Movies and The Internet--PIRATES OF SILICON VALLEY

This made-for-TNT-TV movie starring Noah (ER) Wyle, and Anthony (Breakfast Club) Michael Hall isn't specifically about the internet, but I'm gonna make an exception for my series. This film was able to accurately depict technology and should serve as a good comparison to all the fake-tech in the movies I've watched so far.

A quick summary of PIRATES--it's about Steve Jobs and Bill Gates, as told through the eyes of friends Steve Wozniak and Steve Ballmer (why so many Steves ?!?). The "Pirates" title comes from the film's main theme that "Good artists copy, great artists steal" which is supposed to be a favorite Picasso quote of both Jobs and Gates. All of the truly brilliant ideas in the film seem to originate from other sources (Xerox and their invention of the mouse for instance), and these two guys were able to piece innovation together and make a product that the end-user actually needed. Steve and Bill are pirates, but are mostly sympathetic. because without them these operating system ideas might have taken much longer to come about. Anyway, enough plot, let's take a look at some photos:

Here is the menu screen, and I'd say they did a pretty good job of casting and costume design, especially for a TV-movie.

Here Woz describes his ingenious whistle-tone invention to save on long-distance phone calls (a similar feature appeared in HACKERS with a tape recording).

There are numerous shots of Steve Jobs being a hippee, getting tripped out on lsd for instance:

He does also try more zen methods of enlightenment, just so you don't think he's such a druggie:

Gates, however, likes to let loose driving while eating pizza! Put it down Bill!

Look, it's Blazerillionare Paul Allen:

What is that?! Oh, it's the first mouse...no-one will ever use that thing!

The movie has a couple weird narration elements to it, where they thought it would be cool to have the Steves describe the action from inside/outside the scene. Zany!

Uh-oh, looks like someone just found out he was going to be ousted from the top of the computer-pile. Don't worry Steve, you'll be back!

I'd recommend PIRATES for anyone who wants to know the basics behind the computer war/revolution. It's well-paced and features convincing performances, but really why would you need to see it when you just read this comprehensive summary?