Below is a guest reading list from Daniel A. Gross, journalist-in-residence at the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science in Berlin. He also writes and produces radio about the lives of stuff and the stuff of life.

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Journalism has been called the first draft of history. Here are 5 technology stories that belong in the second draft. Like a lot of technology journalism, they’re each focused on an emerging future, which at times makes them a bit breathless with excitement. But unlike most technology journalism, these stories have only gotten better with age. They’re sprinkled with uncanny predictions and unexpected depth about the devices we’ve come to take for granted.

As We May Think (Vannevar Bush, The Atlantic, 1945) Two months before the end of World War II, and two decades before the first PCs, the wartime head of the Office of Scientific Research and Development (OSRD) rhapsodized about impending technological possibilities. Of these five writers, if Bush were around today, he’d probably be the most excited and least surprised at our digital world. Secrets of the Little Blue Box (Ron Rosenbaum, Esquire, 1971)