On Wed, 17 Feb 1999, Russ Blakeman wrote:
It's accurate as far as my recollection goes
back and Klienrock was a
part of the team of ARPAnet.. Really though, all sorts of thing, to
include FidoNet and the old BBS's made up what we have today, each with
it's own unique contribution. The net is not the last I feel either,
it's just more popular than the others and more commonplace.
I don't think FidoNet or any BBS system contributed much to the net.
There were (are?) some gateways, but none of the protocols or conventions
that are/were used on the net had any origin in BBS's.
For the most part, the net gods and the BBS gods were two non-overlapping
subcultures, but they started to mix a bit in the mid 1980's.
I constantly run into people who seem to think the internet started around
1994 or so. They become incredulous when I tell them I've been using the
net since 1980, and that people were using it 10 years before me.
-- Doug