While idling in traffic today, I listened to the Alex Jones show (don't ask but I learned a lot about the human body's need for selenium), and learned he had a specific guest whose efforts to uncover the truth about GMOs led to attacks to destroy him professionally as a way to discredit his GMO, um, findings. To quote, "On this *Tuesday, January 10* broadcast of the Alex Jones Show, Trump insider *Roger Stone* discusses what to expect in the last ten days before the inauguration. Also, the inventor of Email, *Dr. Shiva Ayyadurai, Ph.D.* joins the show to explain the connection he found between email and GMO’s. On today’s show we’ll also look at the Jeff Sessions confirmation… http://www.infowars.com/watch-alex-jones-show/ Jonathan Coopersmith Professor Department of History Texas A&M University College Station, TX 77843-4236 979.845.7151 979.862.4314 (fax) http://historynewsnetwork.org/blog/author/42 : latest post is "Coal Comfort. Is Hillary Clinton being 'Al Gored'?" at *http://historynewsnetwork.org/blog/153818 <http://historynewsnetwork.org/blog/153818>* * FAXED. The Rise and Fall of the Fax Machine* (Johns Hopkins University Press) is the co-recipient of the 2016 Business History Conference Hagley Prize for best book in business history. On Fri, Jan 6, 2017 at 8:35 AM, Thomas Haigh <thomas.haigh@gmail.com> wrote:
Hello SIGCIS,
In response to the various suggestions that a comprehensive rebuttal would need to engage with Ayyadurai's efforts to define email in a very specific way: yes. A comprehensive rebuttal would. That's why my page www.sigcis.org/ayyadurai is very long and detailed, which also makes it off putting to casual readers. I urge anyone with an interest in the case to read it before commenting further.
My comment was more about a concise and convincing way to explain why this is not a usual invention priority dispute. I do not recall anyone prior to Ayyadurai claiming that things like mid-1970s Arpanet electronic mail or Xerox Laurel were not email. For example, Janet Abbate's book Inventing the Internet talks without reservation about "email" as the killer application of the ARPANET in the mid-1970s.
The SIGCIS community does not need to anoint a "first" for email to agree that something produced in 1978/80/82 cannot possibly be the first email system. Here's an analogy: not everyone believes that the Wright Brothers were the first to fly when they took to the air in 1903. There are other contenders, other definitions, etc. Some people favor Whitehead in 1901. But if someone tells you he invented the airplane in 1918 you don't need to ask about the details of his system. A lot of well documented flying had happened by then. Just show a dated photograph of the Red Baron. And if the would-be inventor of the airplane justifies his claim with a new 60 point definition of airplane you are not obliged to take that definition seriously.
Best wishes,
Tom
-----Original Message----- From: Members [mailto:members-bounces@lists.sigcis.org] On Behalf Of McMillan, William W Sent: Friday, January 06, 2017 6:56 AM To: Sigcis <members@sigcis.org> Subject: Re: [SIGCIS-Members] Resources on Ayyadurai saga
Isn't the claim more to the well-developed metaphor of a mail system similar to a physical office mail system?
For example, Kay and Xerox can claim priority to the UI desktop metaphor, even though all the operations it implemented existed previously in command-line systems.
The parry and riposte to pointing out mail/messaging capabilities of early systems is that, yes, they had similar functions, but that they had not been developed into a coherent metaphor for a complete real-world mail system.
.... not that this is a valid claim ...
Once you get into the UI widget, look-and-feel, metaphor space, the ground gets soft.
- Bill
________________________________ From: Members [members-bounces@lists.sigcis.org] on behalf of Jordi Fornes [jfornes@ac.upc.edu] Sent: Friday, January 06, 2017 4:41 AM To: Guy Fedorkow Cc: Thomas Haigh; members@lists.sigcis.org Subject: Re: [SIGCIS-Members] Resources on Ayyadurai saga
That’s the point. What is an email? At least since 1975 (in the sixth edition of the Unix programmer’s manual) the command “mail” exists “to send mail to designated users”. I have not access to the source code of BSD Unix, but it was developed with a source control revision system, so it should be available somewhere. I'm almost certain that the “mail” command in 4 BSD (circa 1980) sent mail over TCP/IP.
