The Information Machine (1958)

Charles and Ray Eames' 10' short “The Information Machine” was commissioned by IBM to introduce the computer at the 1958 Brussels’ World’s Fair.

More at the architizer blog

mac 1984 commercial

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2B-XwPjn9YY&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HhsWzJo2sN4&feature=related

an add from TIME magazine, June 16, 1986

Best of Creative Computing

archived on atariarchives.org, three volumes of this fantastic magazine, that was published between 1974 and 1985 are available.

vol.1: http://www.atariarchives.org/bcc1/

vol.2: http://www.atariarchives.org/bcc2/

vol.3: http://www.atariarchives.org/bcc3/

Early Computer History @ University of Manchester

From "The Baby" to the "Manchester Mark 1" and the William's Tube. The University of Manchester, were these things were developed more than half a century ago, put together a website with a really nice collection of resources about the history of its early computers.

http://www.computer50.org/

FORTHCOMING

White Heat, Cold Logic

Edited by Paul Brown, Charlie Gere, Nicholas Lambert and Catherine Mason

Technological optimism, even utopianism, was widespread at midcentury; in Britain, Harold Wilson in 1963 promised a new nation "forged from the white heat of the technological revolution." In this heady atmosphere, pioneering artists transformed the cold logic of computing into a new medium for their art, and played a central role in connecting technology and culture. White Heat Cold Logic tells the story of these early British digital and computer artists--and fills in a missing chapter in contemporary art history.

In this heroic period of computer art, artists were required to build their own machines, collaborate closely with computer scientists, and learn difficult computer languages. White Heat Cold Logic's chapters, many written by computer art pioneers themselves, describe the influence of cybernetics, with its emphasis on process and interactivity; the connections to the constructivist movement; and the importance of work done in such different venues as commercial animation, fine art schools, and polytechnics.

The advent of personal computing and graphical user interfaces in 1980 signaled the end of an era, and today we do not have so many dreams of technological utopia. And yet our highly technologized and mediated world owes much to these early practitioners, especially for expanding our sense of what we can do with new technologies.

Paul Brown is Visiting Professor of Art and Technology at the University of Sussex. Charlie Gere is Reader in New Media Research, Institute for Cultural Research, at Lancaster University. Nicholas Lambert is Research Officer, School of History of Art, Film, and Visual Media, at Birkbeck College, University of London. Catherine Mason is an art historian at work on a book about computers and artistic practice in art schools and academic institutions.

Contributors: Roy Ascott, Stephen Bell, Paul Brown, Stephen Bury, Harold Cohen, Ernest Edmonds, María Fernández, Simon Ford, John Hamilton Frazer, Jeremy Gardiner, Charlie Gere, Adrian Glew, Beryl Graham, Stan Hayward, Grisham Howard, Richard Ihnatowicz, Malcolm Le Grice, Tony Longson, Brent MacGregor, George Mallen, Catherine Mason, Jasia Reichardt, Stephen A. R. Scrivener, Brian Reffin Smith, Alan Sutcliffe, Doron D. Swade, John Vince, Richard Wright, Aleksandar Zivanovic.

About the Editors

Paul Brown is Visiting Professor of Art and Technology at the University of Sussex.

Charlie Gere is Reader in New Media Research, Institute for Cultural Research, at Lancaster University.

Nicholas Lambert is Research Officer, School of History of Art, Film, and Visual Media, at Birkbeck College, University of London.

Catherine Mason is an art historian at work on a book about computers and artistic practice in art schools and academic institutions.


February 2009
The MIT Press
A Leonardo Book
ISBN:0-262-02653-8
568 pp., 63 figures

an io9 post on John Whitney + Douglas Trumbull filed under Retro Futurism

IBM System/360 Mainframe (1968) VS Monolith (1968)

"Star Gate" sequence by Douglas Trumbull
from 2001: A Space Odyssey by Stanley Kubrick (1968)

from i09 in their wonderful Retro Futurism category comes a reblogged Media Art Histories connection. this connection traces a few points of contact between John Whitney's DIY cam machine, his experimental film Catalog, Douglas Trumbull's Star Gate sequence from 2001: A Space Odyssey, the Monoliths (as alien/alien technology) and the mainframes of IBM (as similarly monolithic tools in an artists' residency program at IBM)...

"In the late 1950s, animator John Whitney (perhaps most famous for assisting Saul Bass to create the opening title sequence for Alfred Hitchcock’s Vertigo) built a mechanical analog computer using the mechanisms from several WW II anti-aircraft guns. He used the resulting “cam machine” to produce short experimental animated films, releasing a demo reel in 1961 under the title Catalog. 2001 special effects artist Douglas Trumbull saw Whitney’s Catalog and was inspired by the artist's slit-scan technique, using it for the animated sequences in 2001. According to writer William Moritz, Whitney submitted “a proposal for a monolith as a computer-generated effect that would have looked different from anything else in the film. He was turned down.” Nevertheless, Whitney became IBM’s first artist-in-residence in 1966, and is considered one of the forefathers of computer animation."

"How a War Surplus Anti-Aircraft Gun Helped Inspire 2001: A Space Odyssey" - Lynn Peril (1:00 PM on Thu Aug 14 2008)
http://io9.com/5037142/how-a-war-surplus-anti+aircraft-gun-helped-inspire-2001-a-space-odyssey

Sten Vanderbeek presents Beflix (written by Ken Knowlton)

Sten Vanderbeek + Beflix

CARDIAC

short for Cardboard Illustrative Aid to Computing, was a product designed by Bell Labs. It should help to understand the basics of computers and how they operate. The cardboard computer was based on a punched card model.

http://www.boingboing.net/2005/10/20/cardiac-bell-labss-o.html

the machine that changed the world

a series of five documentaries covering the history of computing, produced by WGBH (PBS) and the British Broadcasting Company (BBC) in the early 90ies and including interviews with Konrad Zuse and Presper Eckert.


http://waxy.org/2008/06/the_machine_that_changed_the_world/


The titles of the five parts:

1 - Great Brains
2 - Inventing the Future
3 - The Paperback Computer
4 - The Thinking Machine
5 - The World at your Fingertips