- 20 Mar 08, 08:48 GMT Anyone over 30 is sure to feel a
nostalgic glow whenever the BBC Micro is mentioned. For almost
the whole of the 1980s the Beeb, as it was known, was one of the
main ways people in the UK accessed computer technology. It
seems incredible now that the BBC, a broadcaster, partnered with
a technology company and put its name on the machine at a time
when computers were such an unknown entity. I can't imagine that
happening today - but then again, the BBC's involvement with
Freeview, picking up the pieces from ITV Digital, has been
arguably as forward thinking. At the start of the 1980s the
microchip revolution was beginning to crank into gear. But to
most people a computer was something to be found in the office,
in a factory, not in a home. And an even greater number of
people had no idea what to do with a computer. But a handful of
people in the BBC, among them producers John Criwaczekm, David
Allen, and John Radcliffe felt differently. She told me: "There
was a doc that had been put tog