Name: Ted Nelson

Born: June 17, 1937, in Chicago, Illinois, USA

  • American sociologist, philosopher, and pioneer of information technology—an “IT sociolosopher.”
  • He coined the terms “hypertext” and “hypermedia” in 1963 and published them in 1965.
  • Helped develop HES (Hypertext Editing System).
  • Credited with first using the words transclusion, virtuality, intertwingularity, and teledildonics.

Significant publications

  • POSSIPLEX (2010).
  • Geeks Bearing Gifts: How The Computer World Got This Way (2008).
  • The Future of Information (1997).
  • Computer Lib: You can and must understand computers now (1987).
  • Literary Machines (1981).
  • The Home Computer Revolution (1977).
  • Life, Love, College, etc. (1959).

Honors and awards

  • Awarded the Yuri Rubinsky Memorial Award.
  • Knighted by France as “Officier des Arts et Lettres” (2001).
  • Appointed as a Fellow of Wadham College, Oxford (2004).

Quotes

“The purpose of computers is human freedom.”

“No one’s life has been simplified by a computer.”

“Most people are fools, most authority is malignant, God does not exist, and everything is wrong.”

Websites

  • Ted Nelson personal website
  • Ted Nelson on YouTube