Forgot your password?
Cyhist Jul 11 1996 A
Document Actions
Date: Thu, 11 Jul 1996 23:07:03 -0700
Reply-To: cpsr-history@Sunnyside.COM
Originator: cpsr-history@cpsr.org
Sender: listserv-reply-errors@Sunnyside.COM
Precedence: bulk
From: rab@well.com (Bob Bickford)
To: "Multiple recipients of list cpsr-history@cpsr.org" Subject: CM> Hacker 1 Conference.
X-Listprocessor-Version: 9.1 -- List Server by Sunnyside Computing, Inc.
X-Comment: Discussion of history of computing
X-Info: For listserv info write to listserv@cpsr.org with message HELP
X-Message-Id: <379323427623.LTK.013@cpsr.org>
X-UIDL: 837211171.005
Sender: rab@well.com (Bob Bickford)
Subject: Re: CM> Hacker 1 Conference.
>[Moderator: Maybe you could begin by explaning what the point of the first
>conference was, who organized it, and what happened.]
An excellent suggestion!
The nice folks at the Point Foundation and Whole Earth Review got very
interested in the collection of personalities presented in Steven Levy's
book _Hackers: The Heroes of the Computer Revolution_. The way that
Matthew McClure once described it to me, they wanted to "get these folks
together for a weekend and see what happened". While there were many
folks involved in organizing the event, other than Matthew the only names
that I am certain of are Levi Thomas, who was working for Whole Earth at
the time, and Lee Felsenstein: I know that both helped organize the event.
We would do well to get Matthew on this list, if he's willing (mmc@well.com)
or of course one of the others, for a more first-person account.
Beyond just bringing together a couple hundred very smart people for a
weekend and then standing back and watching ;-) I don't think that the
Point / Whole Earth people had any "point" in mind.
I frequently space on the name of the location, but assuming I'm not doing
that now, it was Fort Baker. In any case, I know *where* it was: inside
the GGNRA in southern Marin County (CA). One of the neater pictures that
I saw of the conference was of the people setting up the chow line on some
tables outdoors; I believe the building in the background of that picture
was one of the old Army barracks.
One of the cooler things done as part of the conference itself was this
multi-player "PONG" game setup where the paddles were "summed". A brief
shot of this made it into the PBS video that Fabrice created (which I
mentioned in my previous email).
Beyond that, and the power outage followed by a frantic search for a
generator which I already mentioned, it seems to me that everything else
of interest was various conversations that were repeated to me, and I'm
realizing now that those would be much better gotten from first-person
memories rather than mine. So perhaps I have less to contribute about
the first conference than I thought.......
--
Robert Bickford rab@well.com
http://www.well.com/user/rab/
______________________________________________________________________
Reply-To: cpsr-history@Sunnyside.COM
Originator: cpsr-history@cpsr.org
Sender: listserv-reply-errors@Sunnyside.COM
Precedence: bulk
From: rab@well.com (Bob Bickford)
To: "Multiple recipients of list cpsr-history@cpsr.org" Subject: CM> Hacker 1 Conference.
X-Listprocessor-Version: 9.1 -- List Server by Sunnyside Computing, Inc.
X-Comment: Discussion of history of computing
X-Info: For listserv info write to listserv@cpsr.org with message HELP
X-Message-Id: <379323427623.LTK.013@cpsr.org>
X-UIDL: 837211171.005
Sender: rab@well.com (Bob Bickford)
Subject: Re: CM> Hacker 1 Conference.
>[Moderator: Maybe you could begin by explaning what the point of the first
>conference was, who organized it, and what happened.]
An excellent suggestion!
The nice folks at the Point Foundation and Whole Earth Review got very
interested in the collection of personalities presented in Steven Levy's
book _Hackers: The Heroes of the Computer Revolution_. The way that
Matthew McClure once described it to me, they wanted to "get these folks
together for a weekend and see what happened". While there were many
folks involved in organizing the event, other than Matthew the only names
that I am certain of are Levi Thomas, who was working for Whole Earth at
the time, and Lee Felsenstein: I know that both helped organize the event.
We would do well to get Matthew on this list, if he's willing (mmc@well.com)
or of course one of the others, for a more first-person account.
Beyond just bringing together a couple hundred very smart people for a
weekend and then standing back and watching ;-) I don't think that the
Point / Whole Earth people had any "point" in mind.
I frequently space on the name of the location, but assuming I'm not doing
that now, it was Fort Baker. In any case, I know *where* it was: inside
the GGNRA in southern Marin County (CA). One of the neater pictures that
I saw of the conference was of the people setting up the chow line on some
tables outdoors; I believe the building in the background of that picture
was one of the old Army barracks.
One of the cooler things done as part of the conference itself was this
multi-player "PONG" game setup where the paddles were "summed". A brief
shot of this made it into the PBS video that Fabrice created (which I
mentioned in my previous email).
Beyond that, and the power outage followed by a frantic search for a
generator which I already mentioned, it seems to me that everything else
of interest was various conversations that were repeated to me, and I'm
realizing now that those would be much better gotten from first-person
memories rather than mine. So perhaps I have less to contribute about
the first conference than I thought.......
--
Robert Bickford rab@well.com
http://www.well.com/user/rab/
______________________________________________________________________
