Talk:History of IBM/SandboxTalk

Proposed Section Additions
I would like to suggest adding two new sections. In this post I will first detail these sections, and then explain how I think they will improve the article. The first new section would be a high level overview of the current IBM, similar to or even drawn from the intro on the main IBM article. This section will provide the reader with a sense of what the end point is for the evolutionary story told by the remainder of the article.

The second new section will in effect become a New Timeline. It will consist of a chronological bullet list of significant developments in the company's history - products, technologies, people, corporate and organizational events. It will be factual, not promotional. I will be happy to provide the initial content for this section. DISCLAIMER: I am Paul Lasewicz, IBM's Corporate Archivist (see my user page). I understand and fully support the reader's and editor's right to be suspicious of any and all content I provide. For my part, I will strive to make this content factual and objective. But I recognize that there will be those who may feel it is still not neutral enough for this purpose, and I would look to those folks for additions and language edits in order to keep make sure the article is in keeping with Wikipedia's policies.

The current section Old Timeline content, which by its narrative format lends itself to a more interpretive, thematic function, would become a new section 3. It would retain its focus on linking events and developments in order to help the readers better understand the broad sweeps of the evolutionary path the company has followed. It would have to be renamed, perhaps something like 'Major Themes'? Similarly, the current section 2 (Major events et al) would become section 4, and retain its utility as a place to capture aspects of the company's history that require deeper dives. See also, Further reading, and References would then become sections 5, 6, and 7.

The benefits that I see in adding this content and shuffling the current organization of the article are multiple. First, the addition of bulleted content will authoritatively enhance the depth and breadth of company historical information presented by the article. It will give the reader a fuller, more accurate account of the scope IBM's activities over nearly a century of being in business.

The second benefit is that it will provide raw material for fleshing out the more narrative, thematic aspects of the article. This fleshing out is, I feel, necessary, because one of the few critiques I have of this article is that the narrative sections tend to be a little uneven. No doubt due to the participation of multiple authors and editors - each who has diverse and different areas of expertise - the current timeline and major events sections can be shallow in some places and too granular in others. This additional material will, when incorporated via future edits, serve to fill in gaps in those narratives. Anything we can do to smooth that uneveness out will enhance the accuracy of the article, and increase its value to the reader.

Lastly, these proposed changes will make editing and maintaining this page less troublesome. IBM can be a polarizing institution - it's a profitable corporation that has in the past and continues to deal with world changing technologies and engages with domestic and foreign governments and businesses. Each of these aspects can be a touchstone for strong feelings. By presenting much of that sometimes polarizing content in brief, bulleted snippets, the article will better and more easily maintain a NPOV. Hopefully, this unbiased, factual manner will minimize subjective word choice and (hopefully) help mitigate, if not actually avoid, controversy for the readers/editors.

Your thoughts? Paul C. Lasewicz (talk) 16:33, 28 July 2009 (UTC)PCL July 28, 2009 Moved 9/15 Paul C. Lasewicz (talk) 12:50, 15 September 2009 (UTC)

Proposed New Section 1. Introduction
As mentioned previously, the purpose of adding an intro would provide the reader with a sense of what IBM is today. That context will better help them understand the content that follows, which outlines the evolution of the company. For the sake of consistency, I suggest using the overview created for the main Wikipedia IBM entry (see below). I've added a few qualifiers, but essentially it is untouched.

Moved 9/15 Paul C. Lasewicz (talk) 12:52, 15 September 2009 (UTC)

Proposed New Section 2. Chronology
The rationale for this new content is outlined in Topic No. 1, above. For purposes of making these factoid bullets more user friendly, I've broken them into chronological sections, which will follow as separate topics. Even so, there's a lot of content here - I figure we can always edit it down if folks feel it is too much.

I've included citations for nearly every bullet; in some cases I resorted to IBM sources, but I tried wherever possible cite independent sources. I throw it out for discussion whether these citations should be included with the factoids as I have here, or broken out as footnotes. Again, there's a lot of content - so there'll be a lot of footnotes.Paul C. Lasewicz (talk) 20:16, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

Moved 9/15 Paul C. Lasewicz (talk) 13:01, 15 September 2009 (UTC)

Proposed New Section 2.1 1880s-1937
This list is meant not to be definitive, but to be a starting point for discussion. For example, it's an open question as to whether these factoids should include the pre-1911 CTR merger era as well. I've thrown one in as an example of what it could look like, but generally focused on the post-1911 era with this initial list. My approach to creating this list is to give a flavor for the development of the firm from a product, administrative, and cultural perspective.

