ABSTRACT
In 1989, PC Magazine columnist Robert Chapman Wood was among the first observers evaluating the nascent Personal Computer (PC) scene in China: ‘China proudly claims to have built more than 32,000 PCs in 1985 alone … There were still 40,000 stocked in warehouses with no customer in sight.’ He also suspected that in most cases, components were imported from Hong Kong and only assembled in Beijing. In particular, PCs were rare in China because a typical system cost about 30,000 yuan ($10,000 at official exchange rates) while the yearly per capita income was only 1,000 yuan. Wood concluded: ‘China's skimpy infrastructure and the demands of its socialist tradition clash mightily with the needs of modern technology, making foreign computer purchase a continuing necessity. The personal computer revolution is advancing only fitfully on the mainland … PC's remain a small part of the Chinese picture.’ (Wood 1989: 245).
