Lessons from the History of the Internet
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The Network is the Message the transformation of business management, capital markets, work, and technological innovation. Next, I invite the reader to move from economy to society by assessing the emergence of new forms of sociability on-line on the basis of available evidence. This Chapter 1 will lead us to analyze the political implications of the Internet: first, by studying new forms of citizen participation and grassroots organizing, secondly, by analyzing the issues and conflicts related to liberty and privacy in the interplay between government, busi ness, and Internet-based communication. In order to understand Lessons from the new communication patterns, I then probe the famed convergence between the Internet and multimedia, exploring the formation of a History of the Internet multi-modal hypertext. Then, down to earth: the Internet does have a geography. I will show you which one, and what are its implications for cities, regions, and our urban life. Finally, I will address the fundamental issue of inequality and social exclusion in the age of the Internet by analyzing the contours and dynamics of the digital divide in a global perspective. So, let us depart on this intellectual journey. It is my hope that it will give the reader a better understanding of a significant dimen sion of our world, and our lives, at the onset of their transformation. The story of the creation and development of the Internet is one of an extraordinary human adventure. It highlights people's capacity to transcend institutional goals, overcome bureaucratic barriers, and subvert established values in the process of ushering in a new world. It also lends support to the view that cooperation and freedom of information may be more conducive to innovation than competition and proprietary rights. I shall not recount this saga, since there are several good chronicles available to the reader (Abbate, 1999; Naughton, 1999). Instead, I will focus on what seem to be the critical lessons we can distill from the processes that led to the formation of the Internet, from the building of the ARPANET in the 1960s to the explosion of the world wide web in the 1990s. Indeed, the historical production of a given technology shapes its content and uses in ways that last beyond its original inception, and the Internet is no exception to this rule. The history of the Internet helps us to understand the paths of its future history-making. However, before embarking on interpretation, to simplify the reader's task, I will summarize the main events that led 8 Lessons from the History of the Internet Lessons from the History of the Internet to the constitution of the Internet in its current form; that is, as a California, Santa Barbara, and the University of Utah. In 1971, global network of computer networks made user-friendly by the there were fifteen nodes, most of them university research centers. world wide web, an application running on top of the Internet. The design of ARPANET was implemented by Bolt, Beranek and Newman (BBN), a Boston engineering acoustics firm converted into applied computer science, which was founded by MIT profes The History ofthe Internet, 1962-1995: An Overview sors, and usually staffed by MIT and Harvard scientists and engi neers. In 1972, the first successful demonstration of ARPANET The origins of the Internet are to be found in ARPANET, a com took place at an international conference in Washington, DC. puter network set up by the Advanced Research Projects Agency The next step was to make ARPANET's connection with other (ARPA) in September 1969. ARPA was formed in 1958 by the computer networks possible, starting with the communication net Defense Department of the United States with the task of mobiliz works that ARPA was managing, PRNET and SATNET. This intro ing research resources, particularly from the university world, duced a new concept: a network of networks. In 1973, two toward building technological military superiority over the Soviet computer scientists, Robert Kahn, from ARPA, and Vint Cerf, then Union in the wake of the launching of the first Sputnik in 1957. at Stanford University, wrote a paper outlining the basic Internet ARPANET was only a minor program emerging from one of architecture. They built on the efforts of the Network Working ARPA's departments, the Information Processing Techniques Group, a cooperative technical group formed in the 1960s by repre Office (IPTO), established in 1962 on the basis of a pre-existing sentatives from the various computer centers linked by ARPANET, unit. The aim of this department, as defined by its first director, including Cerf himself, Steve Crocker, and Jon Postel, among Joseph Licklider, a psychologist turned computer scientist at the others. For computer networks to talk to each other they needed Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), was to stimulate standardized communication protocols. This