(NOTE: This archive is not affiliated with the International Internet Preservation Consortium's Whole Earth Web Archive project, which promotes collaboration among web archiving institutions around the world.)
"Whole Earth" Origin (1976), in which Stewart Brand (SB) explains the origin of his "Why haven't we seen a photo of the whole Earth yet?" button and campaign.
"Genesis" - SB explains how the idea for a Whole Earth Catalog came and how it evolved. Text from The Essential Whole Earth Catalog (1986).
SB explains the origin of "We Are As Gods." This account was originally published in Whole Earth magazine, issue 95 (winter 1998).
Thomas Albright's review of the Catalog at the end of its first year (1969) for Rolling Stone magazine.
A more detailed version of "How to do a Whole Earth Catalog" with more gossip and analysis. From the June 1975 version of the Updated Last Whole Earth Catalog.
In 2016, the MIT Press published a 288-page Whole Earth Field Guide (edited by Caroline Maniaque-Benton with Meredith Gaglio), which "offers selections from eighty texts from the nearly 1,000 items of 'suggested reading' in the Last Whole Earth Catalog." List price: $34.95 (ISBN 9780262529280).
"On the Millennium Road" by Howard Rheingold. What it was like to do the publicity tour organized by the publisher, to promote The Millennium Whole Earth Catalog. Originally published in the spring 1995 issue of Whole Earth Review.
"Guide to the Whole Earth Catalog Records, 1969-1986," Collection number M1045, Department of Special Collections and University Archives, Stanford University Libraries. "The collection contains the editorial files of Stewart Brand and Jay Kinney, reader correspondence, photographic materials, and memorabilia. Also contains correspondence, clippings, photographs, promotional material, and issues of the magazines." Original URL.
"After the WHOLE EARTH CATALOG and its descendants ceased publication, New Whole Earth LLC, headed by entrepreneur and philanthropist Samuel B. Davis, acquired the intellectual property and physical assets of the family of publications from the Point Foundation. We thought it was important to preserve the heritage of the WHOLE EARTH CATALOG and its succeeding publications [as they] continue to engage the brightest minds of the 21st century... it is a gift to readers who loved the CATALOG and those who are discovering it for the first time." The New Whole Earth website had most of the material published after the Catalog evolved into magazines, searchable by author and subject category, each article in a separate file, but it has been superceded by the Internet Archive's collections.
The website of We Are As Gods, a feature-length film documentary by David Alvarado and Jason Sussberg about the life and work of Stewart Brand. Released for theatrical distribution in 2021.
Whole Earth Flashbacks - a 37-minute video (and a 17-minute video preview) about the publications and projects spawned by Whole Earth. Produced by Fabrice Florin for the 50th anniversary celebration of the Catalog at the San Francisco Art Institute, 13 October 2018.
Whole Earth Catalog 50th Reunion Lightning Talks - recorded by Gary Yost at the private party for WE staffers and contributors at Fort Mason Center, San Francisco, 13 October 2018. A series of 5-minute talks by Larry Brilliant, Gail Williams, Will Marshall, Diana Hadley, Orville Schell, Isabella Kirkland, Ken Dychtwald, Peter Schwartz, Ariel Ekblaw, Neil Gershenfeld, Carolyn Garcia, Bruce Sterling and Wavy Gravy. Hosted by Stewart Brand, Ryan Phelan and Danica Remy, with introductions and time limitations by Howard Rheingold.
Whole Earth Catalog 50th Anniversary Celebration - audio recording of the evening program (13 October 2018). Conversations between Whole Earth Catalog contributors and contemporary wave-makers: Ryan Phelan, Danica Remy, Rusty Schweickart, Kevin Kelly, Simone Giertz, Howard Rheingold, Chip Conley, Stephanie Mills, Stephanie Feldstein, Stewart Brand and Sal Khan.
Whole Earth Magazines and Books
Although scans of many Whole Earth publications had been put online earlier, high-resolution scans finally became available in October 2023, thanks to the combined efforts of the Gray Area Foundation for the Arts, the Long Now Foundation and the Internet Archive. Public access to individual volumes is easiest through the Whole Earth Index. Here we only list items not available through that interface:
"Earthrise" - a 30-minute video documentary by Emmanuel Vaughan-Lee about the famous photo of Earth rising above the Moon's horizon, taken during the Apollo-8 mission (1968). Features interviews with astronauts Frank Borman, James Lovell and William Anders.
Since 2017, BlueTurn.Earth has been producing video animations "of the Whole Earth from Lagrangian point L1 one million miles away." Using photos sent from NASA's DSCVR satellite, interpolated to produce a smooth and continuous view of the sunlit Earth in rotation, their HD videos are posted free on their website.
II Cybernetic Frontiers, by Stewart Brand (102 pages, Random House, 1974). The entire book consists of two chapters: an interview with Gregory Bateson and the Spacewar article from Rolling Stone.
"Hackers - Wizards of the Electronic Age": Fabrice Florin's half-hour documentary for KQED-TV about the first Hackers Conference in 1984, which was organized by SB, KK, Whole Earth and the Point Foundation.
"Stewart Brand Meets the Cybernetic Counterculture," by Fred Turner, with an introduction by John Brockman, The Edge [10.3.2006]. Contains the second chapter of Turner's From Counterculture to Cyberculture: Stewart Brand, the Whole Earth Network, and the Rise of Digital Utopianism (University Of Chicago Press). A 14-day loan of Turner's entire book is available from the Internet Archive as a PDF file here.
"What the Dormouse Said": R. U. Sirius interviews New York Times reporter John Markoff about his then-new book (2005) about links between the personal computer industry, the Whole Earth Catalog and psychedelics (25:34).
Hour-long video featuring speeches and interviews from the Whole Earth Festival, University of California at Davis (1978). With Stewart Brand, Buckminster Fuller, Jerry Brown, Timothy Leary and Rusty Schweichert.
"Whole Earth Culture," by Robert Horvitz. Originally delivered in 2002 as a conference talk for Czechs who had no idea what Whole Earth was so it includes alot of explanation.
"The Digital Globe as Climatic Coming Attraction: From Theatrical Release to Theatre of War," by Leon Gurevitch, Canadian Journal of Communication (2013), Volume 38, Number 3, pages 333-356 - how graphic animations of environmental data change our thinking about the Earth, compared to earlier times when still photographs and globes were the most effective representations.
Revive and Restore - "with a mission to enhance biodiversity through the genetic rescue of endangered and extinct species." Reports on de-extinction efforts.
"It's love money," by Camille Pageard, originally published in △ ⋔ ☼ number 1 (October 2011) and reprinted on the f-u-t-u-r-e.org website (October 2011). A deep cultural analysis in French of the Whole Earth Catalog, focussing on the Last catalog.
Whole Earth 50th Anniversary group photo by Gary Wilson
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