Ted Nelson on Xerox PARC: Paper Simulation
The usual story about Xerox PARC, that they were trying to make the computer understandable to the average man, was a crock. They imitated paper and familiear office machines because that was what the Xerox executives could understand. Xerox was a paper-walloping company, and all other concepts had to be ironed onto paper, like toner, to be even visible in their paper paradigm.
.. Today’s arbitrarily constructed computer world is also based on paper simulation, or WYSIWYG. That’s where we’re stuck in the current model, where most softwar seems to be mapped to paper. (‘WYSIWYG’ generally means ‘What You See is What You Get’ — meaning what you get *when you print it OUT*). In other words, paper is the flat heart of most of today’s software concepts.