ABOUT THE SPEAKER
Ian Ritchie - Software entrepreneur
Ian Ritchie

Why you should listen

Ian Ritchie is chair of iomart plc. and several other computer and learning businesses, including Computer Application Services Ltd., the Interactive Design Institute and Caspian Learning Ltd. He is co-chair of the Scottish Science Advisory Council, a board member of the Edinburgh International Science Festival and the chair of Our Dynamic Earth, the Edinburgh Science Centre.

Ritchie founded and managed Office Workstations Limited (OWL) in Edinburgh in 1984 and its subsidiary OWL International Inc. in Seattle from 1985. OWL became the first and largest supplier of Hypertext/Hypermedia authoring tools (a forerunner to the World Wide Web) for personal computers based on its Guide product. OWL's customers used its systems to implement large interactive multimedia documentation systems in industry sectors such as automobile, defence, publishing, finance, and education. OWL was sold to Matsushita Electrical Industrial (Panasonic) of Japan in December 1989. He is the author of New Media Publishing: Opportunities from the digital revolution (1996).

He was awarded a CBE in the 2003 New Years Honours list for services to enterprise and education; he is a Fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering; a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh; and a Fellow and a past-President of the British Computer Society (1998-99). 

More profile about the speaker
Ian Ritchie | Speaker | TED.com
TEDGlobal 2011

Ian Ritchie: The day I turned down Tim Berners-Lee

Ian Ritchie: O dia em que eu disse não a Tim Berners-Lee

Filmed:
644,332 views

Imagine que estamos no final dos anos 90 e você acaba de conhecer um rapaz chamado Tim Berners-Lee, que lhe conta tudo sobre sua proposta de um sistema chamado "World Wide Web". Isto aconteceu com Ian Ritchie. E... ele não acreditou. Esta é uma história curta sobre informação, conectividade e aprender com erros.
- Software entrepreneur
Ian Ritchie Full bio

Double-click the English transcript below to play the video.

