TheTedNelson: the videos Hacker News recommends
Not the channel's most viewed videos: the ones HN commenters kept linking with real commentary. The top pick, "Alan Kay's tribute to Ted Nelson at "Intertwingled" Festival", hN returns to it again and again as a demonstration of how programmable and composable 1970s systems were compared with today's.
- demo recommended in 10 different months by 7 HN users, 2016–2025HN returns to it again and again as a demonstration of how programmable and composable 1970s systems were compared with today's.
- explainer recommended in 4 different months by 3 HN users, 2018–2021HN commenters point to it as the author's own short explanation of Xanadu's core ideas, usually in threads on hypertext, linking and decentralizing the web.
- interview recommended in 3 different months by 3 HN users, 2017–2022HN shares it as an accessible window into Ted Nelson's vision of Xanadu and linking, which commenters say gains meaning with historical context.
- commentary recommended in 3 different months by 3 HN users, 2013–2024HN likes it for Nelson's habit of reframing computing history so that past decisions look arbitrary.
- talk recommended in 2 different months by 2 HN users, 2017–2019HN people point to it as Nelson's candid, first-person overview of his life, Xanadu's failure, and the lessons he drew, a historical record from the man himself.
- interview recommended in 1 different month by 1 HN user, 2017–2024HN cites it as a vivid record of how alien personal computing and hypertext sounded to a skeptical public, and as a favorite Nelson interview.
- comedy video recommended in 1 different month by 1 HN user, 2017–2020Mentioned in Nelson and Engelbart threads as a curiosity with amusing cameos by computing pioneers.
- commentary recommended in 1 different month by 1 HN user, 2014–2023HN readers treat it as a contrarian counterpoint to the usual PARC mythology, though one commenter noted a few apparent mistakes in it.
Questions
Which TheTedNelson video does Hacker News recommend most?
Alan Kay's tribute to Ted Nelson at "Intertwingled" Festival: recommended in 10 different months by 7 HN users between 2016 and 2025.
Is this every TheTedNelson video?
No. Only videos that at least three different HN users linked, in at least three different months, with at least a sentence of their own commentary. That filter is what makes the list useful.