looking at fundings and how an idea takes off i am wondering about one sentence, charles herzfeld said once:

You know, I used to say that ARPA was the only place in town where somebody could come into my office with a good idea and leave with a million dollars at the end of the day. And this is sort of still true; it takes a week or two now. (interview with norberg, 1991)

that was in the 60s, in the 90s people also had ideas and walked out of offices with a lot of money in their pocket, but it didn't help. so what marks the difference here? is it because the money came from government? was invested in visions and not in goals? - as alan kay suggests. or do you simply need 40 more years to see and interpret the results? did people forget in the 90s that it is all about communication - as licklider back then defined computing in his intergalactic vision. bane of economy? competitive pressure?

reading latour's aramis brings some light into this. nice book!

alan kay's piece on arpa, influences and history. long and interesting reference list.

For example, it is no exageration to say that ARPA/PARC had "visions rather than goals" and "funded people, not projects". The vision was "interactive computing as a complementary intellectual partner for people pervasively networked world-wide". By not trying to derive specific goals from this at the funding side, ARPA/PARC was able to fund rather different and sometimes opposing points of view.

have to read: waldrop, m. mitchell, the dream machine: j.c.r.licklider and the revolution that made computing personal, viking, 2001

book excerpt: nerds

Taylor was persistent: "So I kept trying and trying and failing and failing and then one day in the fall of that year [1966], after failing since February, I had an idea. I went in to see Charlie Herzfeld and I said, `Charlie, doesn't ARPA fund 51 percent of Lincoln Laboratory at MIT?' He said, `Yeah.' And I said, `Well, you know this networking project that I want to do, I'm having a hard time getting the program manager that I want and he works at Lincoln Lab.' I said, `Would you call Gerry Dinneen'—the director of Lincoln Lab—'and ask him to get Larry Roberts in his office and tell Larry Roberts that it would be in Larry Roberts' best interest and Lincoln Lab's best interest if Larry would just come down and take this job?' And Charlie said `Sure.' And while I was in his office, he picked up the phone and talked to Gerry Dinneen. I could hear Charlie's end of it and it was a short conversation."

Roberts heard the other end of the conversation, in the director's office at Lincoln Lab: "Bob got Herzfeld to call up the head of Lincoln and say, `Well, we have 51 percent of your money. Why don't you send Roberts down here as fast as you can?' And the head of Lincoln called me in and said, `It'd probably be a nice thing for all of us if you'd consider this.'"

Bob Taylor stood back to watch his plans unfold: "And Charlie hung up the phone at the end of the conversation and smiled and said, `Well, we'll see what happens.' Two weeks later Larry accepted the job."</blockquote>

timeline by larry roberts. his papers trough 1960; including "toward a cooperative network of time-shared computers - with Thomas Marill"; and the memo of licklider for the members and affiliates of the intergalactic computer network, arpa , washington dc, april 25, 1963.