The article “Personal Dynamic Media” (1977) by Alan Kay and
Adele Goldberg explored the use of the Dynabook notebook device and its role in
human’s interaction with media. The notion was presented that “every message
is, in one sense or another, a simulation of some idea” (393), and that the computer could convey active
communication of an idea if done properly. I was amused by this quote: “If the ‘medium
is the message,’ then the message of low-bandwidth timesharing is ‘blah’” (394).
Certainly, the medium needed evolving, and the different iterations and uses of
Dynabook that the article went over was great to see in the educational space
during those years. Different actions built upon the Smalltalk programming
language like painting, musical creation, animation and SHAZAM simulation all showcased
how media interaction worked to bring ideas to fruition.
This was an insightful reading for me because of
my engineering academic background, and the descriptions of these different
applications is like reading a precursor to what would become the modern personal
computer of today as talked about in the introduction. Even then, we in these
current times are moving to a post-PC lifestyle, as much of these creation
activities are moving onto a smartphone or tablet that is always portable and
has a much wider feature set than the interim Dynabook. As devices continue to
evolve into the ideal end-all “Dynabook”-like solution, we are sure to see
unheard-of levels of creativity that the medium allows for.
When reading your blog post I really like how you incorporated the quotes from the article, “Personal Dynamic Media”. It made it easier to understand the article that we read. A lot of the times I think that we forget that quoting the article we are discussing helps us recall what we read and reiterate the main ideas of an article. I agree that the dynabook concept we read about would be evolving and adapting to our needs constantly. Being able to do painting, musical creating, and animating on one device with a technologically advanced device the size of a notebook.
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