was partly accom research in interactive computing. As part of this effort, the build plished in 1973, at a Stanford seminar, by a group led by Cert, ing of ARPANET was justified as a way of sharing computing time Gerard Lelann (from the French Cyclades research group), and on-line between various computer centers and research groups Robert Metcalfe (then at Xerox PARe), with the design of the trans working for the agency. mission control protocol (TCP). In 1978 Cert, Postel, and Crocker, To build an interactive computer network, IPTO relied on a rev working at the University of Southern California, split TCP into two olutionary telecommunications transmission technology, packet parts, adding an inter-network protocol (IP), yielding the TCP/IP switching, developed independently by Paul Baran at Rand protocol, the standard on which the Internet still operates today. Corporation (a Californian think-tank often working for the However, ARPANET continued for some time to operate on a dif Pentagon) and by Donald Davies at the British National Physical ferent protocol, NCP. Laboratory. Baran's design of a decentralized, flexible communica In 1975, ARPANET was transferred to the Defense Communica tion network was a proposal from the Rand Corporation to the tion Agency (DCA). In order to make computer communication Defense Department to build a military communications system available to different branches of the armed forces, the DCA decided able to survive a nuclear attack, although this was never the goal to create a connection between various networks under its control. behind the development of ARPANET. IPTO used this packet It established a Defense Data Network, operating on TCP/IP proto switching technology in the design of ARPANET. The first nodes of cols. In 1983 the Defense Department, concerned about possible the network in 1969 were at the University of California, Los security breaches, decided to create a separate MILNET network Angeles, SRI (Stanford Research Institute), the University of for specific military uses. ARPANET became ARPA-INTERNET, 10 11 Lessons from the History of the Internet Lessons from the History of the Internet and was dedicated to research. In 1984, the US National Science working in California, created his own BBS program, FIDO, and Foundation (NSF) set up its own computer communications net started a network of BBSs, FIDONET. FIDONET is still the cheapest, work, NSFNET, and in 1988 it started using ARPA-INTERNET as its most accessible computer communication network in the world, backbone. relying on PCs and calls over standard telephone lines. In 2000, it In February 1990 ARPANET, technologically obsolete, was de comprised over 40,000 nodes and about 3 million users. Although commissioned. Thereafter, having released the Internet from its this represented only a tiny fraction of total Internet use, the practice military environment, the US government charged the National of BBSs and the culture exemplified by FIDONET were influential Science Foundation with its management. But NSF's control of the factors in the configuration of the global Internet. Net was short-lived. With computer networking technology in In 1981, Ira Fuchs, at the City University of New York, and the public domain, and telecommunications in full deregulation, Greydon Freeman, of Yale University, started an experimental NSF quickly proceeded with the privatization of the Internet. The network on the basis of IBM RJE protocol, thus building a network Defense Department had decided earlier to commercialize Internet for IBM users, mainly university based, which came to be known technology, financing US computer manufacturers to include as BITNET ("Because it's there," referring to the IBM slogan; it also TCP/IP in their protocols in the 1980s. By 1990 most computers in stood for "Because it's time"). When IBM stopped funding in 1986, America had networking capabilities, laying the ground for the dif users' fees supported the network. It still lists 30,000 active nodes. fusion of inter-networking. In 1995 NSFNET was shut down, A decisive trend in computer networking emerged from the opening the way for the private operation of the Internet. community of UNIX users. UNIX is an operating system developed In the early 1990s a number of Internet service providers built at Bell Laboratories, and released by Bell to the universities in their own networks and set up their own gateways on a commer 1974, including its source code and permission to alter the source. cial basis. Thereafter. the Internet grew rapidly as a global network UNIX became the lingua franca of most computer science depart of computer networks. This was made possible by the original ments, and students soon became adept at its manipulation. Then, design of ARPANET, based on a multi-layered, decentralized archi in 1978 Bell distributed its UUCP program (UNIX-to-UNIX copy) tecture, and open communication protocols. Under these condi allowing computers to copy files from each other.