This Week In Tech History: The Mother Of All Demos
“December 9, 1968. Doug Engelbart demonstrates the oNLine System (NLS) to about one thousand attendees at the Fall Joint Computer Conference held by the American Federation of Information Processing. The demonstration introduced the first computer mouse, hypertext linking, multiple windows with flexible view control, real-time on-screen text editing, and shared-screen teleconferencing. Engelbart and his colleague Bill English, the engineer who designed the first mouse, conducted a real-time demonstration in San Francisco with co-workers connected from his Augmentation Research Center (ARC) at SRI's headquarters...”
Book Review: 'Machines of Loving Grace,' by John Markoff
“New book by Markoff juxtaposing artificial intelligence, which seeks to automate human thinking, and intelligence augmentation, which seeks to enhance human thinking. Doug Engelbart, who coined the phrase "Augmenting the Human Intellect" in 1962 and pioneered the field, is mentioned throughout.” See also the Washington Post Opinion piece Who ultimately will have the upper hand: machines or humans?
Smithsonian's "Places of Invention" Exhibit Highlights the Rise of the Personal Computer
“I recently visited the museum and there saw many legendary things, among them: the Xerox Alto; a MITS Altair 8800; Douglas Engelbart's (father of hypertext) invention: the first, wooden mouse; the original Macintosh computer; a general history of Silicon Valley at the genesis of personal computing; ..."
See also the Smithsonian's coverage of this exhibit and photos from Christina Engelbart's visit.
Places of Invention
This book is companion to a Smithsonian exhibit of the same name, based on research conducted by the Lemelson Center for the Study of Invention and Innovation. Together they explore the contexts for invention and innovation, i.e., "What is it about some places that sparks invention and innovation? [...] The exhibit features six hotbeds of innovation, including the rise of the personal computer in Silicon Valley: "A lot of the tech innovations we use and still marvel at today—collaborative documents and video communication to name just two—were envisioned and made into reality in Engelbart's lab—in the 1960s!" See companion article: "What do the Bronx, Silicon Valley, and a Colorado college town have in common?"
Internet Pioneer's Greatest Contribution May Not Be Technological
“Doug Engelbart's greatest breakthrough may be to change how we think, how we learn and innovate, and how we collaborate." The Internet Hall of Fame featured profile on this 2014 Inductee, including how one university is putting his vision to practice in an experimental MOOC and associated Engelbart Scholar Award program.
Why the Computer Mouse's Inventor Isn't the Big Cheese
“Credit for the invention itself goes to Douglas Engelbart, who first developed the computer mouse in 1963, per TIME. By the time the mouse became commercially available, however, Engelbart’s patent had expired, and he never earned royalties for his work.”
Oregon students win history honors, heading for nationals
“Award winners at the Oregon History Day competition will now advance to the National History Day competition this June in Washington, D.C. for their outstanding presentations on Leadership & Legacy.”
Among the winners was eighth grader Zaidie Long for her documentary "Douglas Engelbart: Man Behind the Technological Revolution""
IBM Think Poster features Doug Engelbart Quote
“Payoff will come when we make better use of computers to bring communities of people together and to augment the very human skills that people bring to bear on difficult problems." -- Douglas Engelbart, 2002, from his paper Improving Our Ability to Improve: A Call for Investment in a New Future. For background see IBM Invite You to Think. See also the Artist's note.
From the vault: Watching (and re-watching) "The Mother of All Demos"
“Ars revisits a computing history classic through art, YouTube, and William English. /// In December 1968, engineer and inventor Douglas C. Engelbart and a team of more than a dozen engineers and staff from the Augmented Human Intellect Research Center (AHIRC) gave a demonstration at San Francisco's Civic Center Auditorium to show off what they called the oN-Line System (NLS). The demo, which lasted for about an hour and a half, became known as "The Mother of All Demos".”
