Name Origin Story
Eh. The night was moist.
So the name: It was originally called tik-tak-toe, which was supposed to be a little like rikki-tikki-tavi, a favorite cartoon when I was small, based on a short story by Rudyard Kipling. However it just looked like I didn't know how to spell.
The new name is xox. Named after a contender for the first video game, OXO by Sandy Douglas at Cabridge University in 1952. I felt it was appropriate because this is my first attempt at something of this scale. I could have instead called it "Bertie the Bot" after "Bertie the Brain", the first Noughts and Crosses computer game in Canada (1950), with a bit of Harry Potter thrown in.
Love those every-flavor beans.
Not really.
You have to have courage to try those.
Anyway, back to computers: Though it was earlier than OXO, Bertie didn't use a Cathode Ray Tube as a display. All it had were a bunch of light bulbs on a big board! Bertie would have been an awesome name too. But xox is easier to spell.
I love these early programs because the creators had to be in touch with the whole system. They got all the way down to the bare metal, and all the way up to the human on the other end. They were able to work end to end on a complete through-line of communication to another person. In the end a computer isn't anything all that different from what we've always done as a species. In the past we used other technologies to communicate, like language, then clay tablets, then a bunch of paperwork, files and rules for people to follow. Computers are simply the latest outgrowth of this very human set of tools we have made to keep ourselves organized and thriving. And they have their creator's fingerprints all over them. It's important to remember that. It's always a human at the other end. Apps don't code themselves. Someone is communicating to you and using the app to do it. What are you saying to your users with this tool?
Ok, here's your soap box back. 