[lovich]

I think my, admittedly unstated, point is that most managers were incapable of doing an honest evaluation of computer equipment at the time. Someone coming up to a machine and fucking with it in a way that could produce useful work results, like making a random graphing machine display programmable names, would be a strong indicator that the machine could actually do something instead of being a complete gamble

[stavros]

I don't disagree, but if you weren't there when he programmed it, it would just be "the machine is broken" to you.

[futharkshill]

Imagine someone messing with your car. Might be an easy fix if you are a mechanic. Most people are not.

[Tabular-Iceberg]

I don’t know the machine, but it sounds to me like what he did was just part of the normal operation. So the car analogy would be more like changing someone’s radio presets to some embarrassing station as a prank. Annoying, but you don’t need a mechanic to fix that.