TheTedNelson
1 HN recommender · recommended in 6 months, 2017–2024
25:48 · 19K views · Dec 22, 2016
A 1979 CBC radio interview in which Ted Nelson tries to explain how computers could serve as tools for thinking and visualizing. The interviewer keeps failing to grasp the idea, and Nelson patiently answers again and again.
HN cites it as a vivid record of how alien personal computing and hypertext sounded to a skeptical public, and as a favorite Nelson interview.
7 comments from Hacker News
My favorite Ted Nelson interview: this video It gives a great perspective on Ted's prophetic vision for computers as well as the intense skepticism it raised in many.
Ted Nelson: Computer Lib / Dream Machines (1975) [pdf] (worrydream.com) [LINK] [LINK] For what it's worth, YC is helping Ted Nelson sell his "Computer Lib / Dream Machines" book: [LINK] This book is a truly unique and is worth owning in hardcopy format. [LINK] Ted versus The Media Lab [video] (youtube.com) [LINK] [LINK] Interview with Ted Nelson (notion.so) [LINK] [LINK] Ted Nelson on What Modern Programmers Can Learn from the Past [video] (ieee.org) [LINK] [LINK] Ted Nelson struggles with uncomprehending radio interviewer (1979) [audio] (youtube.com) [LINK] this video Ted Nelson’s published papers on computers and interaction, 1965 to 1977 (archive.org) [LINK] [LINK] Ask HN: What is the best resource for understanding Ted Nelson's ZigZag? [LINK] [LINK] [LINK] Alan Kay's tribute to Ted Nelson at "Intertwingled" Fest (how the script of Tron was the first movie script to ever be edited by a word processing program, on the Alto computer) [LINK] "Silicon Valley Story" — a Very Short Romantic Comedy by Ted Nelson A playful story about the microcircuitry of love, with Ted Nelson as an absentminded genius, featuring Doug Engelbart as Ted's father and Stewart Brand as the villainous CEO. Closing song: "Information Flow", sung by Donna Spitzer and the auteur. With Timothy Leary as the Good Venture Capitalist! [LINK] Ted Nelson's Channel [LINK]
Ted Nelson pointed out that knitting (or was it weaving?) is one of the most popular programming languages back in 1979. this video Edit to add: I wouldn’t be surprised if there are more knitting programmers today than all computer programming languages combined. Just the size and pervasive presence of Walmart or Joann’s yarn and fabric sections makes me almost certain.
This one with Ted Nelson? this video It's got the skeptical interviewer, and at 9:56 (with some lead-in before) there is a discussion of libraries, catalogs, tagging, etc. Edit: and then he goes on to mention Dewey Decimal as well.
As an adjunct, here's a journalist in 1979 struggling to comprehend Ted Nelson's vision that the computer would become a creative tool for the masses, this video