mind biking

I’m reading this book on the counterculture of the 60s & 70s and its interaction with the beginning of personal computing, and two things have struck me so far that seemed worth sharing.

  1. I love this quote: “a bicycle for the mind” in describing Alan Kay’s vision of the Dynabook. (basically, a laptop) The elegance of it just hits the happy place in my head.
  2. If I were ever to go to school at Evergreen, and take an individual contract, I’d spend my year creating an interactive map (?) of the people and organizations of the history of computing. I’ve read at least half a dozen books in the last couple of years from one angle or another: some histories of one era or another, or organization, or particular person. This book is so dense in names that I feel I’m not quite grasping all the relationships.

Back to your regularly scheduled surfing, then.