25Jun

The Machine That Changed the World

posted by Steve Bowbrick

I can’t believe we haven’t linked to this before. A lovely big documentary series: a fascinating 1992 BBC/WGBH co-production about the history and significance of computers. It’s a five-part series: the kind of thing they call a ‘landmark’ these days. It’s fascinating at least in part because it captures the period up to but not including the arrival of the Internet. Since anyone born after about 1980 has no idea what computers were for before they were all connected together (I can hardly remember myself), this kind of serious consideration of the period must have real historical value. The series was rescued from VHS obscurity and carefully cut up into useful chapters (using Viddler) by blogger and creator of upcoming.org Andy Baio. A public service if ever I’ve heard of one. You can watch the rest of the series here.

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  1. Posted by Ladgeful.com › Addiction to Lego is a serious problem… on Wednesday 25th June

    [...] guys over at watchification have dug up a 1992 BBC/WGBH documentary about the computer “The Machine That Changed the World“.  It’s interesting to see what the world of computing was like before the internet [...]

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