Dr. Charles Seiter, 58, was a Macworld hand for way longer than I’ve been a reader of or an editor at this magazine. While I never had the pleasure of meeting him in person (he lived in Sonora, California), I did work with him a number of times on product reviews of software that was of interest mainly to the technical whizbrains of the Mac community. A Macworld writer and contributing editor for some 20 years, Seiter specialized in scientific, mathematical, CAD, and statistical programs. As a publication, we like to keep that group of our readership happy, and whenever one of those complex programs that I could not begin to fathom was released, I always knew the right guy for the job.
But Charles wasn’t esoterically left-brained. He also wrote books like Everyday Math For Dummies and The Internet for Macs for Dummies, and co-authored a slew of books on money management, Excel, and the Web. And he was a former Jeopardy! champion—which placed him squarely inside the popular culture.
Charles was a fine writer, a great guy to deal with, and knew his stuff inside out. I was very sad to hear of his passing just a day before Macworld Expo began. He was a gracious gentleman and a scholar, and I will miss him.
Here are links to some of Charles’ reviews for Macworld over the years. You can find a complete list of his Macworld work here. • Mathematica 5.1 • Dr. Frame3D • IDL 6.0 • CrystalMaker 6.0