It strikes me as rather odd that the calculator application on the PC I'm using right now is considered an "Accessory." In the early days of computers, the main goal seemed to be to perform simple arithmetic calculations, as can be seen with Hollerith's system used for the US Census. The purposes for what a computer was to be used for stayed somewhat consistent through time up until mid the 20th century, when computers became more sophisticated and allowed for rather complex calculations. What I find interesting about the history of computers is that the countries' governments kind of vaulted the development and advancement of the technology, whether it was with a need for a statistical analysis of the country's population or to decode German messages on the radio. It was constantly investing money into the field, even when private sectors were hesitant to do so: "The commercial electronics industry did not initially appreciate the value of integrated circuits, believing them too unreliable and too difficult to manufacture. However both NASA and the American Defense realized the value of the microchips..." (pg. 67) Obviously the military and the electronics industry had different needs, yet the military's needs are the ones that lead to breakthroughs that are most relevant to today's technology ie. integrated circuits are still the core of computer hardware. Of course it wasn't all fun and games where the government just threw money to whoever claimed they could make a better, faster computer. For example, when Charles Babbage redesigned the Difference Engine and applied for additional funding to create it, the British government did not see it as an improvement to the prior version and canceled any future funding in 1842. (pg.16)
As far as culture being affected by computers, this has not really occured yet in pages 1-83 of "Computers." These machines were mostly being used for clerical work such as banking and clearing checks, insurance companies, governments and other organizations who processed large amounts of data and relied on mechanical calculators, punched cards, and tabulators.The computer has not yet reached the individual consumer, which probably will change the landscape of what computers were being built for. I suspect that the reason for this is Business to Business services and products do not really effect the overall image of the product to the greater population. Slowly but surely this was changing though as computers were started to be used for non commercial matters, such as politics, like the UNIVAC correctly predicting that Eisenhower would win the 1952 election by a landslide.
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