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Annals, issue 2022-4
by Hemmendinger, David 07 Dec '22

07 Dec '22

SIGCIS members, The special issue of Annals of the History of Computing on information technology and demography is now on line at the CSDL and IEEE Xplore: www.computer.org/csdl/magazine/an/2022/04 ieeexplore.ieee.org/xpl/mostRecentIssue.jsp?punumber=85 Contents: Introduction: The IT of Demography, Emily Klancher Merchant, Myron P. Gutmann Articles: The Present of the Past: A Sociotechnological Framework for Understanding the Availability of Research Materials, Rebecca Jean Emigh, Johanna Hernández-Pérez Computing Counterinsurgency: The Hamlet Evaluation System (HES) and Databasing During the Vietnam War, Moritz J. Feichtinger When the New Magic was New: The Claritas Corporation and the Clustering of America, Fenwick McKelvey The Missing Link: Data Capture Technology and the Making of a Longitudinal U.S. Census Infrastructure, Katie R. Genadek, J. Trent Alexander Anecdotes department: The Effects of Increases in Computing Power on Demographic Analysis Over the Last 50 Years, Barbara A. Anderson Challenges of Large-Scale Data Processing in the 1990s: The IPUMS Experience, Diana L. Magnuson, Steven Ruggles Book review department: Review of Corinna Schlombs' Productivity Machines: German Appropriations of American Technology From Mass Production to Computer Automation, Devin Kennedy Events & sightings department: A New Book About the First Business Computer, Hilary Caminer, Secretary, LEO Computers Society Enjoy! David Hemmendinger, EIC

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Two podcasts of interest
by Bernardo Batiz-Lazo 06 Dec '22

06 Dec '22

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The first informationexplosion in history
by Richard Vahrenkamp 06 Dec '22

06 Dec '22

Dear SIGCIS, please excuse the "self-promotion": The keyword of the information explosion will be filled in my ebook “The First Information Explosion”. Many examples are given how the use of punch card technology expands the demand for information. The book gives evidence for the suggestion of Theo Pirker that formalization of information induces the growth of the information department in enterprises so that the rationalization is absorbed by expansion. This process is labeled as informationexplosion and the paper portrays the first informationexplosion in history induced by punch card technology. On the basis of the sources, it can be demonstrated in this ebook that the use of punch card technology gave rise to more and more fields of application in the field of commercial data processing. This expansive behavior of information technology can be described by the term informationexplosion. Just as in the fission of the uranium atom 235, a splitting neutron leads to the emission of two more neutrons, triggering a chain reaction with explosion, the introduction of punch card technology in one field creates a hunger for formalized information in neighboring fields and a further expansion of punch card-based analysis. The ebook places punch card (also: punched card) technology in the context of the office machine industry in Germany and discusses the exciting relationship between the two competitors on the market for punch card technology, IBM with its German branch Dehomag and Powers, in Germany, 1909–1939. The punch card technology was based on electrical–mechanical machines as the other office machines before the advent of microelectronics. The question is whether the leading role of the United States in the use of office machines frequently cited by Anglo-American authors really applies. How punch card technology in Germany has advanced from its beginnings is discussed under the heading of rationalisation strategies. The technologies of the punching machine, the sorting machine and the tabulating machine are shown and an example of tabulating a sales table is given. At the example of a chocolate producer a punched card is discussed of how the various products of the chocolate plant are organized on the card. It is interesting to note that the first informationexplosion in history occurred in the field of commercial data processing, not in the field of scientific–technical data processing. Moreover, punch card technology in the first half of the 20th century was characterized by merely slow technical progress, so that the benefits of information processing had not increased through rapid technical progress, as was seen in the second half of the 20th century with microelectronics underlining the expansive power of punch card technology. The ebook focusses on evidence of informationexplosion in Germany. But the arguments apply to other countries as well. Two sources are cited from Bethlehem Steel Works – one of the leading steel works in United States. Bethlehem steel works are an interesting case because Frederic Winslow Taylor worked there as consultant, but he did not mention punch card technology at all. The ebook concludes with an overview of how punch card technology fits into the broader debate about the feminisation of the office. The ebook is available at Amazon. With kind regards from Berlin Richard Vahrenkamp -- ******************************************** Prof. Dr. Richard Vahrenkamp Logistik Consulting Berlin Phone 0177- 628 3325 E-Mail: Vahrenkamp2(a)gmx.de Web: www.vahrenkamp.org Heubnerweg 11 14059 Berlin *********************************************

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Percy Ludgate and Konrad Zuse
by Brian Randell 05 Dec '22

