Carol Shaw

Significance

Women were vastly outnumbered by men in the field of computer science in the 1970s when the field first began to gain traction. Carol Shaw shamelessly blazed a path through social expectations and norms, proving herself to be one of the most creative and competent video game designers in history. As a woman in STEM, Carol Shaw showed younger generations of girls to go against what is expected of them and to create their own paths in their respective fields. While the percentage of women in the field has slowly increased overtime to 30%, figures like Carol Shaw continue to inspire generations of developers and programmers to keep improving, to keep working together to make great products and, quite honestly, history.

Early Life and Education

Born in Palo Alto, California in 1955, Carol Shaw became one of the first female game designers in computer science and gaming's early history. When growing up, Shaw never found herself attracted to the stereotypical "girl" activities or hobbies, like playing with dolls or investing in fashion. She instead was influenced by her one older and one younger brothers, as well as her father, who worked as a mechanical engineer at the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center. She delved into pastimes like model building and modelrailroading, and eventually dipped her toes into math and gaming. She used her highschool computer to explore text based games, a simple curiosity turned passion she would soon pursue in college. She obtained a B.S. in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from University of California, Berkeley in 1977, going on to obtain her masters in Computer Science at the same institution.

Jobs and Breakthroughs

Atari, Inc.

Following her undergraduate graduation, Shaw went straight into working for the gaming and console company Atari, Inc.. Officially hired as a Microprocessor Engineer in 1978, Shaw found herself first working on games for the Atari 2006-VCS console. During her time at Atari, Shaw made history by creating some of the company's most successful games and programs to date, like:

• Atari 3D Tic-Tac-Toe
• Polo
• Video Checkers
• Othello
• Super Breakout
• Atari 800 computer calculator program

Shaw found herself to be the only woman on the programming floor for years, and this remained true for most of her time in her occupation and across companies.

Tandem Computers

Although filled with already incredible accomplishments, Carol Shaw found herself leaving Atari, Inc. in 1980 for the computer company Tandem Computers. During her 16 months there, she worked on programming their fault-tolerant computer systems as an assembly language programmer.

Activision

Moving over to the company Activision in 1982, Shaw continued to improve her genius, efficiency, and leveling up the quality of her work. It was at Activision where she reached eternal status in the computer science in gaming world after creating and releasing River Raid, a vertically scrolling shooter game. It was her most popular work, selling over a million cartridges, her name front and center on every selling box. She also designed the game Happy Trails during her time at Activision.

Life After

After her success in the gaming world, Carol Shaw left and returned to Tandem, working until early retirement in 1990.

Sources

• Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carol_Shaw
• Computing history http://www.computinghistory.org.uk/det/47370/Carol-Shaw/
• Atari Women https://www.atariwomen.org/stories/carol-shaw/
• Vintage Computing https://www.vintagecomputing.com/index.php/archives/800/vcg-interview-carol-shaw-female-video-game-pioneer-2
• Museum of Play https://www.museumofplay.org/2017/07/19/preserving-carol-shaws-trailblazing-video-game-career/