March 2016 - Members - lists.sigcis.org

Vintage Computer Festival East (and West)
by Evan Koblentz 23 Mar '16

23 Mar '16

VCF East XI is April 15-17 this year, at our usual haunt -- the InfoAge Science Center, in Wall, New Jersey. The agenda.... - Friday: Fifteen tech classes/lectures, an eight-bit game programming hackathon, after-lunch keynote by John Blankenbaker who invented the Kenbak personal computer in 1971, long before Altair, Apple, etc. - Saturday morning: Keynote by Stewart Cheifet, who hosted "The Computer Chronicles" PBS television show in the 1980s - Sunday morning: Keynote by the legendary Ted Nelson. We've been trying to get him for many years.... - Saturday/Sunday, rest of the day: several dozen hands-on exhibits of 1960s-1980s computers, all up and running for visitors to enjoy. Also: learn-to-solder classes and tours of the various wings at the InfoAge center, including the newly doubled-in-size computer museum. (We were operating a "living" exhibition long before Paul Allen came up with that name...) This will be the first Vintage Computer Festival under its new ownership, the Vintage Computer Federation, which is a 501c3 non-profit. The web site is www.vcfed.org and the geek-in-charge is me. :) thanks, - Evan PS. - the new Federation also owns VCF West, which will be Aug. 6-7 at the Computer History Museum in Mountain View, California. (VCF Southeast, VCF Midwest, and the European editions are independent.)

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Andy Grove passed away today
by Dag Spicer 22 Mar '16

22 Mar '16

Read about Grove and his contributions in this new blog post by David Brock of CHM’s Center for Software History. http://www.computerhistory.org/atchm/remembering-andy-s-grove/ Dag -- Dag Spicer Senior Curator Computer History Museum Editorial Board, IEEE Annals of the History of Computing 1401 North Shoreline Boulevard Mountain View, CA 94043-1311 Tel: +1 650 810 1035 Fax: +1 650 810 1055

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Marvin Minsky quotation
by Mary Murrell 21 Mar '16

21 Mar '16

I was hoping that the list might help me with the source of a quotation. Marvin Minsky is often quoted as having said the following: "Can you imagine that they used to have libraries where the books didn't talk to each other?" I have not been able to find any actual source for this. Citations, if they exist, are circular, citing back to a source that itself provides not citation. Does anybody know of a published source for this quotation? Thanks, Mary -- Mary Murrell marymurrell(a)fastmail.fm

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Spring/summer of vintage computing
by Evan Koblentz 18 Mar '16

18 Mar '16

SIGCIS'ers, There are four editions of the Vintage Computer Festival series in the U.S. this spring/summer. 1. April 2-3: Vintage Computer Festival Southeast (Atlanta) 2. April 15-17: Vintage Computer Festival East (central NJ) 3. August 6-7: Vintage Computer Festival West (Silicon Valley) 4. September 10-11: Vintage Computer Festival Midwest (Chicago) As always, each VCF event has a hands-on exhibit hall of 1960s-1980s systems and VIP keynotes. Other attractions you might find at a VCF include technical classes, consignment sales, vendors, and museum tours. A non-profit called the Vintage Computer Federation has been formed to organize such events. It also operates the largest discussion forum for vintage computer collectors/hobbyists, incubates local chapters, and owns the computer museum in New Jersey. Full details are at www.vcfed.org. - Evan

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New CHM Blog: The Deep History of Your Apps: Steve Jobs, NeXTSTEP, and Early Object-Oriented Programming
by Dag Spicer 16 Mar '16

16 Mar '16

Hello friends, Enjoy a fascinating look at the archaeology of apps in this new blog post by CHM Center for Software History curator Hansen Hsu. http://www.computerhistory.org/atchm/the-deep-history-of-your-apps-steve-jo… Dag -- Dag Spicer Senior Curator Computer History Museum Editorial Board, IEEE Annals of the History of Computing 1401 North Shoreline Boulevard Mountain View, CA 94043-1311 Tel: +1 650 810 1035 Fax: +1 650 810 1055

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REMINDER: Summer School—Social Studies of Algorithms
by Francis Lee 15 Mar '16

