I read Mythical Man Month some time ago but don't recall that the IBM bureacracy almost killing the project. IBM was a much smaller company then.
Could you elaborate on what was said on that subject?
My impression from the book (and others) was that IBM greatly understimated the time to develop S/360 hardware and software, test it, and get it out the door. It was hard to test the software before the hardware was ready to have something run on it.
Further, the OS software turned out to be much more complex than expected, that is, harder to write, harder to debug, harder to use, and most importantly, extremely slow. Brooks' point was that throwing more people at the project only made it later, and some projects will require time so matter how many people are thrown at it.
I think the biggest problem when he came it was IBM was too big to support the declining business. If there were no PCs or minis and IBM kept selling bigger and fancier mainframes ever year -- as it had been doing since 1952 -- it would've done ok. But that was no longer the marketplace. Just like GM discovernig the marketplace of the 1950s and 1960s had expired in the 1970s.
Mainframes were more of a commodity than they were before; IBM's extensive customization options were not as necessary. I remember the extremely complex option list for PCs -- stuff that would make sense on a mainframe but not on a PC.
In other words, while mainframes were still a viable product, IBM had to significantly reduce the number of people involved in making them--reduce the cost per unit.
IBM never had to contract before in its history, it never had layoffs. It almost always had growth.
The consent decree (more below) constrained IBM from freely competing in those years.
A lot of software vendors in those days imposed various restrictions.
In the 1970s, with electromechanical switching, there were very legitimate concerns about foreign devices hurting the network. The Independent phone companies, state PUCs, and FCC engineers were all in agreement on that risk. ESS has more tolerance and controls. Further, the world has changed. In those days, regardless of actual fault, Bell would be the one held responsible -- blamed -- for any problems caused by foreign gear, not the actual irresponsible party.
As to keeping others out of the market, that was FCC policy. The market was cross subsidized -- the profits from business and toll services cross subsidized local residents. (Today we have 911 and Universal Service Fees. Back then the dial 0 operator handled 911 calls and that was a big part of their traffic.) Anyway, they knew that they'd STILL have to keep residential rates low but without the cross subsidy.
IBM, as a result of the consent decree, did not have patent protection. It was required to release its patents and technology to allow that kind of competition. But how far should IBM go to prop up its competitors?
Times have changed since 1983. IBM changed over the years and the Bell System would've changed to. It was already on its way to dumping company ownership of customer equipment with ESS coming in, better FCC certification, and a recognition that customer problems were the customer's fault. IBM prospered when it dropped bundled and so would've Bell -- as the Baby Bell's did quite nicely.
One key difference was that IBM won its lawsuit but was content to stick with the consent decree a while longer (it eventually rid itself of that and made a big difference). AT&T want it gone so it could go into new projects, which it promptly did.
Strange. I remember Syncsorts ads very well; but never saw an IBM ad for Sort. I also never knew a site that didn't use Syncsort. I thought IBM's sort was free, anyway. Software products didn't become a big thing until the 1990s; they were once free, then pretty cheap.
Except both companies continually did bring new products to market. Also both companies made continual improvements internally to existing products. The "bank per buck" of IBM machines always improved over time.
I do not claim that every IBM product was the best in the marketplace or IBM didn't make mistakes. However, my employers have been IBM customers for the last 35 years and I've seen what they can do. I've also dealt with other vendors and for the most part IBM was superior. Not always, but usually.
Just like any other company.
If that were true, we'd still have SxS or panel and open lines and talk on candlesticks. Period. We'd be using punch card machines. Period.
Both IBM and Bell took plenty of risks over the years. ESS and S/360 were HUGE expensive risks, fraught with tons of problems along the way. They have taken big risks and small risks.