Excerpt from Ted Nelson’s Computer Lib/ Dream Machines

Early in the excerpt I found the position of higher learning being concerned with improving one’s ability to connect differing ideas to be an interesting concept. It has always been my feeling that it is more useful to understand how to “think” more effectively than it is to remember a multitude of random facts. This mostly being because a fact has no meaning without context, and one can only gather context by linking an occurrence (what “actually” did happen) to a multitude of less objective variables... A concept that follows fast on Nelson’s statement on learning in his description of the Japanese film Rashomon.

If knowledge and reality are indeed as subjective as Nelson (and I) believe then, as Nelson argues, it is necessary to facilitate the linkages that form our knowledge and truth. From this need Nelson offers the term “hypertexts”, giving a name to an idea that had been around for at least forty years following the work of Vannevar Bush in the mid-1940s.

Nelson like many other multimedia theorists saw computing technology as possessing the greatest potential in realizing his “real dream” in which everything is hypertext. For example, Google the web portal and search utility, in many ways is progressing toward this ideal. Among other similarities, it most notably links to a multitude of information from every part of the globe, is in the process of digitizing volumes and volumes of printed material, and is preparing to position itself as an online media juggernaut, not to mention its membership in the very exclusive club of profitable web companies. In this way the Web has made most things hypertext, and it has proven the usefulness of storing things digitally instead of physically.

In addition to this, new applications like AutoCAD and processes like stereolithography and CNC machining have realized Nelson's predictions in a more literal sense. As objects can now be conceived and designed in virtual space, transmitted electronically and then produced (and reproduced) solely from digital information.

All in all, while I think Nelson’s vision is a reasonable one, I think his belief that all this will insure that all mankind have access to a “shared heritage” may be a bit optimistic. Ultimately, the increasingly fast access to an increasingly large amount of information will make many things possible, not all of them good; and keeping with the concept of subjective truth, the very idea of “good” itself depends on one’s perspective.

Multimedia from Wagner to Virtual Reality: Overture

This introduction to the text to follow went far to show the links between early theorists and artists to the progression of multimedia.

Early on in this section, one would mostly map the infancy of multimedia directly to that of computer science, as if multimedia draws its roots solely from the technological advancements following the Second World War. The work of notable thinkers in this period all seem primarily concerned with the development of new computing technology be it in the form of Bush’s Memex, or Engelbart’s NLS, the ancestor of the now-pervasive Internet.

Later in the section, however, there is a closer study of the underlying themes of multimedia itself: crystallized as the five concepts of integration, interactivity, hypermedia, immersion, and narrativity. Examples are given as to how the work of various individuals far before Bush (Wagner, F.T. Marinetti, and others), and also after Bush but with approaches less concerned with computer technology, have forwarded all these ideals in creative and overall culture.

It is hard to postulate whether the development of these new technologies and concepts came from the utopian reaching toward improvement of the human condition or rather simple, practical necessity be it in the military, governmental or business realms. I would venture to say that as many other collaborations between the established powers able to fund such ventures and the creative minds able to imagine and implement them have been, it was an amalgam of both. This is evidenced by the employment of many of these early dreamers by the government or large corporations, and the ultimate applications found for their work.

I find it interesting that the Worldwide Web, a construct now taken for granted and that is almost a perfect example of all five multimedia concepts, was foreseen so long ago and with such clarity. But, while from a technological standpoint I believe these individuals got it right, I think they were mistaken as to what larger social impact this new construct would have on global society. Until the barriers between man and machine and therefore perhaps between man and man no longer exist; the Web and its future offspring will remain as their ancestors--the ancient communicative technologies of the past have been--merely tools, still only as effective as their imperfect, isolated operators.

I must begin by saying that I am somewhat skeptical about the concept of visual music. While the relation between sound and visual information can make for a compelling experience, I feel that it is not useful to become singularly concerned with their similarities at the expense of neglecting the aspects unique to each medium. Rather, it seems more appropriate to focus attention on how the two add to a work of art as separate components; how one can strengthen the impact of the other; and finally, how one can inspire the other.

With that said, the early works presented in the “Visual Music” exhibit succeed in demonstrating how visual media can be like music, as their lack of objective form forces the viewer to experience the work internally; or in the case of Richter’s Fuge in Rot und Grun, provide a visual representation of aspects of a particular style of music. Later in the exhibit, however, with the advent of technologies allowing for moving images and the artificial reproduction of sound, the ability to create works that show the interplay between music and images on multiple levels was vastly increased. As in earlier examples, the works are subjective and experienced internally but now images could also be inspired by sound literally as it occurs and vice-versa.

Overall, “Visual Music” was an excellent exploration of the synergy of sight and sound in artistic expression throughout history and how it relates to multimedia today.