[3] The book was intended to introduce the idea of personal computers to a reader who might be faced with them at work or at home for the first time.

He saw this as a matter of convenience—computers can share pictures, which you can't do with a verbal phone call, and computer networks can operate asynchronously, so you can leave information for somebody and have them pick it up at their convenience.

However, unlike hula hoops, the present generation of computer games represents a transitional phenomenon on the way to a permanent alteration of our world.

"[4] In a section called "Microprocessors, or how I flunked biostatistics at Harvard", Crichton lashes out at a medical school teacher who had given him a 'D' fifteen years earlier.

Jerry Pournelle named Electronic Life as his "book of the month" in BYTE in June 1985, writing that "Dr. Crichton has managed to pack a great deal of useful information, philosophy, and common sense into 250+ pages.