The second chapter that ive read

This is the second chapter that ive read, ill post what i have written on the first one later.

Interface Culture
By: Steven Johnson

Chapter 2: The Desktop

In the begining the autor mainly discusses the development of the computer and the early stages of the interface on screen. The first part of the chapter is mainly a novel like history lesson and explains how people in the older days used statues and paintings in cathederals to represent historical events thrugh visual objects. This was supposevly one of the starting points of visual representations a term that whuld be appied to modern day computer desktops.

After the historical lesson the author describes the first atemts to visualy represent a working space on the computer an the desktop metaphor was born. The desktop was supposed to represent aphysical working desk at a office and give people a easier way to work with the computer. Before that, working with computers was mainly typing green text on a black screen. The desktop that was first introduced on apples computers came with the slogan the ”computer for the rest of us”. This new interface offerd people to easily navigate the computer with a mouse and visual representations like folders, trash cans and so on.

Later on in the chapter the autor decribes how the desktop slowly starts to develop into a gateway to internet and the possibility to interact with other people online thrugh cahatroms and games. That the computer became a medium of interaction on different levels for the people.


My own thoughts about the chapter:

This chapter was very interesting to read and gave me a deeper insight about how the interface of the computer screen gave people a better understanding of the computer as a machine. And made it possible for the common folk to be able to interact with it. It was interesting to se that the first design of the desktop still lives on today but with different modifications. Tho the book is a little old since it came out in 1997 the thoughts and ideas about the future that the author discusses have mostly becom true.