Is anyone coming to the Mother of All Demos event at Somerset House tomorrow? @Arthur will be giving a short talk as part of the program

A day of talks, performances and workshops marking the 50th anniversary of internet pioneer Douglas Engelbart’s original 1968 presentation of the key elements that would shape modern computing.

https://www.somersethouse.org.uk/whats-on/mother-all-demos-kassem-mosse-atau-tanaka-ted-hunt

Dang! That sounds awesome. Can’t believe I didn’t hear about this sooner. Unfortunately I can’t make it tomorrow, but I’ll be all ears for first-hand reports and hopefully some links to videos, if they plan to record and publish them.

Need to let off some steam here rather than in public. A journalist on the panel discussing MOAD: “engineers can’t do philosophy”, DE “was not a great thinker”, said DE’s use of the term bootstrapping was vague. I had to interject and describe his ABC Bootstrapping framework as an example. This guy clearly hasn’t read a single thing written by DE and has only watched the video. Yet sitting here criticising the idea of the demo. How can such a high level event and institution parade such ignorance? Not that DE is some sort of angel but at least have a panel with relevant expertise not mouthing off!

Oh my! Better neutralize this experience quickly with some quotes from people who knew him better: https://www.wired.com/story/how-doug-engelbart-pulled-off-the-mother-of-all-demos/

Haha, thanks @Stefan! 😄