The Prophet of Hypertext: Ted Nelson’s War Against the Digital Priesthood
How a Hollywood insider’s son called out Big Tech’s power grab fifty years before it happened and why his warnings hit different when you’re living in the dystopia
It’s 1974. Nixon just rage-quit the presidency, everyone’s wearing bell-bottoms and some guy with serious Hollywood connections drops a manifesto that reads like he time-traveled from our current surveillance hellscape.
“Knowledge is power and so it tends to be hoarded,” wrote Ted Nelson in Computer Lib, his revolutionary middle finger to the emerging tech establishment.
“Experts in any field rarely want people to understand what they are doing; it gives them prestige and power… by a priesthood, people who acquire you with unintelligible answers and some unwillingness to give you straight ones.”
Sound familiar?
That’s because Nelson wasn’t just describing the computer nerds of the 1970s, he was writing the entire playbook for how Big Tech would capture and monetize human attention fifty years later. The man who invented hypertext was essentially predicting the rise of algorithmic overlords, platform censorship, and surveillance capitalism before most people even knew what a computer was.
Here’s where the ideas ruminated:
Ted Nelson wasn’t your typical basement-dwelling code warrior. This was Hollywood royalty, son of Emmy-winning director Ralph Nelson and Academy Award-winning actress Celeste Holm, who grew up watching how media gatekeepers operated and decided to warn everyone about what was coming to computing.
The “computer priesthood” he warned about has evolved into something that would make medieval bishops jealous: a handful of tech giants that don’t just control our devices, but shape our thoughts, relationships, and reality itself.
And the worst part?
Nelson built the alternative that could have prevented it.
We just chose to ignore him. Oops.
The Hollywood Kid Who Chose Chaos Over Control
To understand why Ted Nelson became the digital world’s most prescient party-pooper of the priesthood, you need to know where he came from. Born Theodor Holm Nelson in 1937, this wasn’t some garage-dwelling hacker who stumbled into tech criticism. This was a kid who grew up in the epicenter of America’s dream factory during its golden age, watching power games play out in real time.
His dad, Ralph Nelson, was directing Emmy-winning TV and groundbreaking films like Lilies of the Field, the movie that got Sidney Poitier the first Best Actor Oscar for an African American. His mom, Celeste Holm, was Broadway royalty who snagged an Academy Award for Gentleman’s Agreement and became a household name through classics like All About Eve.
His experiences were a masterclass in how media industries actually work. Young Ted had a front-row seat to watch creative vision get processed through the corporate machinery, artistic dreams get negotiated against studio politics, and distribution gatekeepers decide which stories got told and which voices got heard.
Most kids in that situation would have embraced the glamorous gatekeeping game. Ted? He took one look at the system and said, “Nah, I’m good.”
Instead of leveraging his Hollywood connections, he went full academic rebel: philosophy at Swarthmore, graduate work at University of Chicago, sociology M.A. from Harvard. This was a mind more interested in understanding power systems than wielding them.
His research gigs at places like Vassar and University of Illinois put him right at the intersection where technology meets human behavior; the perfect vantage point to see how new tools could either liberate people or turn them into digital serfs. And having grown up watching how media gatekeepers operated, Nelson had zero illusions about which direction things would go without active resistance.
When he started working on computing in the 1960s, most tech pioneers were engineering types focused on making machines faster and more powerful. Nelson approached it like someone who’d watched his parents navigate Hollywood: he understood that whoever controlled the infrastructure would ultimately control the creative output and that technical choices were always political choices in disguise.
His 1966 First Xanadu Proposal wasn’t just a technical spec, it was a political manifesto wrapped in code. “Unlike any other system that ever has been,” he wrote, “this one’s intent is to meet the user more than halfway, scrupulously avoiding the interposing distractions of user-burdening.”
Translation: computers should work for humans, not the other way around.
Revolutionary concept, apparently.
Xanadu: The Internet That Could Have Saved Us From Ourselves
Nelson’s Xanadu project wasn’t just another computer system, it was a completely different vision for how digital information could work. While everyone else was thinking about computers as fancy calculators, Nelson was designing the infrastructure for human creativity and connection. And unlike the extractive hellscape we ended up with, his system was built around a radical idea: users should actually control their own stuff.
“The basic idea is to build one system so thorough and general that every text-handling application we can now think of will operate through it,” Nelson wrote in 1966. But this wasn’t about creating another monopolistic platform (looking at you, every Big Tech company ever). This was about building infrastructure that would make monopolization impossible.
