"The foundational article in Interaction Design"

As We May Think (The Atlantic Monthly)

by Vannevar Bush

Teaser from the Editor:

"As Director of the Office of Scientific Research and Development, Dr. Vannevar Bush has coordinated the activities of some six thousand leading American scientists in the application of science to warfare. In this significant article he holds up an incentive for scientists when the fighting has ceased. He urges that men of science should then turn to the massive task of making more accessible our bewildering store of knowledge. For years inventions have extended man's physical powers rather than the powers of his mind. Trip hammers that multiply the fists, microscopes that sharpen the eye, and engines of destruction and detection are new results, but not the end results, of modern science. Now, says Dr. Bush, instruments are at hand which, if properly developed, will give man access to and command over the inherited knowledge of the ages. The perfection of these pacific instruments should be the first objective of our scientists as they emerge from their war work. Like Emerson's famous address of 1837 on "The American Scholar," this paper by Dr. Bush calls for a new relationship between thinking man and the sum of our knowledge."

And on the power of "unlimited semiosis" (linking ideas; Hugh read this quote in class):

"The human mind does not work that way. It operates by association. With one item in its grasp, it snaps instantly to the next that is suggested by the association of thoughts, in accordance with some intricate web of trails carried by the cells of the brain. It has other characteristics, of course; trails that are not frequently followed are prone to fade, items are not fully permanent, memory is transitory. Yet the speed of action, the intricacy of trails, the detail of mental pictures, is awe-inspiring beyond all else in nature."

Welcome to the Metastructure: The New Internet of Transportation by Adam Rogers

"Sound familiar? Of course it does. That’s how the Internet works. (Remember when it was called the information superhighway? It’s like that, but for actual highways.) This decentralized approach to remapping our physical roads is fundamentally (and finally) changing everything about how we get around."

Walker Art Center's "Hippie Modernism: The Struggle for Utopia"

And... a look at the catalog ($$) with essays from Hugh and Paul Pangaro (who visited last semester).

Accompanies Hugh's article >> How cybernetics connects computing, the counterculture, and design — [an interactive social graph]

Manuel Lima's TED talk: A visual history of human knowledge

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Fundamental Typography Books:
Design with Type by Carl Dair (1982)
Compendium for Literates by Karl Gerstner (1972)
Typographie: A Manual of Design by Emil Ruder (1967)
Asymmetric Typography by Jan Tschichold (1967)

The Power of Product Integrity (Harvard Business Review)

by Kim B. Clark and Takahiro Fujimoto

Introductory paragraph (hook):

"Some companies consistently develop products that succeed with customers. Other companies often fall short. What differentiates them is integrity. Every product reflects the organization and the development process that created it. Companies that consistently develop successful products—products with integrity—are themselves coherent and integrated. Moreover, this coherence is distinguishable not just at the level of structure and strategy but also, and more important, at the level of day-to-day work and individual understanding. Companies with organizational integrity possess a source of competitive advantage that rivals cannot easily match."