The Musical 'The Demo' at Stanford Recreates the Dawn of the Digital Age
“In December 1968, the computer scientist Douglas Engelbart sat on a stage here and introduced the world to modern computing... On April 1, the composers Ben Neill and Mikel Rouse will perform their new musical theater work based on the Demo." SEE ALSO: (1) our blogpost 'The Demo' now an avant garde opera at Stanford for highlights and links, (2) PC Magazine's year end wrap up The Weirdest Tech Stories of 2015, Dec 30, 2015, and (3)
Review: The Demo, a Musical About the Mouse - A Silicon Valley production re-creates the Doug Engelbart demo that foreshadowed modern computing, by Tekla S. Perry for IEEE Spectrum, 19 May 2015.
CHM Revolutionaries: An Interview with 'The Innovators' author Walter Isaacson
Aired on KQED Tue 7:00 PM.
"Walter Isaacson discusses his latest book, 'The Innovators' with John Hollar for the series Revolutionaries, produced by the Computer History Museum, airing on KQED. The book features Doug Engelbart among others; Watch complete KQED broadcast (Episode #409H); Check out the interview series
BOOK REVIEWS:
The Innovators, by Walter Isaacson, Simon & Schuster (2014) /
Book explores history of digital revolution, Economic Times, Dec 2014”
Learning to Improve: How America’s Schools Can Get Better at Getting Better
with co-authors Louis Gomez, Alicia Grunow, and Paul LeMahieu. “Time after time, promising education reforms fall short of their goals and are abandoned as other promising ideas take their place. In Learning to Improve, the authors argue for a new approach. [...] Organized around six core principles, the book shows how “networked improvement communities” can bring together researchers and practitioners to accelerate learning in key areas of education.”
Remarks by the President at the Cyber Summit
“Addressing the Cyber Summit at Stanford University -- at one point in his speech, President Obama cites Doug Engelbart's seminal innovations: "It was from here, in 1968, where a researcher, Douglas Engelbart, astonished an audience with two computers, connected “online,” and hypertext you could click on with something called a “mouse.” -- in the context of American leadership in the global digital economy today.
Watch segment of Obama's speech citing Doug Engelbart's contributions | Watch whole speech | See Mercury News Article
The Evolution Of Technology In GIF Form Shows Just How Much Our Devices Have Changed
“If you're reading this, chances are you have used a mouse, laptop or a traditional desktop computer with an LCD display. It's easy to see how much technology has changed over the past decade, but it's more startling to see just how far we've come since the mouse made its debut in 1963." See also the source for the article by the folks at Experts Exchange, Transformed: Visualizing how personal computers have evolved over the last 50 years, and fabulous companion animated timeline of morphing mice.
Of mice and Men
A radio show on Design - this episode explores the Keyset invented by Doug Engelbart as a companion to the Mouse. "It allowed them to work with much greater speed and efficiency than was possible with only a mouse and QWERTY keyboard. So why did the keyset never take off like the rest of Doug’s inventions (which included hyperlinks, video conferencing, collaboration tools, digital text editing, and many more technologies in use today)? In this episode we consider the tradeoffs between “user-friendly” and “complicated” designs by talking to Engelbart’s daughter – Christina Engelbart and Apple Computer’s former VP and Chief Scientist – Larry Tesler.
See Christina Engelbart's followup post Meet the 'keyset'– a mouse’s best friend, and our exhibit page Doug Engelbart: Father of the Keyset for more background and archive photos.”
Innovation Magazine and the Birth of a Buzzword
“Today's technoculture of entrepreneurship and creative problem solving owes much to this 1960s magazine… In the September 1971 Issue, Innovation published one of the earliest profiles of computer visionary Douglas Engelbart. Members could sign up for a seminar with Engelbart in his lab at SRI [to] try out the augmentation system made famous by his 1968 public demonstration, in which he debuted a number of groundbreaking technologies.”
See companion article featuring Doug Engelbart: Toward the Decentralized Intellectual Workshop, by Nilo Lindgren, Innovation, issue 24, April 1971, pages 50-60.