05 Dec '22

Hi: I assumed that after the recent celebration in Dublin of the centenary of Percy Ludgate's death (https://www.scss.tcd.ie/SCSSTreasuresCatalog/literature/TCD-SCSS-V.20221015…) when I drew the short straw and was the member of Brian Coghlan's team investigating Ludgate who was tasked with speaking, I would be able to reduce greatly the time I was spending on Ludgate. Instead, the day before the ceremony, we were alerted by Ralf Buelow to his Heinz Nixdorf MuseumsForum blog post (https://blog.hnf.de/percy-ludgate-der-unbekannte-computerpionier/) which revealed to us that Ludgate's work on an "Analytical Machine" had been used, in 1960, to attack Konrad Zuse's attempts at patenting the concept of program-controlled digital computer - work that was one of the reasons that Zuse was denied a patent. This attack was by the Triumph office machinery company, citing Ludgate's 1909 paper on his Analytical Machine. The question which intrigues us is how did Triumph and its patent attorney find out about the little-known Irish inventor? (Konrad Zuse later claimed that the company had received help from IBM - we have established that Triumph's patent attorney also worked for IBM.) Since we received this blog post we have been investigating records of Zuse's patent efforts, and trying to find out how news of Ludgate reached Triumph. In so doing we have found that there was significantly more awareness in the USA in the 1930s of Ludgate's work than we had suspected - in particular that a full reference to his 1909 paper was included a 1938 bibliography by Irwen Travis, a colleague of John Mauchly at the Moore School, who in 1946 gave a talk on the history of computers at the famous Moore School Lectures. One of the major sources we would like to be able to search are the voluminous records of the ENIAC patent litigation (1967-1973), since at the trial a number of the witnesses testified regarding their careers and knowledge of early computer developments, as well as any involvement in ENIAC. These records are at the Charles Babbage Institute, the University of Pennsylvania, and the Computer History Museum. However, these very important records are not fully indexed, and not available online, leave alone as searchable PDFs. (If only a project to generate such an online resource could be resourced and undertaken!) We would be pleased to hear from anyone who has detailed knowledge of these ENIAC records, and could guide our efforts to check whether they contain any references to Ludgate's work. Indeed, more generally, we would welcome any information leading to the discovery of other pre-1960 references to Ludgate, beyond the one we are aware of in Maurice Wilkes' book Automatic Digital Computers (Methuen, 1956). Cheers Brian Randell — School of Computing, Newcastle University, 1 Science Square, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE4 5TG EMAIL = Brian.Randell(a)ncl.ac.uk PHONE = +44 191 208 7923 URL = https://www.ncl.ac.uk/computing/staff/profile/brianrandell.html

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VIDEO: Restoration of Soviet PDP-11 DVK-3 from Chernobyl
by Joly MacFie 04 Dec '22

04 Dec '22

https://youtu.be/r1EWsWxObjA -- -------------------------------------- Joly MacFie +12185659365 -------------------------------------- -

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NRL LASR 10th anniversary
by Jonathan Coopersmith 25 Nov '22

25 Nov '22

FYI: The Naval Research Laboratory Laboratory for Autonomous Systems Research (LASR) is hosting a live/virtual celebration with roundtables, tours, and a party with robots on December 5-6. For more information, see the attached flyer. Stay sane, Jonathan Jonathan Coopersmith Fellow, American Association for the Advancement of Science Professor (retired) Department of History Texas A&M University College Station, TX 77843-4236 979.739.4708 (cell) 979.862.4314 (fax) It's taking longer to vote - especially if you are Black or Hispanic <https://theconversation.com/its-taking-more-time-to-cast-a-ballot-in-us-ele…>, theconversation.com October 13, 2022 “The thought leader’s thought leader,” (interview with Norman Augustine) <https://aerospaceamerica.aiaa.org/departments/the-thought-leaders-thought-l….> *Aerospace America* October 2022. Preserving space archives: https://www.toboldlypreserve.space/ *FAXED. The Rise and Fall of the Fax Machine* (Johns Hopkins University Press)

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What inspired Bush's Memex?
by Koblentz, Evan 15 Nov '22

15 Nov '22

Does anyone have documentation, or good theories, about how/where Vannevar Bush was inspired to develop his ideas for the speculative Memex? I know that he was privy to the latest computer developments, but how did he make the jump from plugboards and punch cards to a virtual encyclopedia and hypertext?

