von Neumann documentary clip - test-drb@ccmp.vtda.org

25 Feb 2015

On 26 February 2015 at 06:11, Jon Elson <elson at pico-systems.com> wrote:
...
  On 02/25/2015 08:33 PM, Brent Hilpert wrote:

 Brief clip from a 1966 documentary about von Neumann:

         https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Po3vwMq_2xA

 Goldstine presenting while standing in front of the IAS machine, which
 appears to be decommissioned and in storage.

 Fuel for the eternal fire: Goldstine seems to be pretty definite in
 attributing the stored-program concept to Johnny.

  Well, I'm not sure the stored program concept was unique to von Neumann, it
 was one of those concepts that was entirely ripe at that time. 
Well, that IBM guy was pretty insistent that it was von Neumann's
idea, but that it's one of those ideas that seems so completely
obvious when you hear about it that you can't imagine that it hasn't
been around all the time. And nevertheless someone had to come up with
the thought first. And afterwards it can never be unthought. The
"meme" concept actually.

BTW the full 55 minutes documentary is on Youtube too.