Building a Modern Memex

The Memex was proposed in 1945 as the ultimate organizational tool. The desk-sized device would store a user’s personal library and allow for information to be searched, organized, connected together with hyperlinks, and shared.

Without a device like this, its creator suggested, our species would drown in information overload and come to a premature end.

Tragically, zero of these devices were ever produced, but 72 years later, I've built a Memex in JavaScript. I've built importers for dozens of different sources of personal data and data consumptions and put it all behind a graph-based API.

This presentations goes over the history of the Memex and demoes my own version by showing what type of queries, organizing tools, and visualization are available.

Transcript

1. Building a modern Memex Andrew Louis (@hyfen) https://hyfen.net/memex
2. History
3. History in tech: var foo = 'bar'; let foo = 'bar';
4. History (ancient): $(document).ready(function(){ $('#header').addClass('foo') .css('color', 'red') .fadeIn('slow');
5. History (pre-): <button onclick=“myFunction()"> Click Me </button>
6. History! (The kind with lots of black and white photos)
7. 1930s
8. Vannevar Bush
12. 1940s
19. “We are being buried under our own product.”
20. “As We May Think” Essay published July 1945
21. “Consider a future device for individual use, which is a sort of mechanized private file and library. It needs a name, and, to coin one at random, "memex" will do.
22. The Memex
23. “A memex is a device in which an individual stores all their books, records, and communications, and which is mechanized so that it may be consulted with exceeding speed and flexibility.”
28. “The human brain files by association. The Memex could do this mechanically”
30. Number of memexes produced: 0
31. ☹
32. I am an information pack rat. A little about me:
39. Overwhelming amounts of personal data to save! ☹
40. Talk to a therapist Talk to a therapist The solution: Build a Memex
41. Building a Memex
42. Gathering data: • Reading and browsing from browser history, ebook reader, twitter, RSS reader • Digital consumptions like photos viewed, videos watched, music/podcasts listened to • Location history from phone • Messaging and social interactions • Journalling, personal photography, notes
43. Data details: • data from 1995-present organized as a graph • 6M activities (things I’ve done) • 5M entities (people, places, thoughts, messages, etc) • 17M relationships linking everything together
44. Live demo time! "
45. </demo>
46. The nitty gritty
47. Fancy graph database • Postgres. • That’s it! • one Nodes table; one Relationships table • database handles graph traversals, fulltext search, geospatial queries, JSON data, and more.
48. Querying verb:listened provider:spotify involved:( represents:song creators:( “Aretha Franklin” ) )
49. API • a single endpoint for querying • a single endpoint for importing data (write-only access with de- duping system)
50. Desktop app Importers Interface API
51. Why ?
56. Where’s this project going?
61. my Memex as a weird art project
62. before i regret it u don't know how many regret i have about school. dunno. might regret it do you regret how you used your year i think i'll really regret the chinstrap later in no regret usually i regret it cancelled. with some regret i have to warn you tha day. not that there's regrets about how things went quick before you get regrets maybe she even regrets it in some way but ag t i just hope i won't regret it later why regret? your two feet. won't regret it. respect. i sincerely regret having stressed her ou
65. my Memex as long- running experiment
69. And open source soon! You should sign up for my newsletter: https://hyfen.net/memex
70. Now back to the story of the first Memex
71. The Memex was weird!
73. The Memex was weird for its form factor
74. This was a computer from the 1930s:
80. http://trevor.smith.name/memex/
81. The Memex was weird for the problem it solved
85. The Memex was weird for the technologies it used (or didn’t use)
89. Extrasensory perception, crystals, and mind-control. Oh my!
90. The Memex was weird for how it was published
99. The Memex was weird for its form factor for the problem it solved for the technologies it used for how it was published
100. The Memex was weird because for the creator, Vannevar Bush, this was just one of many side projects
105. Memex as an “image of potentiality” — Linda Smith (1981)
113. Side projects Make them weird! Make them experimental!
114. Using my own weird side project
119. Thanks!
120. Questions? I have a newsletter! Subscribe if you want to get project updates or be notified when a beta version becomes available: https://hyfen.net/memex Andrew Louis (@hyfen)