At all events, we need a definition of email, accepted by the community of experts, before talk about “firsts” (in my opinion, a trap keyword in history of science).
Best wishes,
— Dr Jordi Fornés jfornes@ac.upc.edu<mailto:jfornes@ac.upc.edu> +34 934 054 064 Computer Architecture Department Room D6-102 Campus Nord, Barcelona
On 5 Jan 2017, at 20:30, Guy Fedorkow <guy.fedorkow@gmail.com<mailto:guy.fedorkow@gmail.com>> wrote:
Tom, As I remember from the last round, the disagreement seemed to be over the definition of "email", wasn't it? I don't think there was a denial that messages were sent between computer terminals prior to the plucky young contributor's work, but that only after that point did the technology truly deserve the appellation "EMAIL", as allegedly proven by the grant of copyright? It does seem like there's been a certain fluidity in choosing whether the argument of the day is based on the name or the functional characteristics... But a refutation might want to consider both factors, i.e., evidence that the term email was in wide use, and that the claimed functionality (beyond just sending a message, although I don't remember what it was) was in use prior to the alleged invention. /guy
On 1/5/2017 12:56 PM, Thomas Haigh wrote: Thanks Dave,
The other advice I have for anyone commenting on this case is to keep the argument simple.
There are a lot of invention controversies along the lines of “Big famous company X says that it invented technology Y in (date 2), but actually plucky inventor Z had previously come up with the same technology in (date 1). Because date 1 is earlier than date 2 we should remember plucky inventor Z as the true inventor of Y, despite the PR and legal resources of company X which denied him recognition.” That’s the narrative that Ayyadurai is telling about himself, and reporters are liable to turn it into an Ayyadurai vs. Tomlinson contest. Discussion of such claims head in the direction of debates on whether plucky inventor Z’s simple prototype really counts as inventing the technology.
What’s different about this case is that plucky inventor Z claims to have invented email in either 1980 or, more recently, in 1978 (and has shown code snippets that appears to come from 1982). Whereas historians already knew that simple electronic mail systems were in use at MIT in 1965, that electronic mail was sent over what became the Internet in 1971, that spam was sent in 1978, that Xerox had a recognizably modern GUI client by that time etc. So the features of Ayyadurai’s system are not the important thing in assessing his claim to be “the inventor of email.” I have no reason to doubt that he produced a perfectly good local email system. But Ayyadurai is only “the inventor of email” if nothing done prior to 1978 (or 1980 or 1982) was email. In other words, he’s trying to use the classic “plucky suppressed inventor” narrative even though his date 1 is many years later than the established date 2.
To rebut this claim one doesn’t need to designate any individual as THE inventor of email, merely to reiterate the historical consensus that email is a synonym for electronic mail and that electronic mail was in use prior to 1978 (or 1980 or 1982). However smart and likeable you are, you can’t invent something that’s already been invented.
Best wishes,
Tom
From: dave.walden.family@gmail.com<mailto:dave.walden.family@gmail.com> [mailto:dave.walden.family@gmail.com] Sent: Thursday, January 05, 2017 10:02 AM To: Thomas Haigh <thomas.haigh@gmail.com><mailto:thomas.haigh@gmail.com> Cc: Christine Finn <christine.finn@gmail.com><mailto:christine.finn@gmail.com>; David Golumbia <dgolumbia@gmail.com><mailto:dgolumbia@gmail.com>; Sigcis<members@sigcis.org><mailto:members@sigcis.org> Subject: Re: [SIGCIS-Members] Resources on Ayyadurai saga
Maybe the document should be something like a friend-of-court brief that is provided to the defense attorney rather than a public document and the court if the case ever goes to court. There is plenty of time for public documents later. I would think that passing Tom's list below to the defense attorney would already be useful. Best regards, Dave http://walden-family.com/bbn/email-invention.html (not updated in several years)
Sent from my iPad
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_______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/ listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org