Deeper Cosmology – Deeper Documents

Ted Nelson 2013 - by Frode Hegland, animated by Matthias Mueller-Prove

This is not my planet. And this is not my conference.

– Ted Nelson’s opening words at ACM Hypertext 2001. Once in a while I find it very refreshing to remind myself on potential alternatives and fundamental considerations about the state of technology with respect to the web and our knowledge management tools as such. An ever-trusted source on this is Ted Nelson (bibliography and videos).
More quotes from the talk:

  • I think of the world wide web and XML and cascading style sheets is the ultimate triumph of the typesetter over the author.
  • three fundamental problems today:
    1. hierarchical file structures
    2. simulation of paper
    3. the application prison
  • Software is a branch of movie making.
  • The question is about starting over.

A friend who has attended the conference gave me a CD with the talk. Eventually, I decided to upload the recording to vimeo. Please enjoy:


Ted Nelson at ACM Hypertext 2001 from mprove.

Photo: Ted Nelson 2013 – by Frode Hegland, animated by myself