Blogs

I am the lead organizer of a workshop to be held in hybrid format at Siegen University on Sept 21 and 22, 2021. In particular, I will be leading two intensive seminar sessions of three hours each on interviewing techniques. 

This workshop will be held in a hybrid format in English. Attendance in person is preferred if possible, to allow for easy discussion and informal chats over lunch. The events after lunch will be talks and a roundtable discussion featuring other experts on historical interviewing, most of whom are participating remotely. 

I was recently the guest on an an episode of Shelly Lesher's history podcast My Nuclear Life. It's a nice podcast, which has approached nuclear history from a variety of perspectives. Previous guests have included Richard Rhodes on the core bomb story, Robert Franklin on the Hanford story, and Adam Higginbotham on Chernobyl.

I am pleased to report that the IEEE History Committee has voted to move forward with approval of a proposal for the IEEE to add the early Manchester University computers to its list of historical milestones. The approved text is:

For several years now I have been editor of the official Turing Award website at ACM. This was originally set up by Mike Williams in collaboration with the ACM IT staff. The main content consists of short biographical profiles of each award winner, accompanied with supporting materials such as an annotated bibliography, links to oral history interviews, Turing Award lectures, and so on.

The Society for the History of Technology (SHOT) presented me with a prize at its recent annual meeting in Milan.

As of Fall 2019 I am now a full professor, still in the UWM history department. A big thank you to my supportive colleagues there, to the anonymous external evaluators, and to everyone who participated in the promotion process.Time to get some new business cards...

Based on a workshop held at Siegen University back in 2017, and published with Springer in mid-2019, Exploring the Early Digital features a lineup of some very well-known figures in the history of computing.

I've now moved faculty positions within the University of Wisconsin--Milwaukee, from the School of Information Studies to the History Department. That's a rather small journey geographically -- 0.3 miles or six minutes walk according to Google Maps -- but a huge shift culturally and intellectually. Thanks to all those in the history department, the College of Letters and Science, and the Provost's office who made this move possible.

I am the primary organizer of a second workshop in what is emerging as a new Siegen University series on the Early Digital. This one is held on January 12-14, 2017 with the theme "Exploring the Early Digital." The workshop is primarily intended to lay the framework for a book, working title also “Exploring the Early Digital” in which members of the history of computing community will begin to reconceptualize their work within a new frame. We’re trying to broaden from “computers” to “the digital” and so engage with some aspects of media studies, engineering practice, etc.