August 1 in A.A. History

In 1993, the General Service Office (GSO) in New York City made group information and contribution details accessible on 3½" floppy disks [left]—to General Service Areas that maintained their records digitally. This initiative resulted from a task force formed by GSO management to review and improve records-keeping procedures.

    In April, during the breaks on Tuesday and Thursday at the 43rd General Service Conference, delegates had the opportunity to attend a presentation of a computer software package demonstrated by two non-alcoholic GSO staff members. This software allowed areas equipped with the necessary technology to access group records retrieved from the GSO mainframe (an IBM AS/400 Model 40) [right, in the upper right corner of the image].