This is one of the most compelling auto-biographical books I have read about any of the great computing visionaries. It is addictive reading and frankly it's impossible to stop turning the pages once you've picked it up. It gives a real insight in to the wild, wonderful, wise and warm world of Ted who's visionary ideas would come to shape all of computing as we know it. Written in a personal style and straight from the heart if you have any interest in the history of computing, the internet, film making, entrepreneurship or simply what makes great people tick, you will enjoy this book.
Ted Nelson's book is fun to read. It is full of fragmentary gems of wisdom and humor. I can't help but produce audible laughter. But of course I haven't finished it yet! I'm in no rush: in honor of Ted and his kaleidoscopic vision and colorful life, I have decided to ingest his book in non-linear fashion - allowing it to ping my mind and viscera from several directions, over extended fractal time; backwards; sideways; imagining that I'm reading it in the form of a swirling galaxy of images and sounds, as his life comes into focus. It's as if his story-filled brain had been partly rezzed onto these pages, accessible by random access, so I can digest it at my own pace. Ted includes a crayon... More > drawing he made in 1968, showing the Smiling Octopus: a schematic of the "computer of tomorrow". It is missing a keyboard. The computer world could have evolved in so many different directions than it had - Ted's early outside wisdom created memes that infected the minds of many thinkers. I recommend this book, and suggest using your own personalized hyperlinked reading style, in the spirit of Ted's kaleidoscopic mind. < Less