WABAC machine
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The WABAC Machine (pronunced Wayback) originally referred to a fictional machine from an ongoing feature of the cartoon The Rocky and Bullwinkle Show used to transport the characters Mr. Peabody and Sherman back in time. It is also used as the name for part of the Internet Archive's site.
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[edit] The Rocky and Bullwinkle Show
The WABAC (pronounced "wayback") machine was from the Peabody's Improbable History segment of the early '60s cartoon series The Rocky and Bullwinkle Show. The machine was constructed by Mr. Peabody, a professorial, bow tie-wearing dog, to be able to visit famous historical events. At the request of Mr. Peabody, Sherman, Peabody's "pet boy" assistant, would set the WABAC machine to a time and place of historical importance, and the two would be instantly transported there. The machine apparently later returned Mr. Peabody and Sherman to the present, although the return trip was never shown in the cartoon segment. The machine was little more than a plot device to allow the characters to visit the past.
The name WABAC is a play on computer names such as UNIVAC and ENIAC that were contemporary to the Rocky and Bullwinkle Show, and the WABAC machine was similar in size to those early computers.
[edit] Popular culture
The concept or term "Wayback Machine" has been extensively adopted in popular culture as a convenient way to introduce issues or events of the past. As in the original cartoon, the Wayback Machine is invoked to suggest the audience follow the narrator back to the past. Frequently such visits to the past are trips of nostalgia, remembering times, places, or things of the not-so-distant past.[1] One example of popular usage occurred in the TV show NewsRadio ("Goofy Ball" (1995)), when station owner Jimmy James (Stephen Root) says: "Dave, don't mess with a man with a Wayback Machine. I can make it so you were never born."[2]
Similar to the original Wayback Machine experience, in such visits of nostalgia there is no need to describe the return trip to the present.
[edit] Internet Archive
The Internet Archive has capitalized on the popular use of the term "Wayback Machine," and uses this name for its service that makes archives of the World Wide Web.[3] This service allows users to see archived versions of web pages of the past, what the Internet Archive calls a "three dimensional index". Millions of websites and their associated data (images, source code, documents, etc.) are saved in a gigantic database. The service can be used to see what previous versions of websites used to look like, to grab original source code from websites that may no longer be directly available, or to visit websites that no longer even exist. Not all websites are available, however, because many website owners choose to exclude their sites.
The use of the term "Wayback Machine" in the context of the Internet Archive has become so common that "Wayback Machine" and "Internet Archive" are almost synonymous. This usage too occurs in popular culture, e.g., in the television show Law and Order: Criminal Intent ("Legacy", first run Aug. 3, 2008), an extra playing a computer tech uses the "Wayback Machine" to find an archive of a student's Facebook style website.
[edit] See also
[edit] External links
- Toonopedia entry on Peabody's Improbable History
- Andy's Anachronisms: Time Travel Television Reviews: Peabody's Improbable History
- The Wayback Machine at archive.org
- The Wayback Machine at the Bibliotheca Alexandrina
[edit] References
- ^ Miller, Ernest (24 September). "Sherman, Set the Wayback Machine for Scientology" (Blog). LawMeme. Yale Law School. http://web.archive.org/web/20060424082239/http://research.yale.edu/lawmeme/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=350. Retrieved on 2007-06-27.
Robinson, Eugene (September 5, 2006). "Who Set the Wayback Machine for 1939?". Washington Post. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/09/04/AR2006090400698.html. Retrieved on 2007-06-25.
Britt, Robert Roy (July 25, 2005). "The Wayback Machine? Nearby Solar System Looks Like Home". Space.com. http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/050725_dusty_star.html. Retrieved on 2007-06-25.
Mallozzi, Vincent M. (April 6, 2007). "A Jukebox Is a Way-Back Machine With Black Vinyl Wings". The New York Times. http://travel.nytimes.com/2007/04/06/travel/escapes/06Ritual.html. Retrieved on 2007-06-25.
Smith, Sam (April 26, 2007). "Condi’s way-back machine". Scholars and Rogues. http://scholarsandrogues.wordpress.com/2007/04/26/condis-way-back-machine/. Retrieved on 2007-06-25.
Clark, Mike (April 12, 2004). "Wayback machine puts out plenty of time-travel movies". USA Today. http://www.usatoday.com/life/movies/reviews/2004-04-12-mikes-menu_x.htm. Retrieved on 2007-06-25. - ^ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0660190/quotes
- ^ Green, Heather (February 28, 2002). "A Library as Big as the World: Brewster Kahle has the technology to assemble the ultimate archive of human knowledge. What's stopping him? Restrictive copyright laws". Business Week Online. http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/feb2002/tc20020228_1080.htm. Retrieved on 2007-06-25.
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