Posted on 05/13/2005 7:35:08 AM PDT by Mike Bates
The '60s represent many things to many people, but did that same era of sex, drugs and rock 'n' roll also inspire the revolution in personal computing?
That remains an unconventional reading of contemporary history. You could just as easily argue that heavy investment in military research was the moving force. Same goes for pro-market tax policies. But a generation of pot smokers and draft dodgers?
Needless to say, it has the makings of a feisty barroom debate. Still, don't dismiss the argument out of hand. In fact, Whole Earth Catalog founder Stewart Brand made a convincing try a decade ago.
In an essay he wrote for Time magazine in 1995, Brand maintained that the communal and libertarian outlook espoused during the hippie era spawned the seeds that later bore fruit in the form of the modern cyberrevolution. "At the time, it all seemed dangerously anarchic (and still does to many), but the counterculture's scorn for centralized authority provided the philosophical foundations of not only the leaderless Internet but also the entire personal-computer revolution."
(Excerpt) Read more at news.com.com ...
I do know drug use is not conducive to software development unless it's caffeine.
The maggot-infested dope smoking hippies had nothing to do with the cyber-revolution. That was the engineers with flat-top crew cuts, pocket protectors, and slide rules.
Hippies Suck!
Naturally, hippies deserve the credit for not cluttering up productive workplaces with their stupid catch phrases, coughing fits, yellow teeth, and the ass smell that radiates from their hair.
Counter-examples include Woz, Paul Allen, anyone at Berkeley. :)
PUH LEEEEZE!
The principles that make the free-wheeling internet THE place for a so very American discourse ARE THE PRINCIPLES THIS COUNTRY WAS FOUNDED UPON. Individual liberty and responsibility, little to no government infringement, and a LMTFA (leave me alone) attitude. These concepts, among others, and to lesser or greater degree, have been the common thread throughout the great American experience.
I daresay, all else being equal, Paine, Henry, Franklin, Jefferson, Madison, Adams, et al, would have used an internet to very good purpose had it been available at the time.....In addition to citizen soldiers in defense of liberty.
Up liberty!
Top sends
Drat. That reminds me that my own subscription just ran out.
The space program and Cold War had more to do with the rise of computing than those worthless smelly hippies.
"Counter-examples include Woz, Paul Allen, anyone at Berkeley. :)"
Geeks have always seemed to fall into two categories. "scruffies" (that Berkely crowd) and "neats" (the pocket protector/crewcut/sliderule........mmmmmmmmmm sliderule group)
I think maybe Clifford Stole (sp) may have been a bridge/hybrid type.
Cheers,
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this article is bunk from the get-go because "communal" and "libertarian" are antonyms.
...idiots
It's a laughable argument that the author makes. There *was* a very strong libertarian movement among the 60's generation that had little to do with the potheads and communists from Woodstock.
You're a hippy when you always wait for somebody else to fill it.
D'oh: Woziak=Wozniak
nobody likes a freeloader!
;-)
Ive always been disgusted that the media when talking about the sixties invariably dwells upon hippies, counter-culture and dopers swimming in mud at "woodstock".
How many people worked on Apollo? How many people showed up to watch Apollo 11 launch? How many people watched the moon landing on TV?
This is probably the greatest story of the sixties. It may be the biggest story remembered in 1000 years from our times. But the media will brush over it with a quick mention (if at all) and forever focus losers who dragged society down to their level.
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