The 20th Anniversary of the Internet

Ross Finlayson writes "In a message posted to the IETF general mailing list, Bob Braden reminds us that, on January 1st, 2003, 20 years will have passed since "the most logical date of origin of the Internet [...] when the ARPANET officially switched from the NCP protocol to TCP/IP". And the rest is history..."

Comments

The Internet was up well before 1983

[Animats]

The Internet was up well before 1 JAN 1983. That was just the date that the old ARPANET NCP people had to switch over. I had machines on the Internet more than 20 years ago, and so did others.

Here's an Internet host list from 1981:

• Date: 5 Oct 1981 1358-PDT
• 
  From: POSTEL at USC-ISIF
  To: mike.bmd70 at BRL
  

  27-May-81 16:52 JBP

  GATEWAYS

  • DCEC-EDN/ARPA
  • MIT-LCS/ARPA
  • BBN-RCC/ARPA
  • BBN-SAT/ARPA
  • NDRE-SAT/ARPA
  • COMSAT-SAT/COMSAT
  • UCL-SAT/UCL
  • UCL-SAT/NULL
  • UCL-UCL/RSRE
  • RSRE-NULL/PPSN
  • RSRE-NULL/PPSN
  • SRI-PR1/ARPA
  • SRI-PR2/ARPA
  • BBN-BBNPR/ARPA
  • Bragg-BraggPR/ARPA

  COMPUTERS

  • ALTA-COMA
  • BBN-UNIX
  • BBN-VAX
  • BBNA
  • BBNB
  • BBNC
  • BBND
  • BBNE
  • BBNF
  • BBNG
  • EDN-HOST1
  • EDN-HOST3
  • EDN-UNIX
  • ISIB
  • ISIC
  • ISID
  • ISIE
  • ISIF
  • MIT-DevMultics
  • MIT-Multics
  • UCLA-CCN 3033

Reminising

[peterdaly]

My first collection of bookmarks was scrawled on paper, and titled "Servers", since none of us had heard of "Bookmarks" yet.

Anyone have an old copy of the Internet Yellowpages sitting in their shelf? (Or in their basement...)

I remember how cool we though it was to download gif images of weather maps from University of Michigan. We didn't have to wait for the news to see an up to date weather map! Think of how commonplace that is today.

-Pete

Re:Reminising

[zaren]

My first collection of bookmarks was scrawled on paper, and titled "Servers", since none of us had heard of "Bookmarks" yet.

My collection was scrawled on the labels of various 1.4 meg floppies. This was back when archie was still popular, and my primary method of Internet access was dialing into my college's Prime mainframe (before most people knew they could get Internet access through their Fortran programming account) with a 2400 bps modem. I still like the sound of a 2400 connecting the best :)

Ah, I remember getting my first CRT. . .

[kfg]

and thinking, " You know, someday this will be in color, and text will be WYSIWYG and the screen will look like *paper*, with black text."

I was a visionary in my 30's. And I was right. We got it, and it was good, in fact it was awsome.

I was also a naive twit in my 30's. Nowadays I've "devolved" into reading mail in text mode using mutt. Dark background, white 80 column text you can read from halfway across a thirty foot room, and it's good. In fact, it's awsome.

A CRT isn't paper. Different rules apply. Your eyes, and the eyes of your readers, will thank you for realizing this.

Ah well, at least it's better than those websites that print black text on a textured navy blue background.

KFG

Re:Ah, I remember getting my first CRT. . .

[evilviper]

Dark background, white 80 column text you can read from halfway across a thirty foot room, and it's good. In fact, it's awsome.

I `inherited' an old qvt-109 terminal (new, in box)... It's been so long, I didn't remember how much nicer amber was on the eyes. It's a damn shame modern monitors (anything with more than 16 colors) don't have the good ol' monochrome button in the back. If something like that was released today, it would be considered a revolution in ergonomics.

But still, nobody figures it out.

A CRT isn't paper. Different rules apply. Your eyes, and the eyes of your readers, will thank you for realizing this.

I always explain to people that reading black text from a white page on a computer screen is like reading the label of a flourscent lightbulb. In fact, the only difference between the two is the refresh rate.

The difference between paper and screen is quite simple... Books aren't backlit, so the light you see when reading, is polarized.

I'm leading up to something here

What that means, is that we need monitors that are NOT backlit. I've heard that the color gameboy screens do exactly this, and are very low-power to boot. So, I can't help but wonder why no one has come forward with a `front-lit' monitor, and sold each for several times what they are worth. That, in fact, is the only barrier left to the paperless office/home. Hey, if everyone's eyes weren't getting burned by looking at a computer screen, they just might read an e-book, rather than printing everything out, just so they can read it once and throw it away.

Meanwhile, millions is spent on ergonomics, electronic paper, tablets, etc. Just manufacture one new monitor, and you too can change the world.

Hey, at this point, I'd be happy with a 10 inch, Black & White, LCD display. It's ironic that the high-end handheld do away with the much easier to read greyscale LCDs.

Ah well, at least it's better than those websites that print black text on a textured navy blue background.

Actually, I don't mind that very much. Hit CTRL+A and all the text will be highlighted, giving the text the contrast it needs.

Dark pictures on dark backgrouds are another story.

But... White backgrounds are everywhere... I don't run into any other terrible design decisions even 1/10o0th as much.

And yet, nobody ever learns. I still don't know why. It's a monkey-see-monkey-do mentality, I suppose.