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Comment by cc101 | Hacker News Reader

I always got a laugh at Byte's motto: "A Small Systems Journal." At about one inch thick, it was anything but small.

I always assumed they the small referred to the systems (i.e. microcomputers) rather than the size of the journal. I doubt the term "personal computer" even existed when Byte was born.

It's an inside joke. Byte at its peak had some issues that were nearly an inch thick and could easily be used as a murder weapon.

> I always assumed they the small referred to the systems (i.e. microcomputers) rather than the size of the journal.

That is correct.

Adjectives don't nest. Lists of adjectives all apply to the subject not each other. Each adjectives applies without reference to others.

I’d argue that in “dark red paint” that most people would say that dark modifies red rather than paint.

(Same/maybe more clear in the phrase “candy apple red paint”)

That's why God invented Parens.

https://archive.org/details/byte-magazine-1979-08

Well compared to Computer Shopper, Byte was small. I recall walking out of the book store with the oversized Computer Shopper, roughly two inches thick, newsprint contents. It was like walking out with a phone book every month.

I recall when they went to a smaller format. The world had changed. Sigh.

BYTE came close, but not quite as thick as PC Magazine, which hit 800 pages in December 1983 <https://books.google.com/books?id=05wAGZQlo9QC&pg=PP1>, forcing it to appear every two weeks.

mostly adverts. but i did like it!

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