The Internet & our hobby

[Fred Cisin]

On Thu, 22 Oct 2015, Murray McCullough wrote:
> 43 years ago around this time the Internet we use to communicate with
> was probably made possible because of TCP/IP, or Transmission Control
> Protocol/Internet Protocol created at Stanford University.

TCP/IP would be 33, not 43 years ago.
The internet was certainly not "made possible" by TCP/IP. 
It was inevitable that eventually there would be movementS towards 
standardization of protocols on the arpanet.  They could have done much 
worse than TCP/IP!

The internet is the result of the confluence of numerous technological 
systems, and NO single one of them can be considered to be the origin, nor 
even "making possible".

But, we each see a different piece of the elephant.  There are even some 
who maintain that World-Wide-Web was what "made possible" the internet!
Facebook was NOT an element of significance in development of the 
internet, contrary to cockamamy idiot college administrators who talk 
about "Web 2.0" (an O'Eilly invention that they should be ashamed of)

In 1969, while working at GSFC (NASA), I asked how the networking worked 
that enabled me to connect my selectric based terminal to numerous 360s, 
as well as some off-site time-sharing systems.  The guy I asked didn't 
feel like wasting his time explaining it to me, so he just told me that it 
was above my clearance level.  (I was also not allowed to handle decks of 
cards with certain colors of edge stripe)
I saw a different piece of the elephant than you did.

The military, educational institutions doing military research, and 
military contractors were the largest elements in development of the early 
internet.  (aka "Military Industrial Complex" 
http://coursesa.matrix.msu.edu/~hst306/documents/indust.html )

But, there were also a few non-military researchers, and other guvmint 
contributors - for example, there was a series of studies trying to work 
out how the IRS could resume collecting taxes immediately after nuclear 
annhilation.   (finally made public by NYT in 1989 
http://www.nytimes.com/1989/03/28/business/nuclear-war-plan-by-irs.html )


> Today 3 billion people are on the net

Is that all?  I've always thought of writing an SF story involving 
extensive extra-terrestial presence on the net.
Do we really know who is on the web?
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/f/f8/Internet_dog.jpg

> but really made it possible for 
> this extravagant number was the microcomputer created at around the same 
> time – the Micral in France and 4004 processor machines in the U.S.

How many people consider the Micral to be of that level of significance?


> Our hobby supported through this web site

waitaminit!   "THIS WEB SITE"??!?

> keeps this history alive.
> Hurrah!

And the conflicts between our memories and priorities keeps this a 
"history", not confirmed "facts".

> PS  This week marks the 100th anniversary of Einstein’s Theory of
> General Relativity though published in 1916 according to Wikipedia.
It is generally believed that Einstein did not use any digital 
(not even Digital) computers in developing it, and the original 
publication did not include any mention on the web for many more years!
He never had his own website, nor even a Facebook account!

--
Grumpy Ol' Fred     		cisin at xenosoft.com