In the Beginning ...

... There Was a Defense Department That Didn't Feel Safe ...

An outgrowth of government-sponsored, defense-oriented research, the Internet was created by a mixture of academics, graduate students, computer scientists, and engineers. From the outset, it has been the meeting ground for a diverse, eclectic, and improbable association of people.

Cruising cyberspace, you can bump into everyone from military analysts and academics to computer geeks, hyperactive technopunks, and outdoor enthusiasts seeking the latest ski report, not to mention software company spies charting their competitors' latest moves. Now that gaining access to the vast Internet computer network is becoming easier -- especially with commercial online services such as CompuServe adding Telnet capabilities -- the Internet is extending beyond its original group of users to encompass all kinds of people all over the world.

Yet ironically, today's eclectic mix of Internet aficionados are benefiting from technology born of paranoid, Cold War fear mongering within the U.S. government. The imagined echo, "the Russians are coming, the Russians are coming," sparked the revolution in computer networking that, ultimately, spawned the Internet. Worried that a thermonuclear strike might cramp its ability to transfer data, the U.S. Department of Defense in the late 1960s began funding research on computer networking as a means of bolstering military communications. One of the projects was a wide area network called the ARPANET (Advanced Research Projects Agency -- a properly Bond-like acronym).

Using the ARPANET both as a way to move data between project sites and as a place to evaluate new communication software and applications, defense-funded researchers put in place a prototype Internet by 1982. Many of the top computer scientists in industry and academia had access to this structure through CSNET (Computer Science Network), a project created by the National Science Foundation (NSF), yet another U.S. government agency. Then, in 1983, all U.S. military sites were connected to the ARPANET, marking its transition to a practical rather than an experimental network.

Recognizing the role interconnectivity had begun to play in computer communication research, the NSF built its own wide area network, called NSFNET, which linked its five supercomputer centers across the country. Determined to extend access to every science and engineering researcher in the U.S. (a goal that eluded both the ARPANET and the NSFNET due to lack of capacity), the NSF helped fund the building of a high-speed wide area network in 1988.

This new Internet opened its doors to all educational facilities, academic researchers, government employees, and international research organizations, which essentially democratized the system. Graduate students using the Internet saw its potential not only for research, but also for fun and games (probably the most unlikely uses the founders of the ARPANET could have envisioned).

What happened next was a sort of "big bang." In 1983, 562 computers were on the Internet. By 1989, that number had jumped to 80,000. With capacity again strained, another wide area network was built in 1992; it forms the backbone of the current Internet. Today, there are more than 30 million users and 2 million computers on the Internet.

So, cyberspace friends, not only are you in good company (you're bound to find someone on the Internet with interests similar to yours), but you have a vast array of worlds to explore. Where else could you buy Erik Estrada keepsakes and check up on the Asian stock market? So, log on, plug in. What have you got to lose?
-- Clyde Ellis

The Odyssey

1950s
The Cold War escalates.
1969
National defense moguls sponsor research on computer networking that includes a network called the ARPANET.
1982
Researchers put a prototype Internet into place, using it to evaluate new communication software and applications.
1983
The U.S. military chooses the Internet as its primary computer communication system; all military sites are connected to it.
1985
The National Science Foundation establishes NSFNET to link its five supercomputers.
1988
The NSF helps fund the building of a new high-speed wide area network. This new Internet is opened up to educational facilities, academic researchers, government employees, and international research organizations..

BIG BANG!!

1992
A new wide area network is built to meet capacity needs; it forms the backbone of the current Internet.
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