The genius was in the details. Where our current web uses “links” that break constantly and provide zero attribution to original creators, Xanadu used “transclusion”, a fancy word for including content while keeping it connected to its source. Imagine if every time someone quoted your tweet, you automatically got credit and micropayments. Imagine if information could be freely shared and remixed without breaking the economic relationship between creators and users.
Mind-blowing concept: a system where platform companies couldn’t extract value from user-generated content without fairly compensating the people who actually created it. It’s almost like Nelson understood that whoever controls the plumbing controls the flow.
Decentralization was key. Instead of concentrating power in the hands of platform owners (again, looking at you, Big Tech), Xanadu would distribute control across a network of interconnected nodes. Each node could store and serve information while maintaining connections to the larger whole. No single points of failure, no central authorities, no digital dictators.
This wasn’t just a technical choice, it was a political statement. Nelson understood that in the information age, whoever controls the infrastructure controls everything else. So he designed a system where nobody could control the infrastructure.
By 1974, when Computer Lib dropped with its iconic raised-fist cover, Nelson’s warnings had become more urgent. The book itself embodied his philosophy, printed as a two-sided volume you could read from either direction, because hierarchical information organization is for authoritarians.
“This book is a measure of desperation,” he wrote, “an attempt and advance in the public sense of confusion and ignorance about computers and the many different things they can be made to do.” He could see the field being “left to a priesthood,” and he knew exactly what that meant for everyone else.
“THE PUBLIC DOES NOT HAVE TO TAKE WHAT IS BEING DISHED OUT,” he declared.
But he also knew that without active resistance, that’s exactly what would happen.
Spoiler alert: it did.
Computer Lib: The Manifesto That Should Have Started a Revolution
Computer Lib was the kind of book that made establishment types nervous and regular people feel like they could actually understand this computer thing. While other tech books were busy explaining FORTRAN syntax to fellow nerds, Nelson wrote a manifesto for everyone else complete with a raised fist bursting out of a computer terminal on the cover. Subtle it was not.
Nelson’s analysis of the “computer priesthood” was so spot-on it hurts to read today. “Knowledge is power and so it tends to be hoarded,” he wrote. “Experts in any field rarely want people to understand what they are doing; it gives them prestige and power.” This wasn’t conspiracy theory, this was basic sociology applied to the emerging tech industry.
But Nelson saw that computing was different from other technical fields. Unlike engineering or medicine, which affect specific domains, computing had the potential to mediate all forms of human information and communication. If it got captured by a priesthood, the consequences would be catastrophic.
His solution? Radical democratization.
“EVERYBODY SHOULD UNDERSTAND COMPUTERS,” he declared.
Not because everyone needed to become a programmer, but because everyone needed to understand the choices being made about systems that would increasingly control their lives.
“Computers are as easy to understand as cameras,” he argued, rejecting the artificial complexity that was already being used to mystify the field. “I have tried to make this book like a photography magazine: breezy, forceful and as helpful as possible.”
The book’s structure was pure Nelson: instead of linear, hierarchical organization, it was designed as a web of interconnected ideas that readers could navigate according to their own interests. This was hypertext in practice, years before anyone knew what that meant. It was also a demonstration of how information could be organized to empower users rather than control them.
But the most prescient part was Nelson’s understanding of how the industry would develop without intervention. He saw that computing would follow the same path as other media industries: initial diversity and experimentation would give way to consolidation and control, with a few powerful gatekeepers determining what was possible and profitable.
“You can and must understand computers NOW,” he wrote. “COMPUTERS BELONG TO ALL MANKIND.” This wasn’t just a slogan, it was a warning about what would happen if ordinary people didn’t take control of computing before computing took control of them.
The priesthood he warned about in 1974 has evolved into something that would make medieval bishops weep with envy: algorithmic systems that shape human behavior while remaining deliberately opaque, platform companies that extract value from user creativity while providing minimal compensation, and surveillance systems that would make the Stasi look like amateur hour.
But here’s the thing: none of this was inevitable.
Every step toward our current digital dystopia was a choice and Nelson provided the blueprints for making different choices.
Plot Twist: The Prophecy Came True (And It’s Worse Than You Think, But Funnier Too)
Fast-forward to 2025, and Nelson’s warnings read like a user manual for digital dystopia. The “computer priesthood” he identified has evolved into something that makes medieval power structures look quaint: a handful of tech companies that don’t just control computing infrastructure, but actively shape human behavior, social relationships, and political discourse on a planetary scale.