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ACM conference program query - thanks to all
by Janet Abbate 15 Nov '22

15 Nov '22

Thank you to everyone who took the time to respond to my query about ACM conference programs—I’m very appreciative! I haven’t been able to locate this particular conference program yet, although some others are archived at CBI. In case anyone's curious, I was trying to track down (or at least find a full citation for) the speech by Edward F. Moore referenced in a letter to the editor of CACM (5:1 1962, p6) by Larry E. Travis of SDC: "Serious injustice will be done if E. F. Moore's attack on artificial intelligence research, in his speech "Is Artificial Intelligence Just Around the Corner?" at the 1961 National ACM Conference, remains publicly unanswered. In this speech he impugned the integrity, intelligence, and competence of scientists working on problems of artificial intelligence, referring to them as pseudo-scientists and classing them with alchemists.” It sounds like quite a colorful speech, and I would have liked to see the context in which it was given. best, Janet Dr. Janet Abbate Professor, Science, Technology and Society Virginia Tech Co-director, VT National Capital Region STS program liberalarts.vt.edu/sts www.facebook.com/VirginiaTechSTS https://sites.google.com/vt.edu/stsconnect/

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Microsoft Research: PhD Internships / Sociotechnical Perspectives
by danah boyd 14 Nov '22

14 Nov '22

Hi y'all! Great to see many of you this weekend. Microsoft Research has a bunch of internship programs each summer, but one is especially targeted for advanced PhD students who want to work with social scientists (namely me, Mary Gray, Nancy Baym, and Tarleton Gillespie). You can find the full deets here: https://socialmediacollective.org/smc-internships/ but I'm attaching a teaser below. Please forward this to students you think might find it of interest! PS: Internships are for current PhD students but we're also hiring postdocs <https://socialmediacollective.org/smc-postdocs/> for next year for newly minted doctors!! ---- Microsoft Research New England is looking for advanced Ph.D. students interested in bringing sociotechnical perspectives to analyze critical issues of our time. Interns will join a group of social scientists using empirical and critical methods to study the social, political, and cultural dynamics that shape technologies and their consequences. Our work draws on and spans several disciplines such as anthropology, communication, gender and sexuality studies, history, information studies, law, media studies, organizational and management sciences, science & technology studies, and sociology. Applications are due December 2, 2022. In 2023 we will return to in person internships! Interns will be expected to be physically present and contribute to the daily life of our lab (based in Cambridge, MA). We are also excited to once again welcome applicants from outside North America.   We are especially interested in candidates bringing sociotechnical approaches to the study of such topics as: - race, caste, and Indigeneity; gender and sexual identities; socioeconomic status and class; and the intersectional dimensions of identity as they are entangled with sociotechnical systems; - how institutions, organizations, networks, and infrastructures (across sectors and domains) configure and are configured by sociotechnical systems; - notions of cooperation, mutual aid, and community engagement and their relationships to governance and responsible technologies; - political economies and emerging organizational forms in digital labor, community, government, non-profit, creator economy, and private-sector contexts; - the politics and public responsibilities of algorithms, platforms, AI, machine learning, metrics, and other manifestations of computational cultures. The questions our researchers are currently focused on include: - How are people’s expectations of work changing and how does that intersect with the rise of the creator and gig economies? (Nancy Baym) - What makes data legitimate in contexts as varied as government, civil society, and industry? (danah boyd) - How do platforms and other algorithmic intermediaries, through their design and policies, govern public discourse? (Tarleton Gillespie) - What are the cultural, political, and ethical implications of digital systems as new forms and sites of semi-automated, globally-distributed digital sites of identities, work, and human rights? (Mary L. Gray) To understand more about the responsibilities, qualifications, application process, timeline, and other deets, head on over to our blog post: https://socialmediacollective.org/smc-internships/

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SHOT FOIA roundtable tomorrow morning
by Meg Leta Jones 11 Nov '22

11 Nov '22

Hi friends! If you're in New Orleans, come bring a coffee to hang out with me and danah boyd in Bayside A on the 4th Floor. We're going to be discussing freedom of information requests as a method of historical research and source of historical record. Please bring your FOIA experiences and/or come to learn from others! Hope to see you there- Meg + danah ----- Meg Leta Jones, J.D., Ph.D. Communication, Culture & Technology Associate Professor Ethics Lab Faculty Fellow Science, Technology, & International Affairs Core Faculty Institute for Technology Law & Policy Affiliate Faculty Georgetown University Meg.Jones(a)Georgetown.edu MegLeta.com <http://megleta.com/> Author of *Ctrl + Z: The Right to Be Forgotten <http://nyupress.org/books/9781479881703/>* (NYU Press, 2016)

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