World's Cultural Capital

[Combat Ingrid]

Originally posted by JohnT
Nope, Doug Engelbart. Nice try, though.

Mobius is right, Lans also invented the mouse, but Engelbart beat him to the patent.

[JohnT]

Nope. Lans invented a "directional tablet" in some undetermined time, somewhere between 1968 and 1973. Most links that I've googled claim, at best, that he "co-invented" the mouse, but the most detailed report is the following usenet post (archived to the web):

http://lists.personaltelco.net/pipermail/ptp/2001q3/009300.html

Fact is, Engelbart invented it, he demo'd it, he has the patent on it, and hell, we even have video of his 1968 demo. Lans invented a touch-screen accessory (The Houston Instruments HIpad) that was used as a pointer device.

There is also Harken Lans home page that doesn't help to shed any light on the subject:

http://www.gpc.se/founder/

The Usenet post above "feels" right... he invented the pad, some tech-illiterate journalists then "gave" him the credit for the mouse, and then Lans kinda, sorta, didn't disabuse them of that notion. 'Bout what you expect from the guy who tried to press his claim that he invented computer graphics.

Tho' he did a good job on that GPS-thingy, heh?

[Combat Ingrid]

Well, whatever...

[JohnT]

Good riposte, that!

[Ned]

John T, The colloquy with the Swede reminds me of the claims by the Russians when I was growing up to have invented virtually everything America was famous for.

Engelbart was inducted into the National Inventor's Hall of Fame for having invented the mouse.

[Ethelred]

Originally posted by Ned
John T, The colloquy with the Swede reminds me of the claims by the Russians when I was growing up to have invented virtually everything America was famous for.

I think that was more of an American perception because of claims that a Russian invented the airplane. Well a Russian did off the ground. Got back too. Course he died in the last part.

[MOBIUS]

Originally posted by JohnT
Good riposte, that!

You win some - you lose some...

I only queried it cos Kamrat X claimed it was a Swedish invention in his Swedish quiz - I didn't think it was, so I would have got an extra point!

[ZoboZeWarrior]

Originally posted by Boris Godunov


Not since the 1950s

So funny.

When we listens americans speaking about Paris, it seems that no American went go to Paris since 1950...

We don't wear no more hats ! We don't drive no more 2CV, we wear jeans pants, we listen other kind of music than Java (even if java is good) and there is a lot of things other tahn Effeil Tower and Pigal street !

And Paris have a gay mayor. It's a sign that we are "on the move"., we are "in"...

[Blisterz]

Well, I know this is not what you are looking for, but Toronto is the most multi-cultural city in the world

[molly bloom]

Originally posted by Ethelred


I am writing in American. I don't call a milk truck a milk float for instance. Take a look at how the Canadians write here. Its hard to tell them from the Americans. Except for the trolling of course.

No- you're writing in English. You're simply operating a local franchise, that's all. You call a tap a faucet because to tap/tup, had more, ah, lubricious connotations (think of Othello- trying to arouse Brabantio's anger at Othello, Iago yells at him in the middle of the night, "Even now, now, very now, an old black ram / Is tupping your white ewe" (1.1.88-89) ). Similarly, you call what is self-evidently a stone and not a larger object, a rock- because stones were another name for testes.
There are differences in Canadian English and American English, just as there are even between Australian and New Zealand English. 'American' has yet to progress to the new or different language stage. On the other hand, we do it all those loan words from Native American languages, and the added vigour of Yiddish terms and the slightly Germanic flavour of some American English usage.

[JohnT]

Originally posted by MOBIUS


You win some - you lose some...

I only queried it cos Kamrat X claimed it was a Swedish invention in his Swedish quiz - I didn't think it was, so I would have got an extra point!

Shows what Kamrat X knows.