I watched a Youtube video that showed an animation of the memex and showed how it would be used by demonstrating the passage from the article about bows. It was very interesting to see how the device would work and how it would look. The machine looked larger than I expected and was much larger than the current personal computers that are used today.
I also found it interesting that the machine was an analog device. It seems very odd to use the microfilm, because I am so used to a computer usually needing nothing but its own parts to perform a given function. Bush was however incredibly prescient in predicting how machines could be used, as computers are currently used as a device to find and share information as well as problem solve. Overall it was cool to see how closely a prediction from the past aligned with how things actually are.
Jacob, I also found it interesting that Bush was able to be so accurate in predicting the rise of a computer like device. He talked at length about how storage and information were getting increasingly smaller, but it seems that even he didn't realize just how small our devices could get. Although part of me thought that him describing it as "desk sized" made it seem like he thought that may be the most user friendly format. Also, many of the terms he mentioned about "microfilm" are not terms I am familiar with and like you, I just take my computer for granted and don't really know how it works.
ReplyDeleteJacob,
ReplyDeleteI also watched the video demonstrating how a memex would work. I found it interesting to see how the creators of the youtube video took what Bush described and were able to accurately demonstrate the functions of the memex.
Jacob,
ReplyDeleteI watched the video as well. I agree it was odd the see how the microfilms acted like our hard drives today, but you have to give Bush credit to be able to create a innovated machine like that with the technology he had to work with. Even though it is different the similarities are numerous. The video was a great way the really learn and understand how the Memex worked and how it looked, which like you said was not near the size of the computers we know and love today.