The parallels are almost too perfect to be accidental. Nelson warned about experts who “acquire you with unintelligible answers and some unwillingness to give you straight ones”, which is basically the entire business model of algorithmic platforms that refuse to explain how their recommendation systems work. He feared concentration of power in the hands of infrastructure controllers exactly what happened when a few platforms came to dominate online communication, commerce, and information access.
But the real vindication of Nelson’s prophecy isn’t just that surveillance and censorship became widespread, it’s that they became profitable. The same surveillance capabilities that governments developed for “national security” became the foundation for the most successful business model in human history. Surveillance capitalism didn’t emerge despite privacy concerns; it emerged because privacy concerns were systematically ignored in favor of architectures that made surveillance easy and profitable.
Consider how far we’ve traveled from Nelson’s vision.
Instead of systems designed to “meet the user more than halfway,” we have platforms designed to capture and monetize attention through behavioral manipulation. Instead of information systems that preserve attribution and enable fair compensation, we have platforms that extract value from user-generated content while providing creators with digital peanuts. Instead of decentralized networks that distribute power, we have centralized platforms that concentrate unprecedented control in the hands of a few corporations.
The irony is particularly bitter because many of Nelson’s ideas were partially implemented in ways that enabled greater centralization rather than preventing it. The World Wide Web incorporated some hypertext concepts but abandoned the crucial elements that would have prevented platform monopolization. Where Xanadu was designed to maintain attribution and enable micropayments, the Web was designed around “free” access and broken links. Where Xanadu was conceived as a decentralized network, the Web developed into a system that naturally concentrated power in the hands of whoever could afford to build the biggest servers.
The result is a digital landscape that embodies everything Nelson warned against. A few companies control the infrastructure through which most digital communication flows. These platforms use deliberately opaque algorithmic systems to make decisions about what information people see, what connections they can make, and what economic opportunities are available to them. The “priesthood” has become a technocracy that wields unprecedented power over human social and economic relations while claiming their control is just the natural result of technical efficiency and user choice.
Even more troubling is how this concentration of power has been normalized and celebrated. The same Silicon Valley culture that once embraced Nelson’s vision of computing as liberation became the primary engine of digital control. The rhetoric of “disruption” and “innovation” has been used to justify destroying existing institutions and replacing them with platform monopolies that are far more powerful and less accountable than the systems they replaced.
The COVID provided a particularly stark example of how the digital priesthood operates in practice. Platform companies made unprecedented decisions about what health information could be shared, what scientific debates could be conducted, and what policy discussions could take place. These decisions were made by private corporations using opaque processes, yet they had profound effects on public discourse and democratic deliberation.
The fact that these companies coordinated their censorship efforts with government agencies only underscored how the digital priesthood had become integrated with traditional power structures in ways that would have horrified Nelson. The tools that were supposed to democratize information had become the primary mechanisms for controlling it.
The Cruel Irony: How Liberation Tech Became Subjugation Tech
Here’s where the story gets really depressing (but in a darkly funny way): many of Ted Nelson’s revolutionary ideas were actually implemented, just in ways that achieved the exact opposite of what he intended. It’s like someone took his blueprints for digital liberation and used them to build the most sophisticated control system in human history.
Nelson’s hypertext concept became the foundation for the World Wide Web, but without the crucial safeguards he’d designed to prevent exploitation. His vision of “transclusion” would have allowed content to be shared while maintaining attribution and enabling automatic compensation for creators. Instead, we got “linking,” which broke the connection between sources and their uses, enabling platforms to aggregate and monetize content created by others without providing meaningful compensation.
This seemingly technical difference had massive political implications. It enabled the development of platforms that could extract value from user-generated content without fairly compensating creators. The broken links that plague the web today aren’t just a technical annoyance, they’re a symptom of a system designed around extraction rather than collaboration.
Similarly, Nelson’s vision of decentralized, user-controlled computing was partially realized in the early internet, but without the economic and social structures necessary to maintain decentralization over time. The internet’s packet-switching architecture embodied some of his ideas about distributed networks, but it lacked the built-in mechanisms for fair compensation and user control that would have prevented power from concentrating in the hands of platform companies.
The personal computer revolution also represented a partial realization of Nelson’s vision of “computers for everyone.” His call for computer literacy was answered as millions of people gained access to powerful computing tools. But this democratization of access wasn’t accompanied by democratization of control. Instead, personal computers became gateways to centralized services controlled by the same kinds of institutions Nelson had warned against.
