Re: Xanadu meme, a case study (Ted Nelson)

From: William Benzon (bbenzon@mindspring.com)
Date: Fri 27 Jan 2006 - 08:49:00 GMT

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    Thanks Ted. If you don't mind, I'm going to post this to the xanadu discussion over at the Valve.

    Bill B

    * * * * * *

    on 1/26/06 11:05 PM, Keith Henson at hkhenson@rogers.com wrote:

    > At 09:59 PM 1/25/2006 -0500, Bill B wrote:
    > Keith wrote:
    >
    >>>> http://tinyurl.com/cwzaj
    >
    >>> Fascinating article Bill, especially to one of the last two people who
    >>> worked on the Xanadu (hypertext) code.
    >>>
    >>> Besides making several of the top spots on the first page, xanadu "Ted
    >>> Nelson" accounts for about 5% of the total hits on Xanadu.
    >>>
    >>> I think I have a current email contact for Ted. He may not remember, but I
    >>> can ask him why he called the project Xanadu if you like.
    >
    >> Sure, Keith, give it a try. The more the merrier.
    >
    > Heh. Of course he would remember. I clipped the personal stuff.
    >
    > **************************
    > Hi
    >
    > I chose "Xanadu" because
    >
    > 1. "Kubla Khan" is the most romantic poem in English and I loved it;
    >
    > 2. The backstory-- that he was interrupted in his reverie by the dreaded
    > Person from Porlock and lost much of the poem-- represents the
    > hazards of the creative process.
    >
    > Which I hoped to eliminate.
    >
    > Thus I always thought of the system as "The magic place of literary
    > memory, where nothing is lost."
    >
    > I have always resented people who speak of it as "technology."
    > The technology follows the idea and not vice versa: it is an idea
    > for which a variety of mechanisms have been found. Or, as Hume
    > said, " The Reason is, and by rights ought to be, slave to the emotions."
    >
    > And, incidentally, I say "idea," not "meme." Ideas matter, memes
    > are ideas gone bad.
    >
    > Ted Nelson
    >
    > *********************
    > [I might argue about the words with Ted in email or perhaps I can get him
    > to wonder in her for a bit. Keith Henson]
    >
    >
    > ===============================================================
    > This was distributed via the memetics list associated with the
    > Journal of Memetics - Evolutionary Models of Information Transmission
    > For information about the journal and the list (e.g. unsubscribing)
    > see: http://www.cpm.mmu.ac.uk/jom-emit
    >

    =============================================================== This was distributed via the memetics list associated with the Journal of Memetics - Evolutionary Models of Information Transmission For information about the journal and the list (e.g. unsubscribing) see: http://www.cpm.mmu.ac.uk/jom-emit

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