Gravity, t3h movie! Imax 3d.

[kandrathe]

One of my patients, who was a NASA employee, claimed that NASA always took the lowest bidder on computer systems (this was 1985-1989), and as a result they had compatibility issues with software, etc.

When I worked for the railroad in the 80's the government required us to follow rigid procurement rules, or risk losing their business. When the Canadians bought a majority share of stock and replaced all the top executives, they wanted us to buy computers from an Italian subsidiary. It was a hellish scenario. Trying to placate the Canadian owners, who wanted us to buy their Olivetti (M24) computers from Italy, ship them in cargo containers to Montreal, and then by rail to Minneapolis and risk ticking off our US government minders who were using us to payoff their political cronies. I just wanted them to let us alone to make good vendor relationships and get the best quality product at a reasonable price. Our entire shop was IBM, and we had 24x7 on call service for any problem on any component. I don't think Olivetti had any repair people in the US at that time. Anyway, I started by getting M24's for the executives and their support staff.