15 Mar '16

*Call for Applicants: Summer School of the International Algorithm Studies Network* *Please disseminate widely* http://algorithmnetwork.org/summerschool/ Date: 4-8 July, 2016 Place: Stockholm, Sweden *The deadline for applications: Friday, 18 March 2016. * Participants will be notified no later than March 31. Algorithms are everywhere! This international summer school explores the increasing importance of algorithms in society and the socio-cultural transformations that this tendency implies. The point of departure is that algorithms become implicated in society and culture: for example in media narratives, in mundane artefacts, or in organizations. Through their output and functioning, algorithms come to classify, hierarchize, value and shape different social phenomena, often well beyond their initial purpose. The aim of this summer school is to address algorithms through a number of themes that shine light on different aspects of algorithms in society and culture: in big data, music, law, surveillance and medicine. The summer school takes place at a few thematically chosen venues in Stockholm: at some government agencies and private organizations. How do these organisations work with algorithms and how can we as scholars understand their omnipresence? *Where* The summer school will take place in beautiful summer Stockholm: the home town of Spotify, Dice, Paradox Interactive, Minecraft, the Pirate Bay, Candy Crush, and countless other digital actors and phenomena. The summer school will be held at Skeppsholmens Folkhögskola overlooking the sea in the very center of Stockholm, next to the Stockholm MOMA on Skeppsholmen. Find it on Google Maps <https://www.google.com/maps/place/Skeppsholmens+folkh%C3%B6gskola/@59.32605…> . The school is hosted by the Department of Thematic Studies: Technology and Social Change at Linköping University, Sweden. *Who should apply?* The summer school invites doctoral students from the social sciences and the humanities. *Application and Deadline* Deadline: Friday, 18 March 2016. Participants will be notified no later than March 31. Reading lists and more information will be sent out in the end of May. To apply send your CV as well as a 500 word motivation letter on how the issues adressed in this summer school is relevant for your research. In the application please note: full name, affiliation, address, dietary restrictions. Please also note if you are interested in staying with friendly Stockholmers. Send applications to: algorithmnetwork(a)gmail.com. The summer school is free to attend. Participants will pay for and arrange their own accomodation and most meals. Some accomodation with fellow participants will be available, but we welcome your own arrangements. The full summer school is worth 7,5 ECTS credits. Credits will be awarded after a course essay on a topic relevant to your dissertation and the topics of the summer school has been handed in and graded. -- - Helgesson, C.-F., Lee, F., & Lindén, L. (2015). Valuations of experimental designs in proteomic biomarker experiments and traditional randomised controlled trials <http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/17530350.2015.1108215>. *Journal of Cultural Economy*, 1–16. http://doi.org/10.1080/17530350.2015.1108215 - Dussauge, C.-F. Helgesson, & F. Lee (Eds.), Value Practices in the Life Sciences and Medicine <http://ukcatalogue.oup.com/product/9780199689583.do>. Oxford: Oxford University Press. (Podcast <http://newbooksinscitechsoc.com/2015/09/26/isabelle-dussauge-claes-fredrik-…> ) - *A Sociology of Treason* <http://sth.sagepub.com/content/39/1/154.abstract?etoc>. Galis, V., & Lee, F. (2014). Science, Technology & Human Values, 39(1), 154-179. (open access preprint <http://liu.diva-portal.org/smash/get/diva2:556667/FULLTEXT01.pdf> ). - Editorial board of Valuation Studies <http://valuationstudies.liu.se/> - Founder of The Algorithm Studies Network <http://algorithmnetwork.org/> Francis Lee, PhD, Researcher, Uppsala University Department of History of Science and Ideas francislee.org | francis.lee(a)idehist.uu.se | +46 734 41 42 19 | Skype: flea_se

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CHM News: New issue of CORE available now!
by Dag Spicer 15 Mar '16

15 Mar '16

Hello friends, Today we are releasing our 2016 issue of CORE, the Museum’s annual publication on computer history, exhibits and programs at CHM. This issue's theme is Women in Computing. Explore Core as contributors Ursula Martin (Oxford University), Marie Hicks (Illinois Institute of Technology), Dag Spicer (CHM), and Marguerite Gong Hancock (CHM) take a critical look at the significance and changing roles of women throughout computer history. Also highlighted in this issue is a remarkable, in-depth look at Cisco co-founder Sandy Lerner, featuring exclusive interviews from her Cisco co-workers and colleagues. And there’s more! Go behind the scenes of the Museum’s newest exhibit, Thinking Big: Ada, Countess of Lovelace; learn how the Cisco Archive is connecting Silicon Valley to history; get a first look at the Museum’s newest artifacts; and discover how CHM is empowering educators with Raspberry Pi. Pick up your copy here: http://s3.computerhistory.org/core/core-2016.pdf Enjoy! Dag -- Dag Spicer Senior Curator Computer History Museum Editorial Board, IEEE Annals of the History of Computing 1401 North Shoreline Boulevard Mountain View, CA 94043-1311 Tel: +1 650 810 1035 Fax: +1 650 810 1055

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How to send an 'E mail' - Database - 1984
by Joly MacFie 14 Mar '16

14 Mar '16

>From UK Thames TV - an archived clip from their Database program. The 'E mail' demo is messaging on the Prestel system. The program concludes with an audio "software transmission" over the end titles. "The least successful method is just to place a microphone in front of the television set". https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=szdbKz5CyhA -- --------------------------------------------------------------- Joly MacFie 218 565 9365 Skype:punkcast -------------------------------------------------------------- -

