Electronic Books and Interactive Illustrations — Transcript of a Talk

Abstract

Someone who thinks, speaks, and writes about the same subject for over twenty years might be seen as lacking imagination. However, I prefer to view this behavior on my part as simple Dutch persistence and dedication to a particular vision, the realization of which, I have been saying all this time, is imminent. And today, I am pleased to observe, electronic books are even more imminent, indeed, inevitable, owing to some exciting breakthroughs in both computer power and the way computers are used. The things we’d really like to be able to do are unfortunately not yet commercial reality. Therefore one of the things I want to focus on is the R & D agenda. Specifically, I want to define three remaining problems that must be solved before some of the techniques I envision can find their way into everyday computing, particularly into computing in education, which has been my special interest for well over twenty years.