Business Notes Computers

With no bitterness but some regret, Jean-Jacques Servan-Schreiber, 61, the former magazine editor (L'Express), author (The American Challenge) and his country's leading technophile, stepped down last week as president of the Paris-based World Center for Computer Science and Human Resources. He resigned to protest his government's decision to use French computers rather than the Apple Macintosh in its ambitious computer-literacy program. Under the plan, which Servan-Schreiber devised in 1984, France will place computer-learning centers in 36,500 cities, towns, villages and hamlets. Yielding to pressure from France's computer industry, the ruling Socialist Party rejected Servan- Schreiber's bid to use the American machines, even though they would have been built in France under license.

Servan-Schreiber argues that the French models selected for the program (a network of inexpensive machines, such as a Thomson, hooked up to larger computers like the Bull Micral) are not Macintosh's equal. Said he: "I personally believe that the best machine is the Macintosh. I am not against French industry. It is just a choice of technology."