Maeda's SIMPLICITY

Getting Rich

Reader James Rait in the UK unearthed an old slide "from the last millenium" from the late PARC scientist Rich Gold in response to my own Bermuda Quadrilateral. I just wikipedia'd "Rich Gold" and was surprised to see that he's not listed there. I do hope some wikipedia-er resolves this problem soon.

I met Rich maybe eight or so years ago when I served on an NAS committee on information technology and creativity. Rich was one of the expert witnesses we turned to as a way to better understand the tech/creative space. He was sort of a wacky guy that I didn't quite get at the time, but clearly his seed was planted in my mind. Sadly most of the links on the Web on Rich are 404s. It made me realize that this idea of "permalink" is funny because it's such an unlikelihood that anything we do online will be permanent in the future at all.

While James ignited my memory of Rich Gold, I began to Google him but accidentally typed his name into the "To:" field of my e-mail app. "Weird," I thought, "I'm sending e-mail to a man long gone." Would I get a reply? Sometimes we like to think in solitude, but it's something we can all do at anytime. For that reason communication (the bonafide "two-way" variety) seems all that more precious to enjoy while so engaged. I remember shaking Rich's hand now and his confused sort of being. I learned, and am certainly richer for the experience.