CONCLUSIONS - Inventing the PC - page 166

None of the preserved MCM corporate documents provides suf-
ficient data to estimate how well the MCM 's message of micro-
computer-based distributed computing was received by the
computer industry and services. One of the internal MCM docu-
ments that survived the company's closure in 1982 lists several
installations of the MCM /70 in renowned financial, research,
educational, and governmental institutions across North Amer-
ica. But such a listing of prominent corporate names is not a
substitute for primary evidence of impact, and one is left only
with anecdotal evidence. New York Life Insurance Company
( NYLIC ) - one of the largest life insurers in the world - pur-
chased several MCM /70s. NYLIC contracted another company,
Warner Computer Systems, for programming and time-sharing
services. Glenn Schneider was one of the Warner Computer
Systems employees charged with the evaluation of desktop
and portable computer concepts such as the MCM /70 and the
IBM 5100. He was also using NYLIC 's MCM /70s to teach APL
classes to the company's management information personnel.
Twenty-five years later, Schneider recollected his exposure to
the 22-pound APL computer from MCM this way: “having a
portable APL machine was such a novelty back then it was a
God-send … Lugging the MCM [/70] home on the subway in
New York helped build up my muscles, as it was hardly a light-
weight, but it gave me great hope (and inspiration) for the future
which would yet erupt.” 16
In 1973 and 1974, thousands of people attended computer
shows and APL conferences where MCM demonstrated its first
computer and promoted the company's vision of personalized
computing. One of the people who learned about the MCM /70
that way was American teacher Harley Courtney.
I saw an early version of the MCM /70 at the Toronto
APL conference in the spring/summer of 1975. Since I
was obsessed with APL and took a job teaching at U.S.