"The objective in the design of the Tom Swift Terminal was to produce a device which encouraged the involvement in computer hardware of amateurs who would not otherwise have incentive to do so. " The intent was to solve hardware reliability problems in the Community Memory Information retrieval system. This network was envisioned as a non-broadcast system of decentralized community information files along with neighborhood communications centers. This radical communications system was conceived as non-hierarchical, wherein any person can reach any other person who shares an interest in similar information.