Early-80s computer author and journalist who realized that he could design (and hype) a machine more effectively than many of the entrepreneurs he was writing about. Thus the Osborne I was born, a "luggable" CP/M based computer with single-density floppy drives. They were garbage but Osborne managed to spark a huge wave of publicity for them and they sold by the tens of thousands. Purchasers were particularly impressed by the software bundle that came with new machines -- at full retail price, the package would have cost as much as the computer did. Instead, the user got them for free.

Osborne Computer Corporation went spectacularly bankrupt on the eve of its IPO in 1983.

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