History and New Media

After reading two interesting literary works so far today, both of which I did not expect to be as related to me as they were, I am proud to say I know more about the history of computers and programming. Both of the articles I was expected to be very drawn out and lacking a true connection with the work.

In Vannevar Bush's article "As We May Think", Source, I felt as if he had written a history article about what life was like in 1945, looking towards the future. The foresight Bush had in how the future would evolve and how technology could possibly be was astonishing. Many of the speculations of what may happen were accurate. An examples of this is when he mentioned stereoscopic film, "It may well be stereoscopic, and record with two spaced glass eyes, for striking improvements inn stereoscopic technique are just around the corner." That sentence, sums up what has happened in the passed 5 or so years. Movies are being created in 3D, TVs, Video Games, most modern art forms have 3D involved with them. There are other examples that are prevalent today as-well, The Encyclopedia Britannica is no longer going to be printed, it will only be available online, available to anyone, at any time, anywhere. Records are no longer kept with pencil and paper, but input straight into machines. I experienced this first hand when I broke my collar bone; the X-ray is no longer on a sheet, it is immediately sent to a computer, archived, and printed on an 8x11. The ability to think sixty, almost seventy years into the future is amazing. Bush presented an idea, that not many people think about, think about the future, what can be done today to help the future. Many things can lead to another, government needs can and often do lead to inventions that are modified and used for the public.

The other reading was "The language of new media/ Chapter 1 What is new media?" by Manovich. This reading, as the title suggests, explains new media. Starting from how media became new, to classifying what new media is, and finishing with what new media is not. Beginning with the growth of art, along with the growth of "computers" Manovich explained that they were similar in growth, that was not independent of each other. This is what I found to be interesting, he continues to talk about the growth of computers through what makes new media. Using examples of computers and programming that supported the knowledge I had gained for each of them. His principles list was very explanatory. It is very similar to the basis of object oriented programming, starting with everything has a value to everything can be built from basic elements.

1. Numerical Representation
2. Modularity
3. Automation
4. Variability
5. Transcoding

These are all important parts of programming, which help explains both new media and programming. Good programming leads to new media, while new media doesn't exclusively come from programming. Many other things can create new media, but somewhere along the line, someone programmed something to make it digital. Out of the two works, I probably enjoyed the Bush article the most, it was a look at the future from the past. It was extremely relevant, along with being informative. Given a chance, I would read more of his work.