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I see this is a popular wish, and I'm afraid it's frustratingly unimaginative. Finally we have a medium that can open up entirely new ways of doing things with

I see this is a popular wish, and I'm afraid it's frustratingly unimaginative. Finally we have a medium that can open up entirely new ways of doing things with computers, yet so many people just wish it could replicate the old ways. Same thing happened when the first display computers were made to emulate paper-based terminals instead of exploring what's possible on a graphical display. We still haven't fully recovered from that. Oh the pink plane.

wmeredith 9y ago
What is a paper based terminal?
- phyller 9y ago
  Instead of a screen, output used to just be typed on paper like a typewriter. And we have basically emulated that as we worked our way up to modern computers. It's a good point.
  - pbhjpbhj 9y ago
    Planar presentation matches the limitations of our visual input. Isn't that why we appear to have copied former presentation media.
- kbob 9y ago
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teletype_Model_33 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teletype_Model_33
0xdeadbeefbabe 9y ago
pink plane? I agree it's unimaginative, so I'm imagining programming in VR in picture-forth.
- Impossible 9y ago
  Is picture-forth an actual thing? Sounds interesting.
  - 0xdeadbeefbabe 9y ago
    It's not that I'm aware of, but color-forth is a thing.
phyller 9y ago
I don't get the pink plane reference, but this is a good point. I'm conflicted about it. On one hand you are right we should try to use new technology to get to entirely different levels of productivity, opening up "new worlds of ideas". At the same time, we have built our organizations, relationships, even our own brains to work in a certain commonly accepted way. Everyone can visualize what I mean when I describe a virtual display, which themselves have basically represented virtual pieces of paper as you mentioned. We would be instantly better off. But yes, it would be a tragedy if the better, more revolutionary way of working was discarded for an incrementally better version of what we are used to. I'd hope somehow we could do both.
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
- smoll 9y ago
  I believe the pink plane comment is a reference to Alan Kay’s idea that there is an entire “blue plane” of ideas that lie orthogonal to the “pink plane” that people live/think in, that only becomes unlocked with a change in perspective (“looking up”). He talks about it in his How To Invent the Future talk. https://www.startupschool.org/videos/11 https://www.startupschool.org/videos/11 https://www.startupschool.org/videos/12 https://www.startupschool.org/videos/12
- AriaMinaei 9y ago
  > But yes, it would be a tragedy if the better, more revolutionary way of working was discarded for an incrementally better version of what we are used to. This tragedy is common occurrence with incremental ideas. Compared to the revolutionary, incremental ideas have an unfair advantage. They are way easier to talk about, way easier to imagine, way easier to implement, and way easier to sell. They capture the market, and before long, too many people's lives will depend on them that no one would dare even propose doing things differently. This has happened time and time again. QWERTY is a nice example: > The top row of alphabetic keys of the standard typewriter reads QWERTY. For me this symbolizes the way in which technology can all too often serve not as a force for progress but for keeping things stuck. The QWERTY arrangement has no rational explanation, only a historical one. It was introduced in response to a problem in the early days of the typewriter: The keys used to jam. The idea was to minimize the collision problem by separating those keys that followed one another frequently. Just a few years later, general improvements in the technology removed the jamming problem, but QWERTY stuck. Once adopted, it resulted in many millions of typewriters and a method (indeed a full-blown curriculum) for learning typing. The social cost of change (for example, putting the most used keys together on the keyboard) mounted with the vested interest created by the fact that so many fingers now knew how to follow the QWERTY keyboard. QWERTY has stayed on despite the existence of other, more "rational" systems. On the other hand, if you talk to people about the QWERTY arrangement they will justify it by "objective" criteria. They will tell you that it "optimizes this" or it "minimizes that." Although these justifications have no rational foundation, they illustrate a process, a social process, of myth construction that allows us to build a justification for primitivity into any system. And I think that we are well on the road to doing exactly the same thing with the computer. We are in the process of digging ourselves into an anachronism by preserving practices that have no rational basis beyond their historical roots in an earlier period of technological and theoretical development. – Seymour Papert, Mindstorms That's why I believe we should be more evangelical in promoting revolutionary ideas (from the blue plane), and more quick to point out incremental ideas (the pink plane).
delinka 9y ago
>Finally we have a medium that can open up entirely new ways of doing things with computers, yet so many people just wish it could replicate the old ways. Right. But to invent the new ways, I need access to A) a replication of the old ways, B) source/config/whatever so I can evolve the Next Big Thing. Without this use case in mind, we're effectively stuck on keyboards and monitors.
jdmichal 9y ago
I wonder if Dynamicland is looking into VR at all? That would be a really interesting mix! https://dynamicland.org/ https://dynamicland.org/ https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15962730 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15962730
- spiralganglion 9y ago
  They are explicitly not. They want to abolish the screen. They want real, touchable objects to be imbued with dynamism. From their FAQ: "Is Dynamicland augmented reality (AR)? It depends what you mean by augmented reality. Dynamicland is primarily about working with actual physical objects that everyone can see and touch. Glasses and phone-based AR is usually about 'holograms' floating in space that only the person with the device can see. It is a central tenet that all people who come in to Dynamicland share the same reality. This enables social cues like pointing, eye contact, and shared attention which are essential for people to be fully present with each other." https://dynamicland.org/faq/ https://dynamicland.org/faq/
  - jdmichal 9y ago
    AR is not VR. I think that VR will certainly enable all these behaviors, eventually. Except in a virtual space, instead of meat space. The behaviors and ideas Dynamicland are advocating should work just as well in both. And while their points ring true for the current iterations of AR-as-personal-assistant, I don't see why a networked AR where everyone shares the same annotations would work any differently. Isn't that what their projectors are doing, after all?
    - spiralganglion 9y ago
      It's not just the social angle — projections in VR and AR aren't tangible, whereas physical objects imbued with dynamism are tangible. Here's a really good article on why this matters so much: http://worrydream.com/ABriefRantOnTheFutureOfInteractionDesign/ http://worrydream.com/ABriefRantOnTheFutureOfInteractionDesi... Now, once we have a holodeck, where the virtual objects are made tangible, your points will hold. But until then, tangibility is a key difference (and perhaps not the only key difference, but this should suffice for now).

