ASCII by Jason Scott

Jason Scott's Weblog

Archive for August, 2015

A Little Bit of the Manuals —

Of the barrage of advice the world was prepared to give me from the vantage point of the Internet, one unique bit of advice came from a long-time collector and rescuer of older computer documentation and equipment. It’s definitely the all-around best advice, and was, in fact, truly unique: nobody else brought it up. The […]

Digitize the Planet —

I know it’s been announcement city over here for the past week and a half. Here’s the last piece in the puzzle: trying to solve the biggest looming problem for online libraries and archives. So, people get it: When items are online, they become infinitely more useful. They can transfer instantly, they can be viewed […]

In Realtime: Post-Mortem —

I’m just keeping the theme with the title. Future postings will be less obscure. This is a wrap up and list of conclusions after this grand experiment. And an announcement. But first things first. A LITTLE BIT ABOUT WARNING TIME. In my inbox, going back over a year (and going back years in my mail […]

A Small Dark Detour —

As the story of the saved manuals gained steam, a greater audience of people began to be aware of it. Once you get past a few thousand, people start showing up who…. don’t forward the conversation. I just wanted to talk a little bit about that situation of the modern era, since I consider it one of […]

In Realtime: It Is Done —

When I can feel my face again, and after I finish cleaning up my untouched-for-a-week life up in New York, I will sit down and write a proper Post-mortem of everything, but here’s the high level news.   The goal, as you might recall, was to go into a closing warehouse of manuals, take as […]

In Realtime: Day 2 Felt Like Week 4 —

This time, I’m sitting in my car, & I don’t feel broken, simply renewed. It’s ten o’clock, and we probably have a couple more hours to go. What we are trying to do is ensure that everything is in a box that is going out. Then, tomorrow can consist of two things: moving items to […]

In Realtime: We are barely halfway done —

I’m kind of broken. It has been a very productive day. I have been here since 8 in the morning. We have boxed over 400 boxes of material. There have been about a dozen and a half of volunteers working like mad to put this together. It seems to have adequately impressed the owner. He […]

In Realtime: Saving 25,000 Manuals —

Earlier this year, a number of kind folks told me that an esteemed seller of manuals was going to be getting out of the business. I lamented but didn’t give it much thought. As the months went on, I eventually got into contact with them, and they with me, and we discussed a possible contingency […]

Slide Reboot —

It’s been a nice bunch of years for presentations and talks I’ve been giving. I started getting on stage to make noise around 1999 (I’d been on stage before that, but for other things). From about 2002 onward, I added slides to the mix, and for most of the 2000s, every talk was usually different […]