Dead Media: What the Obsolete, Unsuccessful, Experimental, and Avant-Garde Can Teach Us About the Future of Media

The Telharmonium. Scopitone. The Euphonia. Bone music, Oramics, rocket mail, the Multiphone, optical telegraphs, scent organs, mechanical televisions, breath printing, calculating machines, magic lanterns . . . What does it mean for a communication or information storage medium to die? What can old media formats—dead, obsolete, experimental, or ahead of their time—tell us about the future of technological communication now? This talk will go back to Cambrian explosions in media types and the visionaries, hucksters, and lunatics who staked knowledge, fame, fortune, and sometimes their lives on the success of their technologies, and tell stories from the vast population of amazing projects that never made it.

Finn Brunton is a postdoctoral researcher at NYU, where he works on digital technology: history, privacy, anonymity, modification and misuse. He is writing a book about spam for Duke University Press.