting of computer hobbyists. This dream would further be up-scaled by their selling of about 200 of such. In the following year, Wonziak and Jobs developed Apple II computer and further incorporating Apple Computers. This time around, this new computer as developed by the duo had color graphics improvement and based on audio cassette as a memory storage. While the original configuration of the computer was developed using a 4kb RAM, a further computer evolution would later be increased to 48kb and a floppy disk drive as a storage medium. In the year 1977, this Darwinian innovation in computing would be introduced by Radio Shack through his creation of TRS-80 which was a microcomputer, based on Z80 processor and 4kb of RAM and a similar size for ROM. This time, an adaptation of this computer came with an enabled memory expansion, and utilization of audio cassettes for computer storage. This innovation sold over 10,000 units within the first month alone. It can be argued that with the innovation of an improved adaptation technique of disk drive for computer storage, applications for personal computing heightened opening new grounds for software development. Walter Isaacson contends that Jobs had a passion for his work. His attitude offered a combination of technology criticism and promotional excitement. Job’s ultimate invention of the music business with the innovation of iPod and iTunes led to the ultimate evolution of personal computing platform in the computing industry. (Isaacson, 2011) In the Darwinian own line of thought, it can be argued that the origin and development of computers can be viewed in the development of species through the process of selection and evolution. Similarly, Steve Job’s concept of Apple computers was in the forefront of changes of computing waves. From Counterculture to Cyberculture: Fred Tuner’s insights on computing concepts From Counterculture to Cyberculture presents a more global viewpoint of pioneering entrepreneurs and scientists around the 1960s to 1990s on the origins of computing concepts particularly the internet and how its birth has affected the current society. In this intellectual piece of writing, Tuner examines how the field of computing and computer science emerged; how large organizations including military groups adopted and used computing technology; and how established countercultural values and social viewpoints refused computing technology and the associated consequences. In his analysis, Tuner examines Nobert Weiner’s arguments of systems theory against that of Jay Forrester on cyberkinetics to the radical and progressive suggestions that were put forward by Buckminster Fuller and Marshall McLuhan. As proposed, Tuner extends his analysis to how core ideas contained in systems theory to the relationship it bears in communication and control design and how these propositions would later influence social role and how people would be connected through ideas, in what he would refer to as “networking.” Tuner’s suggestions views networking not as a medium of connecting people, but one that extends from this basic connectivity role to a more deeper thought connection perspective, that encompasses connection of both tangible (persons) and intangible (ideas and thoughts) objects. This is what in Tuner’s perspectives set the stage ready for computer networking in the early 1980s by the private communities and later in the 1990s with the public’s perception of internet concepts. As such ideas that were once developed by engineers and scientists were quickly spread by individuals who lacked knowledge and seriousness of their acts excelled highly in the communication process. Stewart Brand is portrayed by Tuner as a man who was at the epitome towards the migration from the Counterculture to Cyberculture. His iconic personality is displayed as having thought of the networking concept in the early 1980s, and how he was influenced by systems theory, further engaging in undertakings that involved people’s connectivity. In describing the Whole Earth Catalogue Tuner looks at Brand’s register of things that people tend to value when living in communities and the progressive application of multimedia elements for performance. These would then inspire the creation of Whole Earth ‘Lectronic Link (WELL) -online meeting center formed in 1985 and the Global Business Network Consultancy. (Turner, 2008) Whole Earth Catalogue puts into perspective the desire of people to establish communes through technology and the realization of the transformation process as a medium of social change. These groups of people in Brand’s view used peaceful approaches assisted by small technological advances in slide projectors so that they would bring people closer together to enable them share their common identity. In the end, this group of enthusiasts experienced cybernetic visualization for a reality for information systems. This notion brought to the surface the possibility of a single global that is continuously connected in a myriad of information patterns of a global community. Thus in Tuner’s own words, those who adopted and read the Whole Earth Catalogue helped create a technological vision “as a countercultural force that would in later years shape shape how the public perceived computing…” The internet bubble in 2000 marked new beginnings for a steady rise in the internet sector. This rise was particularly significant with the coming of age of the world wide web, with the rise of specific companies that would later on be referred to as “dot-com”. Many companies started overlooking traditional profit to equity ratio while preferring high technological advancements occasioned by high rise in equity turnover. However, on March 2000, most of these companies came crawling after NASDAQ lost just over ten percent from its business peak in effect grounding most of these dot-com companies to their feet. References Black, E. (2001). BM and the Holocaust: The Strategic Alliance between Nazi Germany and America's Most Powerful Corporation. US: Crown Books. Isaacson, W. (2011). Steve Jobs. US: Simon & Schuster. Turner, F. (2008). From Counterculture to Cyberculture: Stewart Brand, the Whole Earth Network, and the Rise of Digital Utopianism. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Read More