00:15
Well we all know the World Wide Web
0
0
2000
Bem, todos sabemos que a World Wide Web
00:17
has absolutely transformed publishing, broadcasting,
1
2000
4000
mudou completamente a imprensa, a difusão audiovisual,
00:21
commerce and social connectivity,
2
6000
2000
o comércio e a conectividade social,
00:23
but where did it all come from?
3
8000
2000
mas qual a sua origem?
00:25
And I'll quote three people:
4
10000
2000
E vou citar três pessoas:
00:27
Vannevar Bush, Doug Engelbart and Tim Berners-Lee.
5
12000
3000
Vannevar Bush, Doug Engelbart e Tim Berners-Lee.
00:30
So let's just run through these guys.
6
15000
2000
Então vamos falar sobre esses caras.
00:32
This is Vannevar Bush.
7
17000
2000
Este é Vannevar Bush.
00:34
Vannevar Bush was the U.S. government's chief scientific adviser during the war.
8
19000
3000
Vannevar Bush era o principal consultor científico do governo americano durante a guerra.
00:37
And in 1945,
9
22000
2000
E em 1945,
00:39
he published an article in a magazine called Atlantic Monthly.
10
24000
3000
ele publicou um artigo numa revista chamada Atlantic Monthly.
00:42
And the article was called "As We May Think."
11
27000
3000
E o artigo se chamava "Como poderíamos pensar."
00:45
And what Vannevar Bush was saying
12
30000
2000
E o que Vannevar Bush dizia
00:47
was the way we use information is broken.
13
32000
3000
era que usamos a informação de maneira fragmentada.
00:50
We don't work in terms of libraries
14
35000
3000
Nós não trabalhamos em termos de bibliotecas
00:53
and catalog systems and so forth.
15
38000
2000
e catálogos e por ai vai.
00:55
The brain works by association.
16
40000
2000
O cérebro funciona por associação.
00:57
With one item in its thought, it snaps instantly to the next item.
17
42000
3000
Com um item no pensamento, ele muda instantaneamente para o próximo item.
01:00
And the way information is structured
18
45000
2000
E a maneira como a informação é estruturada
01:02
is totally incapable of keeping up with this process.
19
47000
3000
é totalmente incapaz de acompanhar este processo.
01:05
And so he suggested a machine,
20
50000
2000
Então ele sugeriu uma máquina
01:07
and he called it the memex.
21
52000
2000
e a chamou de memex.
01:09
And the memex would link information,
22
54000
2000
E a memex conectaria informação,
01:11
one piece of information to a related piece of information and so forth.
23
56000
3000
uma informação seria relacionada com outra e por ai em diante.
01:14
Now this was in 1945.
24
59000
2000
Agora, isto era em 1945.
01:16
A computer in those days
25
61000
2000
Um computador naquela época
01:18
was something the secret services used to use for code breaking.
26
63000
3000
era algo que o serviço secreto usava para decifrar códigos.
01:21
And nobody knew anything about it.
27
66000
2000
E ninguém sabia nada sobre isso.
01:23
So this was before the computer was invented.
28
68000
2000
Então, isso era antes do computador ser inventado.
01:25
And he proposed this machine called the memex.
29
70000
2000
E ele propôs essa máquina chamada memex.
01:27
And he had a platform where you linked information to other information,
30
72000
3000
E ele tinha uma plataforma na qual você conectava informações
01:30
and then you could call it up at will.
31
75000
2000
e depois você poderia consultá-las.
01:32
So spinning forward,
32
77000
2000
Avancemos um pouco,
01:34
one of the guys who read this article was a guy called Doug Engelbart,
33
79000
2000
um dos caras que leu esse artigo chamava-se Doug Engelbart.
01:36
and he was a U.S. Air Force officer.
34
81000
2000
Ele era um oficial da Força Aérea Americana.
01:38
And he was reading it in their library in the Far East.
35
83000
3000
E ele o leu em uma biblioteca no Extremo Oriente.
01:41
And he was so inspired by this article,
36
86000
2000
E ele foi inspirado por este artigo,
01:43
it kind of directed the rest of his life.
37
88000
2000
ele meio que o direcionou pelo resto de sua vida.
01:45
And by the mid-60s, he was able to put this into action
38
90000
3000
E pelos meados dos anos 60, ele foi capaz de botá-lo em ação
01:48
when he worked at the Stanford Research Lab in California.
39
93000
3000
quando ele trabalhava no Laboratório de Pesquisa de Stanford, na Califórnia.
01:52
He built a system.
40
97000
2000
Ele construiu um sistema.
01:54
The system was designed to augment human intelligence, it was called.
41
99000
3000
O sistema foi projetado para aumentar a inteligência humana.
01:57
And in a premonition of today's world
42
102000
3000
E numa premonição do mundo atual
02:00
of cloud computing and softwares of service,
43
105000
2000
de computação de nuvens e softwares de serviço,
02:02
his system was called NLS
44
107000
2000
o sistema foi chamado NLS,
02:04
for oN-Line System.
45
109000
2000
oN-Line System.
02:06
And this is Doug Engelbart.
46
111000
2000
E este é Doug Engelbart.
02:08
He was giving a presentation at the Fall Joint Computer Conference
47
113000
3000
Ele deu uma palestra na “Conferência de Computadores Associados do Outono”
02:11
in 1968.
48
116000
3000
em 1968.
02:14
What he showed --
49
119000
2000
O que ele mostrou --
02:16
he sat on a stage like this, and he demonstrated this system.
50
121000
3000
ele sentou num palco como este e demonstrou este sistema.
02:19
He had his head mic like I've got.
51
124000
2000
Ele tinha seu microfone na cabeça como o que estou usando agora.
02:21
And he works this system.
52
126000
2000
E começa a trabalhar com o sistema.
02:23
And you can see, he's working between documents
53
128000
2000
E como podemos ver, ele está trabalhando com documentos,
02:25
and graphics and so forth.
54
130000
2000
e gráficos, e por aí vai.
02:27
And he's driving it all
55
132000
2000
E ele o dirige
02:29
with this platform here,
56
134000
2000
com esta plataforma,
02:31
with a five-finger keyboard
57
136000
2000
com um teclado de cinco dedos
02:33
and the world's first computer mouse,
58
138000
2000
e o primeiro mouse do mundo,
02:35
which he specially designed in order to do this system.
59
140000
2000
o qual ele próprio produziu para este sistema.
02:37
So this is where the mouse came from as well.
60
142000
2000
Então, também é daqui que o mouse vem.
02:39
So this is Doug Engelbart.
61
144000
2000
Este é Doug Engelbart.
02:41
The trouble with Doug Engelbart's system
62
146000
2000
O problema com o sistema de Doug Engelbart
02:43
was that the computers in those days cost several million pounds.
63
148000
3000
era que os computadores naquela época custavam milhões de libras.
02:46
So for a personal computer,
64
151000
2000
Então, para um computador pessoal,
02:48
a few million pounds was like having a personal jet plane;
65
153000
2000
alguns milhões de libras eram suficientes para comprar um jatinho;
02:50
it wasn't really very practical.
66
155000
2000
não era muito prático.
02:52
But spin on to the 80s
67
157000
2000
Mas passamos para a década de 80,
02:54
when personal computers did arrive,
68
159000
2000
quando computadores pessoais apareceram de fato,
02:56
then there was room for this kind of system on personal computers.
69
161000
2000
quando havia espaço para este tipo de sistema em computadores pessoais.
