Dr. Dobb's Journal June, 2004
"First there was that whole Godfather thing," Gianni complained, "then HBO comes up with an Italian-American mobster who's seeing a psychiatrist, and now Dreamworks is developing some animated movie about gangster sharks with Italian names and accents."
"That's clearly gratuitous," I agreed. "Sharks aren't Italian."
"Plus, the characters all have big noses."
"Well, sharks do have big noses."
"That's not the point."
I thought of a good comeback about pointed noses, but a look at Gianni's noble Roman proboscis, not to mention the suspicious bulge under the armpit of his sharkskin suit, made me reconsider. I was talking with Gianni Mustacchi, director of the Marconi Action Front for Italian-Americans, a group organized to confront anti-Italian propaganda in the computer and electronics industries. But somehow he had slipped off into a diatribe on popular entertainment. I tried to pull him back in.
"Just exactly where is this anti-Italian propaganda in the tech industries?" I asked. "I'm not sure I've seen any."
"Where?" He looked aghast. "How about the shameful ignoring of the great Guglielmo Marconi? A Nobel prize winner, the father of radio, the godfather of wireless telegraphy, but does he get any recognition?"
I objected that a Nobel prize was pretty good recognition. "Besides, wasn't there some evidence that he didn't invent some of the things he claimed?"
He pounded his fist on the checkered tablecloth, making the lit candle in the fat chianti bottle rock menacingly. "Here's a guy, in 1901, he transmitted a Morse Code 'S' across the Atlantic, bouncing it off the ionosphere twice. He had to send an S; at that distance, he could only send dits, there wasn't enough power for dahs."
"Maybe so, but radio expert Jack Belrose has pretty convincingly argued that Marconi was just picking up dits of static," I said, "and the Supreme Patent Court of the U.S. concluded that Tesla was the true inventor of radio."
"Tesla!" His mustache quivered, and he forked a peevish mouthful of spaghetti.
"Have any Italians made more recent contributions to high tech?" I asked, sensing that if I didn't get him off the Marconi-Tesla theme, I might be making a personal visit to the transatlantic cable.
"Ha! How about Dan Stanzione of Bell Labs, or Mario Mazzolo of Cisco, or the crew at Logitech? And you have heard of Carly Fiorina, maybe?"
"The Michael Eisner of personal computers?" I quipped injudiciously.
"See what you do?" He aimed a loaded fork at me. "Here's a highly successful Italian-American woman, running HP, one of the biggest tech companies, turned her company around, managed a difficult merger, last year launched 158 new products. Why you gotta pick on the lady?"
"I admit she's impressive."
"Plus, she wears Armani. Italians rule. And they know their stuff when it comes to technology. It was an Italian writer, Umberto Eco, who first said, 'the Internet IS democracy.' Italian-born race-car driver Mario Andretti first identified the necessary management philosophy for high-tech companies: 'Se tutto è sotto controllo, stai andando troppo piano.'"
"Which means?"
"If it's not out of control, it's too slow. And Italian-American writer Edward DeBono really nailed the web-surfing experience when he wrote, 'Sto cercando, ma non voglio sapere che cosa finché non l'ho trovata.'"
"Translation?"
"I'll know what I'm searching for when I find it. And 'La stupidit`a comunica in tempo reale,' which means 'Only the stupid communicate in real time': that was from Italian writer Giovanni Mariotti."
"Of course, we are communicating in real time," I pointed out.
"I don't feel any respect here," he said, pushing back his chair. "Watch yourself, Swaine. A clever paisano named Julius once said, 'Io non dimentico mai un volto, ma nel tuo caso, far˜ un'eccezione,' and that's what I say to you." And he left in an Italian huff.
After I got that translated, I was offended.
Lest any reader be offended: This was all in fun. The real Italian quotes are from Webdixit by Gianroberto Casaleggio (Il Sole 24 ORE S.p.A.; 2003); the bad English translations are by Google and me. Gianni Mustacchi and the Marconi Action Front for Italian-Americans do not exist, and there is, of course, no anti-Italian propaganda in the technology industries. I'm just trying to fill that gap.