Continuing the previous thread... below is a message we received from Ian King himself (the kilt-clad globe trekker with the "Grizzly Adams-like coiffure" as the WSJ introduced him). He describes the museum a little bit, and reveals that he's just now starting his Ph.D. and is beginning to immerse himself in the scholarly literature. Ian has also told me that it is OK to share this message with the list and also asked to join SIGCIS! So let's welcome him to our community. A few SIGCIS resources he, and others getting involved with the scholarly side of IT history, might find useful: Our resource guide at http://www.sigcis.org/resources, and my review essay at http://www.tomandmaria.com/tom/Writing/HistoryOfInformationTechnologyARIST_D raft.pdf. The syllabus repository at http://www.sigcis.org/syllabi, if he's curious about what's being taught or needs to plan his own course soon. The member directory at http://www.sigcis.org/member, where he can learn about others working in the field. And of course, we'd love to welcome him to our workshop this year http://www.sigcis.org/workshop11 or a future event. In particular, our "dissertations in progress" special session offers the chance to present a draft dissertation proposal for friendly critique, or for students a little further along the chance to get comments on a precirculated dissertation chapter. We also offer graduate student travel funds, which it sounds from the article like he won't need. (Hint to Ian: get serious about air miles and hotel reward programs). Tom -----Original Message----- From: Ian King [mailto:IanK@vulcan.com] Sent: Wednesday, August 31, 2011 3:35 PM To: thaigh@computer.org; j-coopersmith@neo.tamu.edu Subject: RE: [SIGCIS-Members] Paul Allen and the communities of IT History Gentlemen, I am that grizzly kilt-wearer to whom you refer in the original message. :-) First, let me clarify my position a bit: I am a member of the Living Computer Museum team, and as such I do acquisition, restoration, operation and maintenance, and I am responsible for our educational outreach which has included guest lecturing at the University of Washington. Our scope is the era of timeshared systems and the emergence of interactive computing, and as such embraces roughly the late 50s (CTSS, PDP-1, TX-0) through the mid-80s or so (the rise of the microcomputer and PC/workstation). As I'm sure you recall, Mr. Allen was one of the co-founders of Microsoft with the introduction of Altair BASIC, but you may not know that said product was actually developed on a PDP-10 mainframe. Needless to say, a running DECSYSTEM-20 is one of the centerpieces of the LCM. I wasn't a grad student when I started at LCM three years ago, but I'm starting my Ph.D. in Information Science this fall (with Mr. Allen's approval). My 'hidden agenda' is to contribute to the preservation of the history of the minicomputer era, and I will likely have some sort of impact on the world view to which you refer. My stated research interest is understanding the interrelationship between the evolutionary paths of information science and information technology, highlighting the arcs of innovation and inflection points that led us to the IST-dependent world in which we live today. If that sounds fuzzy, it's because I'm a first-year student. :-) There's so much surface area, so little time..... I hope this exchange will begin a conversation. Since I started down this academic pathway, I've seen more and more interest in this subject matter, which I don't think is merely because I'm paying more attention to it as a scholarly topic: much of what I've been reading and hearing are fairly recent, suggesting that interest is in fact on an upswing. I guess my timing was good this time. I must excuse myself, as I am being interviewed by the Australian Broadcasting Company in just a bit and I want to prep. But I look forward to talking further. -- Ian Ian S. King, Curator of Education Living Computer Museum A presentation of Vulcan, Inc. http://www.livingcomputermuseum.org