The Mysterious Affair at Olivetti: IBM, the CIA, and the Cold War Conspiracy to Shut Down Production of the World's First Desktop Computer Hardcover – Deckle Edge, November 5, 2019

Very interesting

Good Read

Details, who-dun-it and more. Fascinating reading, True story-WOW

Olivetti was the Apple of it's day, with innovative products, design, advertising, and strong emphasis on style as well as substance. The family leaders were also remarkable for their commitment to improving their workers lives. I have been a fan of Olivetti typewriters and enjoyed reading more about the family and the struggles of three generations to build and run a successful company amidst the turbulent 20th century. That said, I don't think this book is very well written. There are a ton of names and side stories introduced. Many sentences and paragraphs jump around so much between names, pronouns, and different ideas that I often had to reread parts to puzzle out what was being said. I felt that the author wanted to include almost EVERYTHING she had researched, rather than focusing on the most interesting and important themes. The evidence for conspiracies and murders is very speculative, and I think the sensational title was added to increase interest in what is otherwise a long and involved family history. Despite various problems with the book, it had lots of information and pictures I had never seen before. I had to push myself to keep going at times through all the poorly organized sections, but am still glad to have read it. For others interested in Olivetti history, I highly recommend checking out the "Olivetti Lettera 22 Typewriter Repair Bible" by T. Hunt. The title of Hunt's book may sound overly technical, but it's a remarkable compilation of original consumer manuals, service information, original advertising, and historical background prepared by the Olivetti company itself on it's 50th anniversary in 1958. The history section alone is almost 180 pages, with great photographs covering people, machines, factories, architectural innovations, and dedicated stores devoted entirely to Olivetti products. Adriano himself contributed a ten page essay to the company history, so the book provides a great opportunity to hear from Olivetti himself about his goals for the company, workers, and community.

Broad, well researched, not sure I bought the underlying conspiracy theory, but the book allowed me to flirt with it.

For better or for worse, the author is a good storyteller and this "mysterious history" would have worked better as a novel. A vast amount of the detail is either derivative of standard histories or simply made up:p. 81: 'it would be safe to assume..."p. 84: "one cannot know... but the odds are good..."p. 119: "Posterity has not handed down an account..."p. 135: "No account has come down to us... [b]ut one can imagine..."This type of speculation occurs dozens of times throughout the book and they add up to a thoroughly unreliable, unconvincing tale.

This is a good human interest story and an interesting biographical sketch of the leaders of Olivetti, which was a good company in its time. Although I have not researched the references, the story of IBM colluding and in conspiracy with the CIA would not surprise me in the least. However, the author's bias and excessively positive and flowery descriptions of the Olivetti family leadership slightly degrades the historical context. In addition, when the author combines what is clearly a human interest and political story and threads it into computer technology and history treatise, she should have had more effective content editing because there are several serious computer history and technology errors and judgement oversights. For example, on page 226 it states: "As for IBM, Vice President Bernie Meyerson claimed in 2001 that his company had invented the personal computer, the IBM 610, which did not appear until 1981." The historical fact is the IBM 610 was co-developed by IBM and Burroughs and appeared in the IBM sales manual in late 1960, not 1981. The IBM 5150 (known as the PC) came out in 1981, but had been preceded by many desktop computers before like the CS9000, IBM 51xx family and even the IBM 632 and 604 calculators. The Olivetti P101 was certainly a groundbreaking product, but not for long. For Olivetti, the P101 was a major product, but for IBM the 610 was a tactical "place holder" for the IBM 1620.

As a fan of Olivetti typewriters, I was looking forward to reading this book. But what a disappointment. The story was not about the cold war conspiracy promised on the cover, but rather a cumbersome and incomplete history of the Olivetti family. And it’s rife with errors — one example is the claim (page 162) that Cormac McCarthy’s Lettera 22 was auctioned by Christie’s for a quarter-million dollars. As any typewriter geek will tell you, it was a Lettera 32. A little thing, to be sure, but proof that — as raised by other reviewers here— this book was not particularly well researched.