Call me ignorant, but I never knew about this amazing demo that has technologies being demonstrated long before they were affordable and mainstream. I must live under the biggest rock on the planet. Either way, super amazing to watch.
https://www.engadget.com/2018/12/10/mother-of … th-anniversary/
I remember seeing this a couple years ago. I'm still amazed watching it.
wrote:Call me ignorant, but I never knew about this amazing demo that has technologies being demonstrated long before they were affordable and mainstream. I must live under the biggest rock on the planet. Either way, super amazing to watch.
https://www.engadget.com/2018/12/10/mother-of … th-anniversary/
Douglas Englebart is a legend. He and his team at Xerox PARC actually invented the modern PC as we use it today, just nobody could afford it and Xerox apparently wasn't interested in marketing it or making it affordable. Apple and later Microsoft basically stole the concept for their respective operating systems but it was Englebart's group that originally invented this stuff.
And yes, you live under a rock 😁
wrote:wrote:Call me ignorant, but I never knew about this amazing demo that has technologies being demonstrated long before they were affordable and mainstream. I must live under the biggest rock on the planet. Either way, super amazing to watch.
https://www.engadget.com/2018/12/10/mother-of … th-anniversary/
Douglas Englebart is a legend. He and his team at Xerox PARC actually invented the modern PC as we use it today, just nobody could afford it and Xerox apparently wasn't interested in marketing it or making it affordable. Apple and later Microsoft basically stole the concept for their respective operating systems but it was Englebart's group that originally invented this stuff.
And yes, you live under a rock 😁
You can poke fun of me, but honestly had no idea about this guy. I knew the Xerox story, but not this one.
wrote:You can poke fun of me, but honestly had no idea about this guy. I knew the Xerox story, but not this one.
Nobody is born knowing these tales, I've only learned about it in recent years as I've come to accept youtube and bought a few computer history books and biographies. I also wouldn't have known about most of the books I buy without the internet as well.. so.
Sup. I like computers. Are you a computer?
I've been on a 'computer history' kick for the last 5 years or so and this is one of those stories that comes up again and again - amazing stuff. Makes you realise that a lot of the Silicon Valley myths are not 100% accurate, particularly around our old friend Steve Jobs. I like Bill Gate's reaction to Steve accusing him of stealing the GUI idea from Apple:
Well, Steve… I think it’s more like we both had this rich neighbour named Xerox and I broke into his house to steal the TV set and found out that you had already stolen it.
Life? Don't talk to me about life.
I know the Xerox story of Jobs checking that out prior to the Lisa, etc., but from what I am reading this is before Xerox and a couple of guys on this project went on later to Xerox. So the whole pre-Xerox story that this is, was unknown to me. Never knew something like this was developed so damn early on. 1968. Just amazing.
It really is amazing to consider that Engelbart had a machine that was essentially everything that makes up the modern PC in a time when my mother was still watching a black and white TV and chewing bubble gum / staring at her Beatles record collection. This was over a decade before the Xerox story that keeps getting mentioned. This was nearly a decade before an Apple computer or even before Gary Kildall had his briefcase computer. Few other people on earth had fathomed these things yet.
Sup. I like computers. Are you a computer?
wrote:wrote:wrote:Call me ignorant, but I never knew about this amazing demo that has technologies being demonstrated long before they were affordable and mainstream. I must live under the biggest rock on the planet. Either way, super amazing to watch.
https://www.engadget.com/2018/12/10/mother-of … th-anniversary/
Douglas Englebart is a legend. He and his team at Xerox PARC actually invented the modern PC as we use it today, just nobody could afford it and Xerox apparently wasn't interested in marketing it or making it affordable. Apple and later Microsoft basically stole the concept for their respective operating systems but it was Englebart's group that originally invented this stuff.
And yes, you live under a rock 😁
You can poke fun of me, but honestly had no idea about this guy. I knew the Xerox story, but not this one.
I was only gently poking fun, it certainly wasn't in mean-spirited sense.
While I wouldn't file this under universal knowledge, I've seen write-ups on him before in both Wired and Hackaday and at least one other site, so I figured it would be more common knowledge among the crowd here.
There are a lot of brilliant minds in the tech field that don't get nearly their due, but not much you can do but try and spread the word.
