Summary
Licklider and Robert Taylor predicted that within years people would communicate more effectively through a machine than face to face, and that online communities would form around shared interests rather than shared geography. Written as ARPANET was taking shape, it foresaw networked computing as a communication medium.
Why it matters
This paper reframes the computer network as social infrastructure — a public good for connection and community. That communitarian, decentralized vision is exactly the spirit the Independent Internet aims to restore.
Part of the AP0110.ORG source library. See the wiki overview.