Physics, meteorology, biology, archaeology — Claude Johnson has dabbled in all of these fields. He was even a sailor! And where does computing fit into all of this? First an element of his scientific training, it became a hobby, then finally a career. He accomplished what many believed impossible, such as adapting Télidon technology to the microcomputer.
His products proved so compelling that they gave birth to a company: Formic, Inc., which currently employs eight people and whose revenues will reach one million dollars this year.
A hunger to learn
Claude Johnson's ideal would have been to explore a new field of study every year. After completing a bachelor's degree in physics, he undertook two successive master's projects: one in biophysics, which he soon abandoned for archaeology. But his eclecticism caused him some difficulties managing his studies, so he decided to redirect himself by taking courses in meteorology. The courses excited him, but the work that followed did not.
Passionate about travel, Claude Johnson managed to find work aboard merchant marine vessels. "The pay was good," he says, "and it allowed me to take long vacations and travel freely." He spent time in Europe, Asia, and Peru, where he met his future wife.
Between voyages, Claude Johnson kept busy. He went to teach biology in Sept-Îles for a year, then returned to Montréal where, after earning a teaching certificate, he began giving evening courses in computing.
The Apple Club and Vidéotron
It was with the arrival of microcomputers that he truly developed his passion for computing and made it his primary activity. The founding, five years ago, of an Apple microcomputer enthusiasts' club played a role in this. The club brought together a handful of people — many of them computing professionals — who saw the microcomputer as a hobby and wanted to share their experiences and discoveries. It gave Claude Johnson the opportunity to deepen his knowledge of the new tool, which soon led him to explore the world of electronics and logic circuits. He did so well that the Université du Québec didn't hesitate to hire him to continue his research in the computer science department.
"At that point," he recalls, "good micro programmers were rare, and when I found myself at Vidéotron setting up the computing department, I was my own boss." At Vidéotron, he created games and translated American software as part of an experiment in distributing content to subscribers over a telephone line.
They were also experimenting with cable-based videotex transmission, using the Télidon graphical page-creation protocol, which was then in full development. Tasked with using the microcomputer to produce a simulation of Télidon over cable while a more costly technology was being put in place, Claude Johnson once again found a way to astonish everyone. When people realized the quality of the "Télidon simulation" he had created on a micro, he was entrusted with pushing his research further toward a pure and simple adaptation of Télidon on the Apple microcomputer. This meant creating specialized software to replace what had previously required much larger systems like Norpak, and making it compatible with existing standards.