Moved 9/15 Paul C. Lasewicz (talk) 13:03, 15 September 2009 (UTC)

Proposed Edits to New 'Section 3' - Timeline
I'm throwing this out for discussion. One of the issues I see when I look at the Timeline Section (Current Section 1) is a wide variance in tone, from broad overviews in some sections (1.1 for ex.) to the more granular (Section 1.3.1) to the cursory (1.3.2). I think we can do better. To get this started, I will propose edits in following talk page sections that will focus on providing a more balanced body of content across the various eras. In some places, where the focus is I feel too granular, I will suggest moving that particular topic to the Major Events, Trends, and Technologies Section, and will offer replacement content that I consider to be more in keeping with the overview philosophy that characterizes the Timeline section. At times the replacement content will result in a change in the focus of that particular section - for ex., Section 1.3.1 does not in my opinion accurately reflect what happened at IBM in the 1970-75 era. Of course, you may disagree with the content I offer, and offer up an alternative of your own - that's perfectly ok with me. Historical interpretation, after all, is mutable. And lastly, once in a while I'll offer a clarification of a fact or two. Your thoughts? Paul C. Lasewicz (talk) 18:15, 2 September 2009 (UTC)

Moved 9/15 Paul C. Lasewicz (talk) 13:10, 15 September 2009 (UTC)

Proposed Reorganization of Major Events, Trends and Technologies
In order to improve current user access to the content in this section, and also to improve the section's ability to scale with the addition of new content in the future, I'd like to propose adding an additional level of categories, and organizing the existing content under them. The new structure might look something like the breakout below; additional categories could be created as needed.

Products and Technologies
 * Evolution of IBM's computer hardware
 * Evolution of IBM's operating systems
 * High-level languages
 * IBM and AIX/UNIX/Linux/SCO
 * Non-computer lines of business

Organization Events
 * Federal Systems Division
 * IBM service organizations
 * ROLM Communications Systems Division
 * Unbundling of software and services in 1969

Paul C. Lasewicz (talk) 15:58, 11 September 2009 (UTC) Moved 9/15 Paul C. Lasewicz (talk) 13:31, 15 September 2009 (UTC)

Addition to Major Events, Trends and Technologies
I propose removing the following content from the 1975-1990 Timeline Section, and creating new entries under Major Events. I think the material, while significant, might be too granular for the summary/overview tone of the Timeline sections.

Midrange Systems In the midrange arena, IBM consolidated the market position its General Systems Division had built in the 1970s with the System/3, System/32 and System/34. The System/38, with its radical architecture, had experienced delays to its first customer shipment since announcement in 1978. In 1982, IBM disbanded the organization that had meant the Data Processing Division sold only mainframes to large customers while the General Systems Division sold only S/3x machines to small and medium-sized customers. Instead, the new ISM (for small and medium customers) and ISAM divisions (large customers) could sell from the entire IBM portfolio.

BICARSA 1983 saw the announcement of the System/36, the replacement for the System/34. And in 1988, IBM announced the AS/400, intended to represent a point of convergence for both System/36 customers and System/38 customers. The 1970s had seen IBM develop a range of Billing, Inventory Control, Accounts Receivable, & Sales Analysis (BICARSA) applications for specific industries: construction (CMAS), distribution (DMAS) and manufacturing (MMAS), all written in the RPG II language. By the end of the 1980s, IBM had almost completely withdrawn from the BICARSA applications marketplace. Because of developments in the antitrust cases against IBM brought by the US government and European Union, IBM sales representatives were now able to work openly with application software houses as partners. (For a period in the early 1980s, a 'rule of three' operated, which obliged IBM sales representatives, if they were to propose a third-party application to a customer, to also list at least two other third-party vendors in the IBM proposal. This caused some amusement to the customer, who would typically have engaged in intense negotiations with one of the third parties and probably not have heard of the other two vendors.) Paul C. Lasewicz (talk) 12:41, 4 September 2009 (UTC)

Moved 9/15 Paul C. Lasewicz (talk) 13:44, 15 September 2009 (UTC)

Proposed Changes Implemented
After posting section change proposals in relevant talk pages and not receiving any negative feedback, I went live with the changes today. If this causes any angst, please let me know. Paul C. Lasewicz (talk) 16:39, 23 October 2009 (UTC)