Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
38 Screenshot of Douglas Engelbart at his now-famous multimedia presentation at
the 1968 Fall Joint Computer Conference in San Francisco, ca.
proclaiming the radical potential of computers in enabling the
augmentation of human intelligence. This connection was rein-
forced at the conference by the presence of Brand. Engelbart's
project resonated with the concerns with personal development and
the appropriate use of tools and technology that underpinned the
Whole Earth philosophy. Thus it was not surprising that, through
the Whole Earth Catalog , the Co-Evolution Quarterly and journalism
for Rolling Stone magazine, Brand argued for the potential of
computers. This led not just to the conditions that enabled the PC,
but also presented a context in which its future development could
be imagined, as a counter-cultural and even revolutionary device.
In the same year that Engelbart and his associates undertook
their famous demonstration, Nicholas Negroponte founded the
Architecture Machine Group at MIT. Negroponte was a graduate
of MIT where he had studied computer-aided design, and where
he joined the faculty in
. The Architecture Machine Group was
intended as a combination laboratory and think tank for studying
issues of human-computer interface. In
1966
the group proposed
to DARPA a project called 'Augmentation of Human Resources
1976
Search WWH ::




Custom Search