Watch the 1st American Newsreel of Sputnik Launch

MMBK writes with this snippet from motherboard.tv: "Fifty three years ago this week, the Russians won the space race – or one of its laps – by successfully launching the Sputnik satellite into orbit. This newsreel, the first to report on the launch, recycles older animation about geosynchronic orbits, since all film footage was kept secret (note the very un-Soviet IBM logo on one of the massive computers)."

Comments

Re:Its a good thing

[Pharmboy]

Or more scary is the internet could have started as a purely commercial venture. Imagine if it had not existed, and AOL had created their own version of the internet. It is kind of what they were trying to do before the open internet kicked their butts. You would have several private nets (like in the 80s) and eventually, the big ones would buy out the small ones. You would have MUCH less content, as the price to enter the market with a website would be dictated by singular corporate interests. Most important is the fact that Free Software wouldn't be as far as it is now, with a more limited distribution method.

The only reason that the internet is as open as it is now is the US govt. was naive enough to not know what it could really be. Otherwise, they would have tried to control it more.