SXSW conference: From Plato, our internet could have been

No, not the philosopher. Plato was a computer system from the Sixties, already with touchscreen, chats and Onlinegames. Revolutionary, but sadly forgotten

SXSW conference: From Plato, our internet could have been

Brian Dear has spent last 32 years and 1,000 interviews to document DieGeschichte from Plato. The founder of event website Eventful has even written a book about it. In autumn, friendly orange glow, Daser just appeared at South By Southwest Festival (SXSW) in Austinpräsentierte. Already remarkable, at SXSW it is mostly about looking into future. However, from fate of Plato Könntenauch developers of today learn to SagtDear.

For him, Plato is a derwenigen technological development that has never been properly investigated. Even in Computer History Museum in Silicon Valley, system was not even mentioned for a long time, let alone exhibited. While ARPANET developed at about same time as a forerunner of today's internet was sufficiently documented, Plato remained nothing more than a footnote in history – a system for nerds and few historians. That's a pity, not to say tragic, finds dear.

South by Southwest (SXSW)

Since 1987, South by Southwest (SXSW) is held annually in capital city of Austin, Texas. What originally started as an alternative music festival is now also one of world's most important digital conferences, bringing toger start-up founders, scientists, designers, developers, politicians and journalists. For many years now online has been reporting live on spot about trends and developments in technology industry.

Pages? Plato had long

Plato stands for programmed logic for automated teaching operation. Eswurde at beginning of Sixties at University of Illinois Alscomputergestützte learning platform developed. Through terminals, which were a keyboard and a screen, students were able to take courses in inlate, chemistry, math and music, among or things. With EinerProgrammiersprache called Tutor, NeueInhalte could be created with appropriate knowledge. 40 years before first "real" online courses imworld Wide Web occurred, students in Illinois could already have Leistungenvon courses that y had reached on a computer.

© Jakob Börner Eike Cool ly is an editor in digital and reports for time online from Austin, Texas, from SXSW festival. to author page

The breakthrough, however, came in 1972 with depurity of Plato IV. The orange plasma display was introduced, DasToucheingaben supported. "In fact, it supported sogarMulti touch input as it was later used by Apple in iphone," sagtDear. Because se inputs consumed too much bandwidth and computational power, function was ultimately not used. Neverless, users were able to make input directly from screen and not just through a externeTastatur.

Plato IV was also used in or locations in Denusa and later in or countries. In 1975, systems were approximately 150 universities and companies, some of which were connected via mainframe computers – Plato was thus a kind of Protointernet.

Plato was in core of a social platform Brian Dear, start-up entrepreneurs and founders

The potential of this interconnected system was not hidden from users. Why Dröge Math courses, Comparison could do so much more with Plato? "Plato was in core Einesoziale platform," says Dear, "only Entwicklernoch public financiers." But eager students at DenHochschulen, who gradually "hacked" system for ir purposes.

Date Of Update: 13 March 2018, 12:03
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