Dear John Letter: In Which Leo Klein Turns Down 'History' in Favor of 'Multimedia' (Circa 1997)

I came upon of slew of emails I had written while at NYU in the mid-to-late 90's. I hadn't seen them for years. Here's one from 1997. In it, I'm telling the Grad Adviser from NYU's History Dept. that I'm dumping him in favor of the far more attractive "Multimedia" Program at NYU's 'Interactive Telecommunications Program" (ITP):

Dear Mr. W*:

You were assigned as my adviser, so I guess you're the one to whom I should address this message.

The gist of it is that I am a new grad student in the History department. Over the summer however I had a moment of epiphany while taking an intense course in multimedia. It was something I found intensely rewarding and when the course ended (a week ago, by the way) I felt like a kid at the amusement park when a really good ride is over. In other words, I wanted it to continue or at least for me to pursue something similar. Since then, I heard that Tisch offered a program in this area called the Interactive Telecommunications Program. So I ran over there and spoke with a Mr. G* who told me to come back on Friday, Aug. 29.

I'm not exactly sure what's going to happen on Friday except I think he may be able to sign me up for two courses. I won't be an official student there of course since I've succeeded in missing every deadline for application possible and will have to wait till next year to be officially entered into the program.

I know this is rather pathetic--much like being engaged to be married and then falling in love with another woman. It's particularly awkward since I don't know exactly what I am supposed to do or how to go about doing it other than I want to somehow be involved with that program at Tisch. After I meet with Mr. G* again on Friday, I'm sure I'll have a clearer idea.

Sincerely, LEO

History Repeats Itself as U of I's Global Campus Goes Belly Up

NYUonline (2001):

New York University is closing down its for-profit electronic learning operation, NYUonline, and moving some of its curriculum and staff into its School of Continuing and Professional Studies.

U of I Global Campus (2009):

[University of Illinois] trustees meeting in Chicago voted to follow a faculty task force plan to scrap much of the current version of Global Campus.

NYUonline (2002):

In two and a half years of operation, NYUonline received nearly $25 million from the university, but enrollment remained anemic at best: just 500 students at its peak.

U of I Global Campus (2009):

The $10 million program had only attracted about 360 students as of last month.

NYUOnline (2001):

The university blames last month's closure of the distance-learning company, called NYUonline, on the economy.

U of I Global Campus (2009):

...[Prof. Nick Burbules] said, a global recession has changed conditions under which the older initiative was established.

NYUonline (2001):

"I believe that the value of our work -- some of which will continue to be carried on by the university, and some non-academic portions of which may be acquired by third parties -- will become even clearer with time," [NYUonline CEO Gordon] Macomber said in the release.

U of I Global Campus (2009):

Burbules said the 2.0 model draws from the UI's experience with the initiative. "I think what is driving this process is the belief that the mission of expanding the online offerings is important," he said. "I give [U of I President White] full credit for inspiring this work, and I personally believe it is the future of higher education."

Note, there were significant differences between the programs, though stated goals tended to shift over time. Nevertheless, what the two shared was an inability by the people in charge to truly understand what the technology was capable of and what it wasn't. Decision-makers themselves had no strong background in online content development for higher education. This lack of background made it hard to evaluate alternative strategies. Instead of identifying successful initiatives already in place and extending those, they chose to concoct their schemes out of whole cloth.

The outcome should come as no surprise.

NYU Ref. Associates Reunion

Former NYU Reference Associates Leo, Andy and Mariana get together in NYC, first for a tour of Andy's current gig and then for din-din at a local restaurant.

Blast from the Past: The Sisters Zilla

Wow, here's something I haven't seen for a while: It's a clip called, "The Sisters Zilla" [archive.org] that I did as a final project for one of my classes at NYU's Interactive Telecommunications Program -- almost 10 years ago! It's kind of funny, especially near the end. What's more amazing: the link still works (requires RealPlayer):

Here's the original description for the piece:

The Sisters Zilla (in RealVideo). Emotive blockbuster combining the best of "The Three Sisters" by Anton Chekov together with "Godzilla" by Sony Entertainment plus a shot or two of ITP thrown in for good measure. Done with Debbie Tarjono for 'Digital Video'. (Premiere 5.0, AfterEffects 4.0; Summer 1999).

Bye-Bye Dailup at NYU

Reading my copy of Connect Magazine, which the IT People at NYU are kind enough to still send me, I notice that they're discontinuing Dailup Service as of January 20, 2009.

That's a shame though probably long overdue. NYU Dailup service was my first gateway to the Internet way back in 1994. I had had a modem on my laptop since the late Eighties but the only time I actually used it was to dial into a special government number to download some unexceptional data. Dailing into specialized phone numbers was about all you could do with a modem back then -- that and then a bit later on, connecting to proprietary networks like AOL or CompuServe.

It's when I got to NYU in '94 and was able to connect to their Dailup service that this strange unfamiliar network called the 'Web' became accessible. This was the era of GIF images and Netscape 1.0. In fact, just before I got there, the Library at NYU had completed an initial effort to make content available online -- in Gopher.

Oh well. I used Dailup till sites like Napster started getting big, at which point I switched over to DSL from Verizon. Ah, the days of 28kbs and 56kbs connectivity!

(NYU) ITP AlumniBlender Blog

I got a nice note from Rob Faludi saying he had added me to the ITP Alumni Blog, 'ITP AlumniBlender'. I thanked him and told him I thought it was a great idea.

I graduated from ITP in 2000. I think the best thing I got out of it was the contact with my fellow students, some of whom were easily the most talented designers and software developers in NYC.

The graphic by the way, goes to a spoof I did of ITP's website at the time. The thing really suffered from an overdose of black (yeah, I know, everyone was doing it) and sans serif fonts.