News article on AT&T

edhall at RAND-UNIX.ARPA edhall at RAND-UNIX.ARPA
Thu Jun 28 06:44:06 AEST 1984


From:  Ed Hall <edhall at RAND-UNIX.ARPA>

As near as I can tell the article is correct, except for its mention
of UNIX being given away to `students' rather than `universities'.
For many years a distribution of UNIX, complete with printed
documentation and reprints of technical articles, could be licensed
for any number of CPU's at an institution of higher learning for a
mere $300 fee.  For example, a total of 27 CPU's in the California
State University and Colleges were licensed for one fee--about $11
per CPU.  (Only a minority of them actually ended up running UNIX,
though.)

I suppose you can quibble over whether this is actually `giving away'
UNIX, but it is sure close to it.  And so far as being a marketing
ploy by AT&T, I don't know if that was the original intention, but
it ended up working out that way.

		-Ed Hall
		Rand Corporation
		Santa Monica, CA



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