The Web, 50 years before it was invented

Paul Otlet was a computing visionary before there were computers.

"In 1934, Otlet sketched out plans for a global network of computers (or 'electric telescopes,' as he called them) that would allow people to search and browse through millions of interlinked documents, images, audio and video files. He described how people would use the devices to send messages to one another, share files and even congregate in online social networks. He called the whole thing a 'réseau,' which might be translated as 'network' — or arguably, 'web.'"

In the 1920's, he (and others, later with the help of the Belgian government) had set out to catalog every piece of information in the world, a "master bibliography of all the world’s published knowledge."

This initial version of the project generated millions of index cards, and was actually used--- sort of a proto-Google. Queries would come in by mail and telegraph, get looked up by a staff of humans, and then the answers would be sent out right away.

The paperwork became unmanageable as the catalog grew, so Otlet turned to mechanized help. "At one point he posited a kind of paper-based computer, rigged with wheels and spokes that would move documents around on the surface of a desk."

"Since there was no such thing as electronic data storage in the 1920s, Otlet had to invent it. He started writing at length about the possibility of electronic media storage, culminating in a 1934 book, 'Monde,' where he laid out his vision of a 'mechanical, collective brain' that would house all the world’s information, made readily accessible over a global telecommunications network."

His work was stopped cold by WWII, and Otlet and his vision were forgotten for decades.

There's a nice story with lots more detail here: http://tinyurl.com/5kal5f (free registration required)

In some ways Otlet's work reminds me of the Phaistos Disk, an early example of movable type that predated Gutenberg by nearly 2000 years. The world wasn't ready, culturally or technologically, for that premature appearance of movable type.

Similarly, the world wasn't quite ready for Otlet; it took another generation for the pieces to be in place. Today's web--- the thing you're using to read these words---is the reinvention of the same basic idea that Otlet had.

Paul Otlet deserves to be remembered.