Stu Phillips Cyberspace is the only place where equal opportunity is the order of the day. From humble beginnings in a chapel at Westminster, in the 15th century, to mass production of trillions of books, magazines and newspapers, giving a world-wide readership of untold millions, printing has taken over 500 years.
Radio took 35 years to establish an audience of 50 million. Television needed only 15 years to achieve this number of viewers. However, the Internet, phenomenally, exceeded 50 million users, in only three years. Today there are well over 300 million regular users, accessing nearly 100 million Web Sites, and rising.
The most transforming invention in human history, the Internet has the capacity to change everything: the way we work, the way we learn and the way we play. The Net is a global network of networks, connected to the World Wide Web (WWW). Invented in 1990, the Web went public on 15 January 1991. So called because it encloses the world in a web of billions of electronic threads. It is a hypermedia system linking millions of pages of text, illustrations and sound and video clips.
The Internet opened to commercial traffic in 1994; there is no central control, no one owns it, no one is in charge. There is no membership fee, anyone can join. Being completely open, the Net is a system which links millions of people. It is a means of communication; to some people a way of life; to others, their very lifeline. A truly global phenomenon.
BUT WHO INVENTED THE INTERNET?
During World War II, the military were using teleprinter and radio for their communications. There was the Defence Teleprinter Network in Britain. Tape relay stations interconnected and transmitted messages across and between continents.
Many feel that the emergence of the Russian Sputnik on 4 October 1957 caused the Americans to redouble their scientific efforts. Both Russia and the USA were building nuclear ballistic missile capability. Development of a safe and reliable communication system was paramount.
It was just about the time when Neil Armstrong made his historic statement: . . . "One giant leap for mankind." that the US made the second great leap by connecting a number of their computers into an integrated network. This was probably the beginnings of the Internet.
THE DREAM
Vennevar Bush (1890-1974), director of he United States Office of Scientific Research and Development, was first concerned with the inadequacies of the paper-based office, he visualised a system whereby: "The operator taps a key and items are permanently joined . . . Thereafter information can be instantly recalled merely by tapping a button." That was the dream . . . It would be for others to make the dream come true.
FATHER OF THE INTERNET
One name seems to emerge as "the father of the Internet": that is Paul Baran, an American of Polish extraction. After graduating with a degree in electrical engineering in 1949, Baran joined the RAND Corporation in 1959. Here he was asked to develop a communications system capable of withstanding any catastrophe - including all-out nuclear war. Some task! His first attempts were rejected, but he decided: "to give them so damn much communication capacity - they won’t know what the hell to do with it."
It was Baran who devised "distributed digital working." He designed an "interactive computer system"; beginning in the early 1970’s. Messages would travel from one computer to another by whichever route was most convenient.
Bob Taylor, an Englishman, was concerned that some computers would not talk to others, he devised a compatibility programme. Taylor decided to adopt what he called "packet post". Here messages were broken down into smaller packages - to ensure that communications would not break down.
Early in the 1970’s Ward Christensen and Randy Suess devised a programme called MODEM. The devise was used simply to transfer files, by telephone line, between their personal computers.
THE SPIDER
Tim Berners-Lee, another Englishman, working at CERN (European Centre for Nuclear Research), was charged with the task of using the Net more effectively. In so doing, he invented a new way of structuring, storing and accessing information. He called it the World Wide Web. He is said to be the spider that began to spin the web. It was Berners-Lee who began to make the dream of Vennever Bush come true.
E-MAIL
Ray Tomlinson, at BBN (a computer consultancy), an early computer hacker, deserves to be remembered as the inventor of electronic mail: E-mail.
Tomlinson developed the system CYPNET to carry messages between different machines on the Net. Incidentally, it was Tomlinson who first used the icon @, whilst trying to find a punctuation mark which could not form part of any one’s name. As a matter of interest, the first e-mail contained the simple message: "qwertyuiop"!
Rather than try to track down the inventor of the Internet, we must accept the fact that the Internet evolved. It evolved because of necessity, resolution, obstinacy and grim determination. Dozens, if not hundreds of workers in differing fields, striving together have produced the greatest aid to communication man has known. Perhaps the biggest leap forward since Caxton introduced movable type.
SURFING THE NET
The World Wide Web is like having a giant encyclopaedia, permanently open. Just imagine all the information we ever want, at our fingertips.
Requirements are simple: a PC (personal computer), a modem, together with a "free" Internet Service Provider (ISP). Calls are about one penny per minute, to anywhere in the world! With the emergence of Broadband and special Service Provider deals, you can stay on the net permanently.
SKYPE
Skype is a software application that allows users to make voice and video calls over the internet.
There is a device called a "Dongle", this allows you to plug into your laptop, and be connected to the internet, via a mobile connection. Some mobile phones can now access the internet. From the moment you first dip your toe into the fast-flowing currents of Cyberspace, you will realise that one is restricted only by the limit of one’s imagination.
Cyberspace is where it’s @.