Even more ironically, many of the companies that now dominate the digital landscape were founded by people who explicitly embraced Nelson’s vision of computing as liberation. Steve Jobs spoke eloquently about computers as “bicycles for the mind,” and early Google executives championed the democratization of information access. Yet these same companies became the primary engines of digital control and surveillance.
This transformation wasn’t inevitable, but it was predictable given the absence of the structural safeguards Nelson had proposed. His warnings about the computer priesthood weren’t just about technical control, they were about the broader social and economic structures that would determine how computing developed. Without active intervention to prevent power concentration, he understood that computing would follow the same path as other media industries: initial diversity and experimentation would give way to consolidation and control.
The evolution of the internet from a decentralized network of equals into a centralized system of platforms and users represents perhaps the greatest betrayal of Nelson’s vision. The early internet embodied many of his ideas about distributed networks and user empowerment, but it lacked the economic and governance structures necessary to maintain these characteristics as the network scaled.
The result was a system that naturally evolved toward centralization as companies with greater resources were able to build more sophisticated services and capture larger shares of user attention and data. This wasn’t some mysterious force of technological determinism, it was the predictable result of designing systems without the safeguards necessary to prevent power concentration.
Nelson saw this coming because he understood that technological systems aren’t neutral tools, they’re embodiments of particular values and power relationships. The choices made in the early stages of a technology’s development can have profound and lasting political implications. This is why he focused not just on what computers could do, but on who would control them and in whose interests they would operate.
The Prophet’s Legacy: Time to Debug the System
So here we are, fifty years after Nelson’s vision, living in exactly the digital dystopia he predicted. The computer priesthood has become a techno-oligarchy. Surveillance capitalism has turned human attention into the world’s most valuable commodity. Algorithmic systems shape political discourse while remaining opaque to the people they manipulate.
But here’s what both Nelson and the best of the old-school hackers understood: none of this was inevitable. Every step toward centralization was a choice. Every privacy violation was enabled by a design decision. Every algorithmic manipulation was the result of optimizing for engagement rather than human flourishing.
Which means it can all be debugged.
The tools exist. The alternatives are being built. The knowledge is available. What’s missing isn’t technical capability, it’s the collective will to choose different systems and the wisdom to learn from past mistakes.
This isn’t about going back to some imaginary golden age of computing. The early systems had plenty of problems and Nelson’s Xanadu project famously never shipped a working product. But the principles that motivated his work: user control, decentralization, fair compensation for creators, resistance to gatekeeping are more relevant than ever.
The blockchain revolution has shown that decentralized systems can work at scale. The success of Signal and other privacy tools has proven that strong encryption can be user-friendly. The growth of mesh networks and self-hosting communities demonstrates that people are willing to take responsibility for their own digital infrastructure.
But we’re also running out of time. Every day that passes, the surveillance infrastructure becomes more sophisticated, the network effects become stronger, and the alternatives become harder to implement. The window for building truly decentralized alternatives to Big Tech platforms is closing, but it hasn’t closed yet.
Roll up your sleeves, not your eyes. Learn enough about how digital systems work to make informed choices about which ones to use. You don’t need to become a computer scientist, but you should understand the difference between centralized and decentralized systems, between surveillance-based and privacy-preserving business models, between platforms that extract value from users and systems that empower them.
Patch first, party after. Support the people building alternatives to surveillance capitalism. Use Signal instead of WhatsApp. Try Mastodon instead of Twitter. Run your own server if you can. Every choice to use decentralized, privacy-preserving alternatives is a vote for the kind of digital future Nelson envisioned.
Blame DNS, then prove it. When systems break, when platforms censor, when algorithms manipulate, don’t just complain, understand why it happened and what could be done differently. The problems we’re facing aren’t bugs in otherwise functional systems; they’re features of systems designed to concentrate power and extract value.
The computer priesthood Nelson warned about has become more powerful than he could have imagined, but it’s not invincible. Every monopoly can be disrupted. Every surveillance system can be routed around. Every attempt at digital control can be resisted with the right tools and the right knowledge.
Ted Nelson understood something that we’re only now beginning to appreciate: the architecture is the politics. How we design our digital systems determines who has power within them, who can be surveilled, who can be censored, and who gets to make the rules.
The prophet of hypertext gave us some of the vision and the blueprints. The question is whether we’re finally ready to listen.
Time to debug the system and patch the future. The priesthood won’t do it for us.
He showed us what was coming and provided blueprints for building something better.
The tools exist, the alternatives are being built, and the choice is still ours.
But not for long.
