Kevin Kelly uploaded on 11/4/13

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OqRdGfDPCDE&feature=em-uploademail-ot/Video can’t be loaded because JavaScript is disabled: Whole Earth Catalog, 1971 production in Saline Valley, CA (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OqRdGfDPCDE&feature=em-uploademail-ot/)

This is about 20 minutes of super 8 film that Stewart Brand shot in the winter of 1971. It documents the production of the January 1971 “Difficult But Possible Supplement” to The Whole Earth Catalog. Supplements were 60-page long magazine-like periodicals that appeared seasonally between the many-year cycle of the book-like Catalogs.

This films shows (briefly near the end) the simple tools used to make the catalogs: paper, wax, an IBM Selectric typewriter, and a Polaroid reproduction camera.

There were 6 staff from Whole Earth, and 2 from Ant Farm, an art collective. Ant Farm built the structures. The camp was centered around a beautiful wild hot spring. 70 miles to the nearest phone. They erected a dome in the desert and then battled the winds while trying to erect an inflatable structure. It was Burning Man 40 years ago.

The wind came up …