HCI History and the Trajectory to Generative AI

This course examines HCI history broadly, then conversational AI history from ELIZA to generative AI. A study of an LLM predecessor illuminates possibilities. With rapid change comes rising uncertainty. Not all history is relevant, but unchanging human nature abides. Some digital dreams become digital nightmares. Social media can deliver disinformation, malware, negative self-image, and polarization that undermines communities. Generative AI provides value but raises employment and career questions, education challenges, and empowers bad actors. We benefit from understanding the forces, the trajectories that brought us here, and how unanticipated consequences arose. Past events that shaped the present have become evident.