02:58
And my company, OWL
70
163000
2000
E minha companhia, OWL,
03:00
built a system called Guide for the Apple Macintosh.
71
165000
3000
desenvolveu um sistema chamado "Guia para o Macintosh da Apple".
03:03
And we delivered the world's first hypertext system.
72
168000
4000
E produzimos o primeiro sistema de hipertexto do mundo.
03:07
And this began to get a head of steam.
73
172000
2000
E isso começou a ganhar velocidade.
03:09
Apple introduced a thing called HyperCard,
74
174000
2000
A Apple apresentou uma coisa chamada HyperCard,
03:11
and they made a bit of a fuss about it.
75
176000
2000
e teve bastante agitação por causa disso.
03:13
They had a 12-page supplement in the Wall Street Journal the day it launched.
76
178000
3000
Eles publicaram um suplemento de 12 páginas no Wall Street Journal no dia do seu lançamento.
03:16
The magazines started to cover it.
77
181000
2000
As revistas começaram a dar cobertura.
03:18
Byte magazine and Communications at the ACM
78
183000
2000
A revista Byte e a "Communications at the ACM"
03:20
had special issues covering hypertext.
79
185000
2000
tiveram edições especiais cobrindo hipertexto.
03:22
We developed a PC version of this product
80
187000
2000
Desenvolvemos uma versão deste produto para PCs,
03:24
as well as the Macintosh version.
81
189000
2000
além da versão Macintosh.
03:26
And our PC version became quite mature.
82
191000
3000
E nossa versão para PC tornou-se bem aperfeiçoada.
03:29
These are some examples of this system in action in the late 80s.
83
194000
3000
Estes são alguns exemplos deste sistema em ação no final dos anos 80.
03:33
You were able to deliver documents, were able to do it over networks.
84
198000
3000
Éramos capazes de produzir documentos, éramos capazes de trabalhar durante a noite.
03:36
We developed a system such
85
201000
2000
Desenvolvemos um sistema
03:38
that it had a markup language based on html.
86
203000
2000
que tivesse linguagem baseada em html.
03:40
We called it hml: hypertext markup language.
87
205000
3000
Nós o chamamos de hml: "hypertext markup language".
03:43
And the system was capable of doing
88
208000
2000
E o sistema era capaz de produzir
03:45
very, very large documentation systems over computer networks.
89
210000
4000
documentos muito muito grandes utilizando redes de computadores.
03:49
So I took this system to a trade show in Versailles near Paris
90
214000
3000
Então levei este sistema para uma feira de tecnologia em Versalhes, próximo a Paris,
03:52
in late November 1990.
91
217000
3000
no final de Novembro de 1990.
03:55
And I was approached by a nice young man called Tim Berners-Lee
92
220000
2000
E eu fui abordado por um jovem agradável chamado Tim Berners-Lee,
03:57
who said, "Are you Ian Ritchie?" and I said, "Yeah."
93
222000
2000
que disse "Você é Ian Ritchie?" e eu disse "Sim."
03:59
And he said, "I need to talk to you."
94
224000
2000
E ele disse "Preciso falar com você."
04:01
And he told me about his proposed system called the World Wide Web.
95
226000
3000
E ele me falou sobre o sistema que ele estava propondo, chamado World Wide Web.
04:04
And I thought, well, that's got a pretentious name,
96
229000
3000
E eu pensei, bem, ele tem um nome pretensioso,
04:07
especially since the whole system ran on his computer in his office.
97
232000
3000
especialmente por estar funcionando apenas no computador de seu escritório.
04:10
But he was completely convinced that his World Wide Web
98
235000
3000
Mas ele estava completamente convencido que a sua World Wide Web
04:13
would take over the world one day.
99
238000
2000
algum dia dominaria o mundo.
04:15
And he tried to persuade me to write the browser for it,
100
240000
2000
E ele tentou me persuadir a escrever o navegador,
04:17
because his system didn't have any graphics or fonts or layout or anything;
101
242000
3000
porque o sistema dele não tinha nenhum gráfico, nenhuma fonte, nem layout, nem nada;
04:20
it was just plain text.
102
245000
2000
era apenas texto.
04:22
I thought, well, you know, interesting,
103
247000
3000
Eu pensei, bem, interessante,
04:25
but a guy from CERN, he's not going to do this.
104
250000
2000
mas um cara do CERN, ele não vai fazer isso.
04:27
So we didn't do it.
105
252000
2000
Então não fizemos negócio.
04:29
In the next couple of years,
106
254000
2000
Nos próximos anos,
04:31
the hypertext community didn't recognize him either.
107
256000
2000
a comunidade de hipertextos não o aceitou também.
04:33
In 1992, his paper was rejected for the Hypertext Conference.
108
258000
3000
Em 1992, seu artigo foi rejeitado da conferência de Hipertexto.
04:36
In 1993,
109
261000
3000
Em 1993,
04:39
there was a table at the conference in Seattle,
110
264000
2000
tinha uma mesa na conferência em Seattle,
04:41
and a guy called Marc Andreessen
111
266000
2000
e um cara chamado Marc Andreessen
04:43
was demonstrating his little browser for the World Wide Web.
112
268000
3000
estava demonstrando o seu navegador para a World Wide Web.
04:46
And I saw it, and I thought, yep, that's it.
113
271000
2000
E eu o vi, e pensei: "Sim, disso que ele precisava."
04:48
And the very next year, in 1994, we had the conference here in Edinburgh,
114
273000
3000
E no próximo ano, em 1994, a conferência aconteceu aqui em Edimburgo,
04:51
and I had no opposition in having Tim Berners-Lee as the keynote speaker.
115
276000
4000
e eu não me opus em ter Tim Berners-Lee como o principal palestrante.
04:55
So that puts me in pretty illustrious company.
116
280000
2000
E isto me põe em companhia ilustre.
04:57
There was a guy called Dick Rowe
117
282000
2000
Tinha um cara chamado Dick Rowe,
04:59
who was at Decca Records and turned down The Beatles.
118
284000
2000
que era da Decca Records e rejeitou os Beatles.
05:01
There was a guy called Gary Kildall
119
286000
2000
Teve um cara chamado Gary Kildall
05:03
who went flying his plane
120
288000
2000
que saiu para voar no avião dele
05:05
when IBM came looking for an operating system
121
290000
2000
quando a IBM veio procurar por um sistema operacional
05:07
for the IBM PC,
122
292000
2000
para o PC da IBM,
05:09
and he wasn't there, so they went back to see Bill Gates.
123
294000
2000
e ele não estava lá, então eles voltaram para negociar com Bill Gates.
05:11
And the 12 publishers
124
296000
2000
E as 12 editoras
05:13
who turned down J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter, I guess.
125
298000
3000
que disseram não para o Harry Potter da J. K. Rowling, eu acho.
05:16
On the other hand, there's Marc Andreessen
126
301000
2000
Por outro lado, há o Marc Andreessen
05:18
who wrote the world's first browser for the World Wide Web.
127
303000
2000
que escreveu o primeiro navegador do mundo para a World Wide Web.
05:20
And according to Fortune magazine,
128
305000
2000
E de acordo com a revista Fortune,
05:22
he's worth 700 million dollars.
129
307000
2000
ele tem uma fortuna de 700 milhões de dólares.
05:24
But is he happy?
130
309000
2000
Mas ele é feliz?
05:26
(Laughter)
131
311000
2000
(Risos)
05:28
(Applause)
132
313000
7000
(Aplausos)
Translated by Rafael Eufrasio
Reviewed by Nadja Nathan