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literature sources
by Dave Walden 10 Mar '16

10 Mar '16

Hi, I am interested in sources on the history of computer technology coming into newspapers and newsrooms. I am less interested in the aspects of digital type (as that is broader than newspapers). I am interested digital typesetting, layout, and intra-institution communication in newspapers and in the companies that provided this technology to newspapers if it was not home grown. I would be happy to read an treatment of the whole spectrum all the way to printing the actual newspaper sheets, if such a thing exists. I have some bits of material already, and will shortly be heading out to Boston area libraries (BPL, MIT, Athenaeum, ...), if someone happens to know that one such institution is strong in the newspaper technology history area. I will also take a look at the library Printing Museum near Boston and the history of printing collection at the public library in Providence. Thanks, Dave

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Fwd: Call for Participation: Archives Unleashed 2.0 - Web Archive Hackathon
by Joly MacFie 09 Mar '16

09 Mar '16

Apropos recent Berlin discussion, a perhaps more legit exercise in web archive activity, albeit from a sociological angle. ---------- Forwarded message ---------- ***Call for Participation*** Archives Unleashed 2.0: Web Archive Data t hon Library of Congress, Washington DC 14 – 15 June 2016 Travel grants available for US-based graduate students; additional funding may be available for international participants Applications due 15 March 2016 http://www.archivesunleashed.com **This event is a follow-up to the Archives Unleashed datathon held in March at the University of Toronto Library. With generous funding from the National Science Foundation and the Social Science and Humanities Research Council (Canada), we’ve been able to extend the datathon program, and are excited to bring this program to the Library of Congress.** The World Wide Web has a profound impact on how we research and understand the past. The sheer amount of cultural information that is generated and, crucially, preserved every day in electronic form, presents exciting new opportunities for researchers. Much of this information is captured within web archives. Web archives often contain hundreds of billions of web pages, ranging from individual homepages and social media posts, to institutional websites. These archives offer tremendous potential for social scientists and humanists, and the questions research may pose stretch across a multitude of fields. Scholars broaching topics dating back to the mid-1990s will find their projects enhanced by web data. Moreover, scholars hoping to study the evolution of cultural and societal phenomena will find a treasure trove of data in web archives. In short, web archives offer the ability to reconstruct large-scale traces of the relatively recent past. While there has been considerable discussion about web archive tools and datasets, few forums or mechanisms for coordinated, mutually informing development efforts have been created. This hackathon presents an opportunity to collaboratively unleash our web collections, exploring cutting-edge research tools while fostering a broad-based consensus on future directions in web archive analysis. This hackathon will bring together a small group of 20-30 participants to collaboratively develop new open-source tools and approaches to hackathon, and to kick-off collaboratively inspired research projects. Researchers should be comfortable with command line interactions, and knowledge of a scripting language such as Python strongly desired. By bringing together a group of like-minded scholars and programmers, we hope to begin building unified analytic production effort and to continue coalescing this nascent research community. At this event, we hope to converge on a shared vision of future directions in the use of web archives for inquiry in the humanities and social sciences in order to build a community of practice around various web archive analytics platforms and tools. Thanks to the generous support of the National Science Foundation, the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, the University of Waterloo’s Department of History, the David R. Cheriton School of Computer Science and the University of Waterloo, and the School of Communication and Information at Rutgers University, we will cover all meals and refreshments for attendees. We are also providing sample datasets for people to work on during the hackathon, or they are happy to use their own. Included datasets are: • the .gov web archive covering the American government domain • Canadian Political Parties and Political Interest Groups collection Those interested in participating should send a 250-word expression of interest and a CV to Matthew Weber (matthew.weber(a)rutgers.edu <mailto: matthew.weber(a)rutgers.edu>) by 15 March 2016 with “Archives Unleashed” in the subject line. This expression of interest should address the scholarly questions that you will be bringing to the hackathon, and what datasets you might be interested in either working with or bringing to the event. Applicants will be notified by 25 March 2016. We have a limited number of travel grants available for graduate students; preference will be given to those who have not participated in the Archives Unleashed program in the past, although we welcome returning participants. These grants can cover up to $750 in expenses. If you are in an eligible position, please indicate in your statement of interest that you would like to be considered for the travel grant. A letter of support from your graduate supervisor will also strengthen your application. On behalf of the organizers, Matthew Weber (Rutgers University), Ian Milligan (University of Waterloo), Jimmy Lin (University of Waterloo) Matthew S. Weber Assistant Professor School of Communication and Information http://www.matthewsweber.com <http://www.matthewsweber.com/> Co-Director NetSci Network Science Lab http://netsci.rutgers.edu <http://netsci.rutgers.edu/> Rutgers University (ph): 848-932-8718 -- --------------------------------------------------------------- Joly MacFie 218 565 9365 Skype:punkcast -------------------------------------------------------------- -

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