wmeredith 9y ago

What is a paper based terminal?

phyller 9y ago
Instead of a screen, output used to just be typed on paper like a typewriter. And we have basically emulated that as we worked our way up to modern computers. It's a good point.
- pbhjpbhj 9y ago
  Planar presentation matches the limitations of our visual input. Isn't that why we appear to have copied former presentation media.
kbob 9y ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teletype_Model_33 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teletype_Model_33

0xdeadbeefbabe 9y ago

pink plane? I agree it's unimaginative, so I'm imagining programming in VR in picture-forth.

Impossible 9y ago
Is picture-forth an actual thing? Sounds interesting.
- 0xdeadbeefbabe 9y ago
  It's not that I'm aware of, but color-forth is a thing.

phyller 9y ago

I don't get the pink plane reference, but this is a good point. I'm conflicted about it. On one hand you are right we should try to use new technology to get to entirely different levels of productivity, opening up "new worlds of ideas". At the same time, we have built our organizations, relationships, even our own brains to work in a certain commonly accepted way. Everyone can visualize what I mean when I describe a virtual display, which themselves have basically represented virtual pieces of paper as you mentioned. We would be instantly better off. But yes, it would be a tragedy if the better, more revolutionary way of working was discarded for an incrementally better version of what we are used to. I'd hope somehow we could do both.

deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
smoll 9y ago
I believe the pink plane comment is a reference to Alan Kay’s idea that there is an entire “blue plane” of ideas that lie orthogonal to the “pink plane” that people live/think in, that only becomes unlocked with a change in perspective (“looking up”). He talks about it in his How To Invent the Future talk. https://www.startupschool.org/videos/11 https://www.startupschool.org/videos/11 https://www.startupschool.org/videos/12 https://www.startupschool.org/videos/12
AriaMinaei 9y ago
> But yes, it would be a tragedy if the better, more revolutionary way of working was discarded for an incrementally better version of what we are used to. This tragedy is common occurrence with incremental ideas. Compared to the revolutionary, incremental ideas have an unfair advantage. They are way easier to talk about, way easier to imagine, way easier to implement, and way easier to sell. They capture the market, and before long, too many people's lives will depend on them that no one would dare even propose doing things differently. This has happened time and time again. QWERTY is a nice example: > The top row of alphabetic keys of the standard typewriter reads QWERTY. For me this symbolizes the way in which technology can all too often serve not as a force for progress but for keeping things stuck. The QWERTY arrangement has no rational explanation, only a historical one. It was introduced in response to a problem in the early days of the typewriter: The keys used to jam. The idea was to minimize the collision problem by separating those keys that followed one another frequently. Just a few years later, general improvements in the technology removed the jamming problem, but QWERTY stuck. Once adopted, it resulted in many millions of typewriters and a method (indeed a full-blown curriculum) for learning typing. The social cost of change (for example, putting the most used keys together on the keyboard) mounted with the vested interest created by the fact that so many fingers now knew how to follow the QWERTY keyboard. QWERTY has stayed on despite the existence of other, more "rational" systems. On the other hand, if you talk to people about the QWERTY arrangement they will justify it by "objective" criteria. They will tell you that it "optimizes this" or it "minimizes that." Although these justifications have no rational foundation, they illustrate a process, a social process, of myth construction that allows us to build a justification for primitivity into any system. And I think that we are well on the road to doing exactly the same thing with the computer. We are in the process of digging ourselves into an anachronism by preserving practices that have no rational basis beyond their historical roots in an earlier period of technological and theoretical development. – Seymour Papert, Mindstorms That's why I believe we should be more evangelical in promoting revolutionary ideas (from the blue plane), and more quick to point out incremental ideas (the pink plane).

delinka 9y ago

>Finally we have a medium that can open up entirely new ways of doing things with computers, yet so many people just wish it could replicate the old ways. Right. But to invent the new ways, I need access to A) a replication of the old ways, B) source/config/whatever so I can evolve the Next Big Thing. Without this use case in mind, we're effectively stuck on keyboards and monitors.

jdmichal 9y ago

I wonder if Dynamicland is looking into VR at all? That would be a really interesting mix! https://dynamicland.org/ https://dynamicland.org/ https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15962730 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15962730

spiralganglion 9y ago
They are explicitly not. They want to abolish the screen. They want real, touchable objects to be imbued with dynamism. From their FAQ: "Is Dynamicland augmented reality (AR)? It depends what you mean by augmented reality. Dynamicland is primarily about working with actual physical objects that everyone can see and touch. Glasses and phone-based AR is usually about 'holograms' floating in space that only the person with the device can see. It is a central tenet that all people who come in to Dynamicland share the same reality. This enables social cues like pointing, eye contact, and shared attention which are essential for people to be fully present with each other." https://dynamicland.org/faq/ https://dynamicland.org/faq/
- jdmichal 9y ago
  AR is not VR. I think that VR will certainly enable all these behaviors, eventually. Except in a virtual space, instead of meat space. The behaviors and ideas Dynamicland are advocating should work just as well in both. And while their points ring true for the current iterations of AR-as-personal-assistant, I don't see why a networked AR where everyone shares the same annotations would work any differently. Isn't that what their projectors are doing, after all?
  - spiralganglion 9y ago
    It's not just the social angle — projections in VR and AR aren't tangible, whereas physical objects imbued with dynamism are tangible. Here's a really good article on why this matters so much: http://worrydream.com/ABriefRantOnTheFutureOfInteractionDesign/ http://worrydream.com/ABriefRantOnTheFutureOfInteractionDesi... Now, once we have a holodeck, where the virtual objects are made tangible, your points will hold. But until then, tangibility is a key difference (and perhaps not the only key difference, but this should suffice for now).