As We May Think Vannevar Bush Presented by:Eylon Caspi AJ Shankar Jingtao Wang CS294 Reading The Classics 9/21/04

Agenda Background of Vannevar Bush and “As We May Think” Technological Predictions Memex Limitations, Mispredictions, Lessons

Bio – early year highlights Born on March 11, 1890, in Chelsea, Massachusetts. He had two sisters Educated at Tufts College, graduated in 1913 Worked for General Electric and was laid off after a fire Started teaching position at Clark University in 1914 Earned his doctorate in engineering in less than a year from MIT Got faculty position at Tufts and later at MIT

Bio – before WWII Analog computers at MIT, 1930s –Differential analyzer – 1930 –Claude Shannon was one of his student at that time Became the president of the Carnegie Institute in 1937 Microfilm Rapid Selector at MIT,

Bio – during the war Created military research –NDRC ‘40, OSRD ‘41-47 Managed nuclear weapons research throughout the 40’s –Manhattan Project Wrote “science - the endless frontier” 1945

Post-WWII Military consultant through 50’s Recommended the creation of NSF The Vannevar Bush Award was created by the National Science Foundation in 1980 After WWII, Bush continued to push for analogue computers (and against digital).

Bush on the Role of Science Master the Environment Knowledge, Communication

Technological Predictions Acquisition Instant photography, dictation Storage Unlimited image storage in microfilm Calculation / Automation Fully automatic accounting (point-of-sale, billing) Electric, fast Programmable Data entry job Symbolic logic + math (à la Mathematica) Retrieval Rapid selection via index (card, film, or magnetic index) Information workstation: Memex Hyperlinks Neural Interfaces

Bush’s Memex Store publications, correspondence, personal work, on microfilm Items retrieved rapidly using index codes –Builds on “rapid selector” Can annotate text with margin notes, comments Can construct a trail through the material and save it –Roots of hypertext Acts as an external memory

Memex Limitations Basic unit of content is an image page –No links to/from sub-text No digital content –No keyword search, only TOC/index codes No networking –No rapid info sharing, live docs, subscriber model Economical? –Free libraries, starving academicians –Technical challenges unsolved (dry photography, tape robots) Still no user trails today

Mispredictions Underestimated… –Rise of digital (Bush’s student Claude Shannon) –Networking (Rapid information sharing, content subscriber model) –Role of science in entertainment (as driver, beneficiary) vannevar: n: –a bogus technological prediction, esp. due to overestimating a challenge