Historically, different mediums have been born with and oriented towards human beings.
Imitating the human thinking mechanism, computers have evolved in a human-friendly manner,
and today’s IT devices feature a vitality that indeed reaches that of humans.
What drew us closer to computers in the early years of their 40-year history was computer games.
In 2013, one of Korea’s largest game companies opened a computer museum in Jeju Island.
Nexon Computer Museum seems as interesting as the company’s computer games.
Computers as Games
Located near Jeju International Airport, Nexon Computer Museum harmonizes
its symbolic image of high technology with the primitiveness of the adjacent Halla Arboretum.
It took four years for Nexon, renowned for its MMORPG, The Kingdom of the Winds, to complete its computer museum in Jeju.
Opened in the late July 2013, this museum is Asia’s first and only computer museum.
The tour can begin from the underground floor, called the 'Crazy Arcade'
With the theme of 'Special Stage' this space makes visitors feel as if they have travelled
to the past in a time machine and stepped into a childhood video arcade.
An interesting part of the collection is PONG, one of the world’s first commercial video games.
Developed in 1972 by Atari, an American game company,
PONG is a simple arcade game where players each move a bar on the screen to play a game just like ping-pong.
Computers as Theatre
1st floor exhibition is called 'Welcome Stage'.
After passing through a tunnel showing images of early computers,
visitors will find themselves in a computer motherboard and learn core features of personal computers
along with their history and development; input/output, CPU, memory, graphic, sound and network.
Navigating through the collections, visitors cannot miss the original Apple Computer I,
the first computer made by Apple and a milestone of early personal computers.
Released to the market in 1976, the number of manually manufactured Apple I units was only 200,
and now only about 50 survive worldwide.
In addition, only six of them still work normally, including the one exhibited in Nexon Computer Museum.
Another important part of the collection is the world’s first mouse, invented by Douglas Engelbart.
This is indeed one of the world’s best IT inventions.
The history of computers with ceaseless innovations continues upstairs.
Computers as a Gateway to the Future
2nd floor, called 'Open Stage', offers a commanding view over the history of computer games,
under the theme 'Between Reality and Fantasy'
Among others, the game genre zone exhibits the yearly progress of historical
shooting games in the format of arcade, game console, and personal computers.
Nexon Computer Museum Library is one of the most popular spaces in the building,
with a mission to collect and preserve every game around the world.
Befitting its title 'Hidden Stage', 3rd floor offers the highlights of this computer museum.
The regular on-site program called 'Sneak Preview' provides an opportunity to pre-registered visitors
to operate various devices equipped with state-of-the-art technologies.
Lab 1.0 currently features a special exhibition about keyboards and mice,
and Lab 2.0 is where visitors can have hands-on experience of both past and current computer programs.
Lastly, Lab 3.0 is dedicated to a range of educational programs and workshops,
introducing experimental pleasures every computer user can enjoy with their own personal computer.
Watson is a supercomputer developed by IBM.
It competed on the American quiz show 'Jeopardy!' against former winners and even defeated Ken Jennings,
who had earlier won 74 times in a row. Since then, global ICT companies have loaded artificial intelligent software on their new products.
Computers have surprised the world thus far, and they will certainly do so in the future as well.
If you want to learn all about this amazing existence, just log on to Nexon Computer Museum!
