In 1967, Jim Henson was contracted by IBM to make a film extolling the virtues of their new technology, the MT/ST, a primitive word processor. The film would explore how the MT/ST would help control the massive amount of documents generated by a typical business office. Paperwork Explosion, produced in October 1967, is a quick-cut montage of images and words illustrating the intensity and pace of modern business. Henson collaborated with Raymond Scott on the electronic sound track. The Twilight Zone, Rod Serling-like narrator's mantra of letting the IBM machines do the work so we "humans" can think seems particularly quaint given the ways in which we are all now tethered 24/7 to our machines. But imagine a world where Jim Henson and Raymond Scott continued to collaborate on corporate messaging. How great would that be?
IBM