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Even Before Memex, a Plan For a Networked World
phlurg writes "The New York Times presents an amazing article on 'the Mundaneum,' a sort of proto-WWW conceived of by Paul Otlet in 1934. 'In 1934, Otlet sketched out plans for a global network of computers (or "electric telescopes," as he called them) that would allow people to search and browse through millions of interlinked documents, images, audio and video files. He described how people would use the devices to send messages to one another, share files and even congregate in online social networks. He called the whole thing a "réseau," which might be translated as "network" — or arguably, "web."'
A fascinating read." (You may be reminded of Vannevar Bush's "Memex," which shares some of the same ideas.)
Indeed, "reseau" (but with an accent, which didn't show up when I pasted it) is the word used in French for "network", in both computer and other senses.
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The Memex was (or would have been) a personal workstation, not a networked device. True, it had hyperlinking, but only among documents on the same device. This Mundaneum seems to be entirely network-centric.
Réseau is the french word for network!
Well I remember watching a documentary over the mondaneum (I'm belgian). Pre WWII he enjoyed a relatively popularity in Belgium and amongst the intelligentsia around the world. Besides the mondaneum I remember that he tried to create somekind of a 'universal city' where human knowledge would have been concentrated and archived.
He did try to settle it somewhere near Antwerp (If I remember well) but nobody truly wanted it. I think he tried to settle it somewhere in Switzerland but it didn't work either (or maybe just part of his project, I really don't know anymore).
During the occupation, Nazi (and/or collaborators) were truly concerned about his pacifism, the mondaneum was located in the cinqantenaire (a famous building in brussels). I think (but it should be checked) that they did whatever they can to force him to leave. His real tragedy was when thugs came in and took all his archives, with no regards for their complex classification, loosing parts of it...Everything became unclassified and thus almost lost entirely too.
Then the remaining mundaneum archived have been moved to Mons. He did his best to revive his project and it never worked like before WWII.
Sad story.
It shows the difficult part of ideas isn't dreaming them up, it's actually realizing them.
I disagree, look at the sketch books of Da Vinci, the man was clearly a genius. Just because he didn't have the technology to create the parts he needed, doesn't detract from the thought and creativity required to conceive them.
Otlet was definitely a visionary. He saw a need for an accessible and indexable catalog of information that was linked by context. Even 100 years ago people began choking on massive amounts of paper. Otlet was arguably the first to conceive of a novel solution to this problem. Just because he didn't have access to electronic mass storage and computing power doesn't mean that his idea wasn't brilliant.
As other posters have mentioned, just because hyper links and networks seem obvious today, 70 years ago the idea was just starting to form. Someone had to have the insight to envision them.
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The Machine Stops. (Written in 1909, as in ninety-nine years ago. In England.)
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