Artifacts: An archaeologist鈥檚 year in Silicon Valley by Christine Finn, MIT
Press, 拢16.95, ISBN 0262062240
IMAGINE Silicon Valley buried like Pompeii鈥攖he activity stilled, the
cars, houses and workplaces buried beneath layers of volcanic ash, the artefacts
of a single moment preserved. What could we learn about this very particular
place and time by sifting through the objects of everyday life?
Archaeologist Christine Finn is fascinated by Silicon Valley, specifically by
the speed of change of the meanings attached to the region鈥檚 key
artefact鈥攖he computer. Charting technological changes is a key tool in
exploring and evaluating ancient cultures. In Silicon Valley, computers change
from cutting-edge technology to junk to museum pieces within a couple of
decades.
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Finn uses that pell-mell progression as her starting point for a wide-ranging
discussion about how values change over time. In a book that makes wide use of
interviews, she pauses frequently to play with the 鈥淧ompeii effect鈥�, stepping
back to look at the houses, the workspaces, restaurants and bars as a set of
artefacts separate from the people, and asks what a future archaeologist might
make of these things. It鈥檚 a device that lifts the book above simple anecdotal
description to something more analytical and interesting.
Not only do the artefacts of Silicon Valley have fluctuating values, so too
do the tech workers themselves. The year 2000, when Finn was researching, was
particularly volatile as the dot.com bubble burst. The San Jose Mercury
News carried an ad reading: 鈥淎 month ago you were a 28-year-old
millionaire, now you鈥檙e just 28.鈥� Tom Jackiewicz, 24, lost a contract for
several million dollars of venture capital when the stock market got jitters,
and became a freelance consultant instead. In Silicon Valley, start-up failure
is part of the culture鈥攑eople just pick themselves up and try again.
Study of land re-use provides archaeologists with valuable evidence of
change. Deborah Olson owns one of the last cherry orchards in the valley, but
sold half of it in 1999 for redevelopment into housing and retail outlets. The
pressure on housing is immense, pushing prices far beyond the reach of locals
and even many techies. Top-end mansions sell for millions of dollars. Our future
archaeologist may be confused by the evidence that there were only one or two
occupants in these multi-roomed homes. Sounder deductions may come from evidence
of extensive wiring to support multiple computers.
Chip manufacturer Intel already has a museum in Santa Clara, charting its
history in chips, discs, documents and clean-room workwear. There are many
privately held collections. Still in his twenties, Sellam Ismail is nostalgic
for the machines of his childhood and obsessively collects them. He owns a
vintage computer warehouse containing everything from Altairs to Sinclair ZX80s.
He also hunts out software, and is often called upon to recover 鈥渓ost鈥� data from
old machines. Finding the right operating system is already like stumbling upon
the Rosetta Stone.
Archaeology explores the relationships between objects and people, and Finn鈥檚
lively and insightful interviews are at the heart of this book. She offers her
research as a series of snapshots of life in Silicon Valley at one particular
time. Like a private album, the photo essay opening the book means more once its
owner has talked us through the significance of the black-and-white images.
The speed of change in Silicon Valley is so great that it would be easy to
get sucked into the details and lose the bigger picture, but the combination of
an archaeologist鈥檚 examination of artefacts with a journalist鈥檚 instinct for
good interviews has created a text that maintains the difficult balance between
objectivity and immersion. Silicon Valley, Finn convincingly contends, is
connected to the rest of the world as much by history as by modems.