288 ◾ Computing
Intermediate” for the 20th National Conference of ACM in 1965. Nelson
thought that the concepts of Bush’s Memex could be better applied to com-
puter networks than to photoelectrical or mechanical devices. e main
thrust of his work has been to make information easily accessible to ordi-
nary people. Nelson founded Project Xanadu in the 1960s, intending to
create a computer network with a simple user interface. e project name
Xanadu came from the poem “Kubla Khan” by Samuel Taylor Coleridge
(1772–1834). Xanadu was the summer capital of Kublai Khan’s Yuan
Empire, which Coleridge described as a dreamland. e poem suggested
to Nelson an image of a vast storehouse of memory [19].
In 1974, Nelson published his book Computer Lib/Dream ...