▲Back to top

ABOUT THE SPEAKER
Ian Ritchie - Software entrepreneur
Ian Ritchie

Why you should listen

Ian Ritchie is chair of iomart plc. and several other computer and learning businesses, including Computer Application Services Ltd., the Interactive Design Institute and Caspian Learning Ltd. He is co-chair of the Scottish Science Advisory Council, a board member of the Edinburgh International Science Festival and the chair of Our Dynamic Earth, the Edinburgh Science Centre.

Ritchie founded and managed Office Workstations Limited (OWL) in Edinburgh in 1984 and its subsidiary OWL International Inc. in Seattle from 1985. OWL became the first and largest supplier of Hypertext/Hypermedia authoring tools (a forerunner to the World Wide Web) for personal computers based on its Guide product. OWL's customers used its systems to implement large interactive multimedia documentation systems in industry sectors such as automobile, defence, publishing, finance, and education. OWL was sold to Matsushita Electrical Industrial (Panasonic) of Japan in December 1989. He is the author of New Media Publishing: Opportunities from the digital revolution (1996).

He was awarded a CBE in the 2003 New Years Honours list for services to enterprise and education; he is a Fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering; a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh; and a Fellow and a past-President of the British Computer Society (1998-99). 

More profile about the speaker
Ian Ritchie | Speaker | TED.com