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- Hacker News
- Thank you LSD trip!by XzetaU8
- Amusingly, my first intro to the Whole Earth Catalog was the cocktail menu at Trick dog in 2019[0], which is very clearly a reference to the Fall 1970 issue.
[0]: https://www.sfchronicle.com/file/484/6/4846-Whole%20Dog%20Ca...
by joshuamorton - Previously:
Complete Whole Earth Catalogs Archive Available Online and Free - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38068370 - Oct 2023 (7 comments)
The whole of the Whole Earth Catalog is now online - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37872774 - Oct 2023 (81 comments)
by tomhow - Sadly, it doesn't mention the related (and equally-wonderful) Whole Internet User's Guide and Catalog: https://www.computinghistory.org.uk/det/16352/Whole%20Intern...
Before web search engines became a thing, "searching the net" meant either fiddling with WAIS/Veronica (which searched only titles, not content), sending mail to your local "weirdy beardy" Unix guru - or getting a bus into town, heading for the nearest bookshop, and spending half an hour flicking through their sole copy of WIUGC.
The latter course often turned out to be by far the most productive...
by roryirvine - This is great! I remember a turning point for me when I was feeling very low at the height of the War on Terror and jingoism appeared to have taken over the world. Just before the housing bubble popped and politics would swing the other way, but we didn't know that was going to happen yet.
John Mayer was playing music at Macworld 2007 (wish I could find the video) and said "Steve Jobs and Apple Inc. just make life more fun. It's like the opposite of terrorism":
https://www.cnet.com/culture/live-macworld-coverage/
I think of stuff like the Whole Earth Catalog as the opposite of neofeudalism and tech bro culture's revisionist history.
It doesn't have to be this way. Wealth inequality isn't invincible, or even inevitable. Back to basics works. We can get our hacker culture back. We can restore the timeline that's been stolen from us, the one we were on in the 90s before financialization and ensh@ttification ruined all the fun.
by zackmorris - Not sure why wealth inequality is mixed anywhere near the rest of the topics.
I couldn't care less about it, if some people live to make money, let them, as long as they do it legally.
On the other hand hacker culture is very lacking and the fact that we don't really own our devices is part of the issue.p
by epolanski - Inspiring comment. I hope you're right, if nothing else for the next generation's sake. I'm a bit more pessimistic here.
> We can restore the timeline that's been stolen from us, the one we were on in the 90s before financialization and ensh@ttification ruined all the fun.
It'd have to be a cultural change. Consumers at large have decided with their wallet they'll buy products made anywhere, of any quality, with missing or abusive support, if it means they can save a dime. Or that they'll sign away every ounce of privacy if it's free. Until we fix that problem, fixing anything else is going to be hard.
I like that younger generations care, or at least pretend to, about causes and sustainability. Not that that itself isn't being abused, but it's a glimmer of hope.
by silisili - People may also be interested in The WELL (Whole Earth 'Lectronic Link) - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_WELL
Apparently it's still around at https://www.well.com/
by CalRobert - This is pretty COOL! Right up my alley. I have been working on a similar project with PUNK ZINES. I have a lil loop going with Internet Archive - Scraped all of their zines and any new submissions I upload to them. Yours is much prettier than mine. NICE NICE job. Bookmark.by behole
- Is it live yet? I'd love to see it whenever it is.
- Apparently ( https://www.quora.com/What-is-the-importance-of-Christopher-... ) one of the things that originally got computer scientists interested in Christopher Alexander was the original Whole Earth Catalog promoting his Notes on the Synthesis of Form.by leoc
- I have never heard of Christopher Alexander (and Quora is unusable). Who is he?by adastra22
- Jobs called it "Google in paperback form" [1].
I wonder what obscure (probably online?) source of information of today we'll be comparing to the mainstream sources of tomorrow.
[1] https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2011/oct/09/steve-job...
by curl-up - I have a book which lists companies which sent out mail order catalogs back in the 70s --- I'm pretty sure it was listed in a Whole Earth Catalog (might even have been published by them).by WillAdams
- Probably books like the Imponderables and Uncle John's Bathroom Reader series. It wasn't always the most accurate, but they at least made an effort.by Kye
- He specifically references the last page of the last issue, and concludes his commencement speech with its words "Stay hungry. Stay foolish." [1]
Pretty nice to see it context, next to all the other editions.
> I wonder what obscure (probably online?) source of information of today we'll be comparing to the mainstream sources of tomorrow.
Maybe this very website will be among them?
[1] https://wholeearth.info/p/whole-earth-epilog-october-1974?fo...
by taink - Project like this make me stop and truly appreciate the time someone took to make this... and make me wish I had more time in my day to consume this beauty in its entirety. So much knowledge retained here.by ziptron
- I recall seeing the catalog around. My (hippie) mom must have had a copy.
I was only a kid growing up in the 70's but it definitely brings back memories of that time of optimism. There was a lot of experimentation and a willingness to try new ideas in all aspects of society. Besides the experimental education that I recall brushes with, you had Buckminster Fuller and his dome-home ideas, the U.S. space program…
To be sure things weren't all Pet Rocks and Lava lamps but there sure did seem to be a lot more joy and fun in the world then.
What I do these days for "comfort time" is to pull down things like these (and old magazines) in PDF form and browse them off-line.
You can use whatever viewer you like of course, but I ended up building a crude but dedicated device (based around Raspberry Pi and a small Python app) that is just for PDF-magazine browsing. Bookmarking, a progress indicator per title so you know which magazines you've read, which one you are still working through.
I have easily a terra-byte of magazines to still work through. As I implied though, I go back to it when I just want to decompress and shut out the present-day for a while.
(I'm pulling all these Whole Earth Catalogs down now.)
by JKCalhoun - I love the Whole Earth Catalog. That era of techno-utopian optimism is so exciting. I'm too young to have experienced more then the tail end of it in the 90s going to computer camp as a kid, but it felt like anything was possible and everything was connected.
It is a bit sad to see where we have landed after all that.
by solomonb - > It is a bit sad to see where we have landed after all that.
For a comically small amount of money I can listen to any song I want to, read any book I want to, watch any movie/TV show I want to. Then there’s the ad-supported videos and images and text. Then there’s the AIs that I use every day!
I’m in awe at how amazing where we have landed at is. Sure some stuff isn’t perfect but what fun is it to be sad about what is pretty cool?
by paulcole - If you look at the first 10 years of Whole Earth Review, starting in 1985, it's startling to see the similarities to the issues of today.
January 1985: Computers as Poison - "It is not our hand that we put into the computer, it is our attention."
July 1985: Digital Retouching - "The end of photography as evidence of anything"
Winter 1985: "Islam: Beyond the Stereotypes"
Spring 1986: "Peering into the age of Transparency" - about space surveillance
Summer 1986: “This text tries to explain how minds work. How can intelligence emerge from non-intelligence? To answer that, I’ll show that you can build a mind from many little parts, each mindless by itself.”
Fall 1986: The Fringes of Reason - Strange myths and eccentric science
Winter 1986: AmerRuss - Joining America and Russia into one country
Summer 1987: What is real & A No-Cash Economy that Works
Fall 1987: Doing Drag & Male Identity
Summer 1988: The Far Left & Far Right Converge Summer 1988: The Rights of Robots
Summer 1989: Is the body obsolete
Summer 1991: Electronic Democracy
Winter 1991: Questioning Technology
Fall 1992: Artificial Life
by ghc