Context: Before the US joined the war, IBM had a business deal with the Nazi regime to supply their machines. Their tabulation machines were used for everything from census and logistics to concentration camp administration. IBMs punch card systems along with numbers tattooed on prisoners were used to track their relocations, labour schedules and executions.
IBM claims that they lost control of their German division after the US entered the war but some historians claim that they still continued to profit from their partnership knowingly and despite the fact.
Yeah I am calling bullshit on this. The only thing IBM had pre WW2 was tabulating machines operated with punchcards. Computers did not exist until mid-war, and certainly none that IBM could make a “business deal” with.
Edit: to be clear, I am not disputing that they had a deal on tabulating systems. But the first real computer - Z3 - was only invented around 1941. By a German, no less…
Yeah, I misremembered the actual type of machine and computers was the first thing that came to my mind. I’ll edit the context to make this more clear.
Thanks for acknowledging the mistake. You must be younger, to me it was an immediate "WTF - computers weren’t invented before that war (to be fair I had to look it up because I also thought they were invented in the 50s. But I guess it is a longer window of constant improvement until they could be marketed at least to companies with a huge room and power to spare.
If I am younger then you must be in your 40s. ;)
I just wrote this from the top of my head from what I remembered reading a long time ago. I remember IBM had a deal with Nazi Germany and then my brain associated them with computers immediately afterwards.
Or even older… But yes.
Understandable mistake to make for the youth of today ^^
I said that because I’m 37.