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Cyhist Dec. 08 1997 B
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========================================================================= Date: Mon, 8 Dec 1997 16:14:42 -0800
Reply-To: les@cs.stanford.edu
Sender: "CYHIST Community Memory: Discussion list on the History of
Cyberspace" <CYHIST@MAELSTROM.STJOHNS.EDU> From: Les Earnest <les@STEAM.STANFORD.EDU>
Subject: Re: Net / CMC Pornography
X-cc: "Michael S. Hart" <hart@PRAIRIENET.ORG>
In-Reply-To: <Pine.SOL.3.95q.971208102529.15858O-100000@bluestem.prairienet.org>
(hart@PRAIRIENET.ORG)
______________________________________________________________________
Community Memory: Discussion List on the History of Cyberspace ______________________________________________________________________
Michael S. Hart writes:
I don't know if you would categorize Playboy as pornography, but there were ASCII renditions from Playboy hanging on the walls of many computer centers as calendar girls, literally as far back as I can remember there being large line print.
This could possibly go back to even before those sites were on the Arpanet.
A justice of the U.S. Supreme Court once acknowledged that he couldn't define obscenity but claimed that "I know it when I see it." Pornography is not necessarily obscenity, but I believe that judgements about it are similary subjective -- if it turns you on, it must be pornographic.
Shortly after we set up the Stanford Artificial Intelligence Lab. in 1966, which had both television cameras and a line printer connected to out DEC PDP-6 computer, lineprinter artwork of various kinds began appearing on the walls. Overprinting was used to get as wide a range of grey scales as possible. Some of the images were plagerized from Playboy, but our enterprising grad students also did live portraits, including nudes.
We failed to realize the commercial potential of this scheme until line printer imagery began appearing in carnivals and street fairs a decade or so later. Another opportunity missed!
-Les Earnest
______________________________________________________________________
Reply-To: les@cs.stanford.edu
Sender: "CYHIST Community Memory: Discussion list on the History of
Cyberspace" <CYHIST@MAELSTROM.STJOHNS.EDU> From: Les Earnest <les@STEAM.STANFORD.EDU>
Subject: Re: Net / CMC Pornography
X-cc: "Michael S. Hart" <hart@PRAIRIENET.ORG>
In-Reply-To: <Pine.SOL.3.95q.971208102529.15858O-100000@bluestem.prairienet.org>
(hart@PRAIRIENET.ORG)
______________________________________________________________________
Community Memory: Discussion List on the History of Cyberspace ______________________________________________________________________
Michael S. Hart writes:
I don't know if you would categorize Playboy as pornography, but there were ASCII renditions from Playboy hanging on the walls of many computer centers as calendar girls, literally as far back as I can remember there being large line print.
This could possibly go back to even before those sites were on the Arpanet.
A justice of the U.S. Supreme Court once acknowledged that he couldn't define obscenity but claimed that "I know it when I see it." Pornography is not necessarily obscenity, but I believe that judgements about it are similary subjective -- if it turns you on, it must be pornographic.
Shortly after we set up the Stanford Artificial Intelligence Lab. in 1966, which had both television cameras and a line printer connected to out DEC PDP-6 computer, lineprinter artwork of various kinds began appearing on the walls. Overprinting was used to get as wide a range of grey scales as possible. Some of the images were plagerized from Playboy, but our enterprising grad students also did live portraits, including nudes.
We failed to realize the commercial potential of this scheme until line printer imagery began appearing in carnivals and street fairs a decade or so later. Another opportunity missed!
-Les Earnest
______________________________________________________________________
