The Life of Alan Kotok: Resource Archive

Status: This page is a gathering place for links to thoughts, memories, stories, news, articles, pictures on and of Alan Kotok. The directory in which this page sits, http://www.w3.org/2006/05/Kotok/, is a place where we can store copies of images and other resources of Alan that we fear may not persist in their current locations. Most of the resources are public, but there are also links to a few Team- and Member-only resources.

Please add, enhance, correct this page and the directory contents as you feel moved to do.

Public archived list for memories to celebrate Alan's life

• Send public information, thoughts, stories, pictures to public-memoria@w3.org
• Archived list: http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-memoria/2006Jun/
• There are also lots and lots of very kind thoughts and memories in the Advisory Board and Team archives. We should ask these folks to re-send to public-memoria.

Announcements

• From Tim and Ralph to the Team [TEAM ONLY] (31 May 2006)
• From Tim and Steve to the Members, Chairs, AB, TAG [MEMBERS ONLY] (1 Jun 2006)
• Regarding Judie's passing, from Alan to the Team [TEAM ONLY] (27 Oct 2005)
• Home page news (1 June 2006)
• CSAIL home page at MIT (screen shot, 7 June 2006)
• MIT news office (13 June 2006)
• Other news articles
  • "Alan Kotok, 64, a Pioneer in Computer Video Games, Is Dead", the New York Times, John Markoff (3 June 2006)
    • Also, the obituary by Markoff at CNET News.com (3 June 2006)
  • "Alan Kotok; he tred vanguard of computers with brilliance, wit", Boston Globe, (6 Jun 2006) [local copy]
  • "Legendary computer scientist Alan Kotok has died", Joystiq, Conrad Quily-Harper (2 Jun 2006)
  • "If you've ever played a video game- a moment of silence, please", ZDNet, Russel Shaw (3 Jun 2006)
  • "Obituary: Alan Kotok, Computer Developer, Video Game Pioneer", W. David Gardner, TechWeb (5 June 2006)
    • Also, the obituary by Gardner in InformationWeek" (5 June 2006)
  • "Spacewar creator dies", Eurogamer, Ellie Gibson (5 June 2006)
  • "L'addio a Kotok, pioniere dei videogiochi", Punto Informatico (5 June 2006)
  • "Elhunyt az első videojáték egyik készítője", Origo (6 June 2006)
  • 「Spacewar」を作ったメンバーの一人，Alan Kotok氏，亡くなる, 4Gamer.net (6 June 2006)
  • Usenet articles in alt.sys.pdp10, it.comp.retrocomputing, rec.games.video.arcade.collecting, alt.folklore.computers, sci.electronics.design and alt.obituaries (Google Groups)
  • "Gaming pioneer Alan Kotok dies", Ferrago, Luke Guttridge (7 Jun 2006)
  • "Maker eerste videogame is overleden", InsideGamer (blog starting 7 June 2006)
  • 史上首款电子游戏的开发者因病去世, 中华网 - 17小时前 (China.com, 7 June 2006)
  • "E' morto Alan Kotok, uno dei creatori di Spacewar", Giorgio Melani, Multiplayer.it (7 June 2006)
  • "Alan Kotok: Erfinder des Computerspiels tot", GameStar (7 June 2006)
  • "Vater der Computerspiele 64-jährig verstorben", deStandard.at (8 June 2006)

Resources on the Web

• Wikipedia entry English, German (feel free to add to them)
• Kotok Family Web page.
• "A Long Time Ago, in a Lab Far Away . . .", the New York Times, John Markoff (28 Feb 2002)
• Oral History of Alan Kotok (.pdf) (15 Nov 2004)
  • audio files (.wav)
• "A Chess Playing Program for the IBM 7090 Computer", MIT MS Thesis (Jun 1962)
  • article on computer chess featuring Alan
  • HTML memo
• Computer History Museum, Mountain View, California (do a search there for "kotok" and you'll see many resources)
• PDP story with Alan "the Master of the Lights"
• Twenty Years of 36-bit Computing with Digital 1964-1984
• Spacewar - read the Readme and play Spacewar, 1962
  • "The origin of Spacewar" by J. M. Graetz, Creative Computing 1981
  • "Spacewar The first computer video game. Really!"
  • Ce n'est pas un joystick.
  • "Spacewar" by Stewart Brand, Rolling Stone 1972
  • What the Dormouse Said: How the 60s Counterculture Shaped the Personal Computer, John Markoff, 2005, p. 86
  • ...
• Tech Model Railroad Club Dictionary
  • Kotok: 1) hereditary treasurer; 2) the ALAN KOTOK AWARD FOR FISCAL CONSTRAINT; 3) astronomical unit of refrigeration.
• Alan a "true hacker" in Hackers: Heroes of the Computer Revolution by Steven Levy (at Project Gutenberg)
• Newton-Wellesley Dublicate Bridge Club.
• Organs. North German tour (2004).
• Early music. ???
• Wikipedia "Did you know...", English main page
  • Alexander Kronrod (screen capture, no main page image available), 23 December 2006
  • Mac Hack (screen capture), Wikipedia, 29 December 2006
  • T-Square (screen capture), 31 December 2006
  • Expensive Tape Recorder (screen capture), 31 December 2006

Images

• Of Alan, by Jose Kahan (May 10, 2006) [local copy]
• Of Alan at work, by Jose Kahan (Mar 13, 2006)
• PDP Team. From Gordon Bell archives. Alan is in top row, 4th from the left (1964ish?) [local copy]
• Alan programming the PDP-6. Gordon Bell looking on. From DEC Timeline for first around-the-world networking, Gordon Bell archives. (1965) [local copy]
• Space War team. Alan is on left. (1962) [local copy]
• AB dinner, Edinburgh, with Maggie and Ann Bassetti (19 May 2006)
• Alan and waiter in New York
• Alan and Barry Rein in Paris
• Alan and Team at W3C party (Jan 2002)
• Alan with Peter Samson and Steve Russell, August 2005
• W3C10 stage by Richard Ishida
• Alan speaking at W3C10 by Masayasu Ishikawa

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