The result after several evening's work?
... soon to be seen again as part of the back-to-the-future zeitgeist.
Edit 2: also a minor flashback. We used to steal stacks of electronic components from the college stock room. They knew, to the point one of the tutors said he did and that he'd face the other way and read his newspaper while we helped ourselves, because it kept their budget for tech department allocated
That was very explicitly SOP at HP.
One of the Bill 'n' Dave stories used to instill the HP Way at new sites involved Bill. He came in one weekend to do some work in the lab, and found a padlock and chain on the stores. He removed it with a boltcutter and left a note requesting that the stores not be locked in future.
The fundamental point was that Bill and Dave wanted a company where the employees were trusted and trustworthy - a classic Theory Y company. In this case they explicitly allowed employees unlimited access to the store cupboard, and trusted they would not abuse that. The attitude was that using company property for "home office" projects was fine, since they would enjoy it and might just do something that would benefit HP.
The net result was beautifully summed up in
http://www.satirewire.com/news/0105/loyal.shtml which went around the company usenet like wildfire during one of Princess Fiorina's purges.