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RIchard Greenblatt was born on December 25, 1944 in Portland, Oregon. -
Richard Greenblatt was a very smart young kid. Levy talks about his great chess skills which brought him to be a great competitor to many players double his age. His love for chess and his intellect at a young age is reflected later through his life within his many computer science achievements. -
His family moved to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania when he was a child. He then decided to stay close to home and attend Massachusetts Institute of Technology. -
After going to school it didn't take very long for Greenblatt to become interested in the Tech model railroad club. The club had started by working on model railroads and had evolved into the start of many young hackers including Greenblatt. -
While at university, Richard Greenblatt crossed paths with Bill Gosper, a mathematician and programmer, who would later become a close friend and co-founder in what would eventually be recognized as a pivotal moment in hacker history. Their friendship expanded during their involvement in the Tech Model Railroad Club at MIT, where they shared a passion for exploring the boundaries of computing. -
Greenblatt spent so much time programming the Programmed Data Processor (PDP) machines there that he failed out of MIT as a first-term junior and had to take a job at a firm, Charles Adams Associates, until the AI Lab hired him about 6 months later. -
Greenblatt strongly believed in the hacker's ethic, which is all about sharing and openness in the world of computer programming. When he was studying at MIT and even afterward, he was a big supporter of the idea that software should be free for everyone to use and learn from. This belief is a big part of what makes someone a "hacker" nowadays. Greenblatt's passion for sharing knowledge and working together with others helped shape what it means to be a hacker in the world of computers. -
One of the earliest significant projects Greenblatt undertook outside of MIT involved working on the LISP compiler. He adapted the existing LISP compiler designed for the PDP-1 computer to make it compatible with the PDP-6 computer. -
Inspired by his love for chess and influenced by Kotok's work, Greenblatt started on his next project in 1967. He created the MacHack Chess program, marking the first instance of an online chess game played between humans and the PDP-6 computer. https://prabook.com/web/richard.greenblatt/1945004 -
Following conversations with programmer Edward Fredkin, Greenblatt wanted to transition the PDP-6 computer to a time-sharing system. Despite some doubt, the team eventually agreed to the switch, enabling multiple users to access the computer simultaneously. -
Following its initial development, the MacHack chess program gained significant traction. Greenblatt made a decision to enter the program into real chess tournaments against human opponents. This move marked a revolutionary achievement in artificial intelligence technology, as MacHack successfully fulfilled the goal of competing head-to-head with humans.
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In 1977, unbeaten chess champion Bobby Fischer played three games in Cambridge, Massachusetts against Greenblatt"s computer program, and Fischer won all of them.
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Known as the ultimate hacker computer by Levy. -
In 1980, Greenblatt founded Symbolics. Symbolics became notable for establishing the first-ever "dot-com" website domain. Today, the website https://symbolics.com remains accessible, offering a insight into this milestone in internet history. -
The publication of "Hackers: Heroes of The Computer Revolution" By Steven Levy in 1984 brought attention to the work of hackers like Greenblatt.