Reminder to Purchase Books

Please purchase the two required print books for English 25 from the UCEN bookstore or an online vendor. (If you are purchasing online, search for these specific editions if possible, though you may buy the e-book versions if you wish.)

Thomas Pynchon, The Crying of Lot 49
(Harper Perennial, 2006)
ISBN-13: 978-0060913076
(Please purchase this specific edition if possible: ISBN-13 number: 978-0060913076) (Same edition as ISBN-10: 006091307X)

William Gibson, Neuromancer
(ACE, 1984)
ISBN-13: 978-0441007462
(Please purchase this specific edition if possible: ISBN-13 number: 978-0441007462) (Same edition as ISBN-10: 0441007465)

Readings for This Week

• For Wednesday’s readings (Claude Shannon, Warren Weaver), concentrate on concepts. (Don’t worry about the details of the math.)
• For Friday’s readings (in computer history):
  • Read the essay (selections) by Vannevar Bush as a principal statement of its times about the possible future of information technology.
  • Read the histories of computing for background, paying attention to:
    • The main historical narrative of the rise of the computer and Internet.
    • Main technical developments. You need to know only the standout developments–key figures, machines, and technologies (e.g., John von Neumann, the Univac computer and other famous machines, the rise of the ARPAnet and Internet, etc., but not the detail of all historical figures, machines, technologies, etc.)
    • Main conceptual and logical principles (e.g., von Neumann computer, stored program computer, networking)
  • For  the reading assignment about HTML, just look through the document to get an orientation about how HTML works.

Experiment with turning on real-time subtitles for lectures.

“Strange Books”