Hyperland is a prescient 1990 BBC television documentary written by and starring Douglas Adams, about a non-linear dream featuring a software agent named Tom, played by fellow Doctor Who alum Tom Baker, that foreshadows the World Wide Web and modern AI assistants.

In this dream, Tom guides Adams through an interactive space full of linked text, sound, pictures, and movies represented by animated icons, reminiscent of Apple’s HyperCard software of the time.

Quietly tucked away in the BBC2 schedules of autumn 1990 was this ahead-of-its-time gem, written by Douglas Adams – technnology lover, Python writer, occasional Pink Floyd guitarist and creator of the iconic Hitch-Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy series of books and radio/TV programmes.

With Tom as a guide, Adams explored the evolution of interactive media, from interconnected information-storage systems like Vannevar Bush’s Memex to modern multimedia experiments with internet pioneers. Remarkably, Hyperland aired in September 1990, months before Tim Berners-Lee had the first World Wide Web server running at CERN.

Pop-up ‘micons’ (moving icons) conveniently link to interviews with leading technologists of the era (among them Ted Nelson, Robert Winter, Robert Abel, Kristina Hooper, Fabrice Forin and Steve Gano). Some of this stuff has dated badly – few visions of the future get everything right! – but the programme is nevertheless of considerable historical importance.

MrMartinPipe, who uploaded the video, notes that this version of Hyperland is missing footage due to a copyright claim, but points to a version on the Internet Archive that they say is complete.