Island Tinkerers: Innovation and Transformation in the Making of Taiwan’s Computing Industry Honghong Tinn, University of Minnesota, Twin Cities In-person and online  Registration Requested   Join us Thursday, March 6 at 3:30 – 5:00 PM in Thomson 317 or online for ‘Island Tinkerers: Innovation and Transformation in the Making of Taiwan’s Computing Industry’ a book talk with Honghong Tinn, University of Minnesota Twin Cities. How did Taiwan, a former Japanese colony and the last fortress of the defeated Chinese Nationalists, ascend to such heights in high-tech manufacturing? In Island Tinkerers, Honghong Tinn tells the critical history of how hobbyists and enthusiasts in Taiwan, including engineers, technologists, technocrats, computer users, and engineers-turned-entrepreneurs, helped transform the country with their hands-on engagement with computers. Rather than engaging in wholesale imitation of US sources, she explains, these technologists tinkered with imported computing technology and experimented with manufacturing their own versions, resulting in their own brand of successful innovation.

Register for either in-person or online HERE

Honghong Tinn is Assistant Professor in the Program in the History of Science, Technology, and Medicine and the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the University of Minnesota Twin Cities. She received her Ph.D. in Science & Technology Studies from Cornell University. Her research interests are in the areas of the history of electronic digital computing, Cold War, and econometrics. Her work on these topics has appeared in Technology and Culture, Osiris, IEEE Annals of the History of Computing, and East Asian Science, Technology and Society. She is the author of Island Tinkerers: Emulation, Innovation and Transformation in the Making of Taiwan’s Computing Industry (MIT Press, 2025), and a co-author of Computer: A History of the Information Machine, 4th edition (Taylor & Francis, 2023). She was on the Executive Council of the Society for the History of Technology (2017-2019), chaired the Society’s Internationalization Committee (2013-2014) and the International Small Grants Committee (2017-2019), and is an elected member of the Nominating Committee (2023-2025).ss History. He holds an A.B. from Dartmouth College and a Ph.D. from Columbia University.

This event was made possible by the generous support of the Chiang Ching-kuo Foundation for International Scholarly Exchange.