George Plimpton, Paris Review Founder, Pitches 1980s Video Games for the Mattel Intellivision — openculture.com

Space, choose Atari; sports, choose Intellivision. So went the conventional wisdom of early-1980s home video gaming, where the Atari 2600 enjoyed an insurmountable advantage when it came to blasting alien invaders, but where the Mattel Intellivision — putting aside the sheer discomfort of those wonky controllers — could satisfy the electronic sportsman like no other console. For Mattel, winning over the jocks and the nerds at once would require a delicate marketing balance, one attempted by the hiring of George Plimpton, the man who personally pitched against the National League, sparred with Sugar Ray Robinson, trained with the Detroit Lions, tended goal amid the Boston Bruins, hit the PGA Tour in the heyday of Arnold Palmer and Jack Nicklaus, and helped found the Paris Review. (The name did stand for “intelligent television,” after all.)

Read More