BBC Interviews Charley Kline and Bill Duvall, Creators of Arpanet (bbc.com)
- Reference: 0175356031
- News link: https://tech.slashdot.org/story/24/10/29/2233243/bbc-interviews-charley-kline-and-bill-duvall-creators-of-arpanet
- Source link: https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20241028-the-failure-that-started-the-internet
> BBC: What did you expect Arpanet to become?
> Duvall: "I saw the work we were doing at SRI as a critical part of a larger vision, that of information workers connected to each other and sharing problems, observations, documents and solutions. What we did not see was the commercial adoption nor did we anticipate the phenomenon of social media and the associated disinformation plague. Although, it should be noted, that in [SRI computer scientist] Douglas Engelbart's [3]1962 treatise describing the overall vision, he notes that the capabilities we were creating would trigger profound change in our society, and it would be necessary to simultaneously use and adapt the tools we were creating to address the problems which would arise from their use in society."
>
> What aspects of the internet today remind you of Arpanet?
> Duvall: Referring to the larger vision which was being created in Engelbart's group (the mouse, full screen editing, links, etc.), the internet today is a logical evolution of those ideas enhanced, of course, by the contributions of many bright and innovative people and organisations.
>
> Kline: The ability to use resources from others. That's what we do when we use a website. We are using the facilities of the website and its programs, features, etc. And, of course, email. The Arpanet pretty much created the concept of routing and multiple paths from one site to another. That got reliability in case a communication line failed. It also allowed increases in communication speeds by using multiple paths simultaneously. Those concepts have carried over to the internet. Today, the site of the first internet transmission at UCLA's Boetler Hally Room 3420 functions as a monument to technology history (Credit: Courtesy of UCLA) As we developed the communications protocols for the Arpanet, we discovered problems, redesigned and improved the protocols and learned many lessons that carried over to the Internet. TCP/IP [the basic standard for internet connection] was developed both to interconnect networks, in particular the Arpanet with other networks, and also to improve performance, reliability and more.
>
> How do you feel about this anniversary?
> Kline: That's a mix. Personally, I feel it is important, but a little overblown. The Arpanet and what sprang from it are very important. This particular anniversary to me is just one of many events. I find somewhat more important than this particular anniversary were the decisions by Arpa to build the Network and continue to support its development.
>
> Duvall: It's nice to remember the origin of something like the internet, but the most important thing is the enormous amount of work that has been done since that time to turn it into what is a major part of societies worldwide.
[1] https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20241028-the-failure-that-started-the-internet
[2] https://slashdot.org/~dbialac
[3] https://www.dougengelbart.org/content/view/138
So nice to see (Score:2)
humbleness.
The part I most agree with (Score:3)
"Kline: While the openness of the internet allows experimentation and new uses, the lack of control can lead to compromises. Arpa kept some control of the Arpanet. That way they could make sure that everything worked, make decisions about which protocols were required, deal with issues such as site names and other issues."
The basic Internet architecture is not fit for purpose, blatantly so for nearly 3 decades by now, yet unfixable ... Cloudflare is now as fundamental a part of the Internet as DNS, it shouldn't be.
Okay, time for my Metamucil (Score:2)
"The BBC interviewed scientists Charley Kline and Bill Duvall 55 years after the first communications were made over a system called Arpanet"
Like a few others here, I predate the internet (as my sig will confirm).
YOUR PARTY but the world's potluck (Score:1)
Perior to the ARPAnet (and MILnet and the NSFnet and ANS and the Internet of today and so on) the concept was like a party for the neighborhood... except that the food was what YOU brought to YOUR party.
The networking framework of the ARPAnet allowed client/server architecture so that YOUR party could make use of OTHER people's food all over the networks, and now the world. Client/server allowed all the things we take for granted today, like web sites, social media, video sharing, UGC, etc.
The Internet (ca
Multipathing? (Score:2)
> It also allowed increases in communication speeds by using multiple paths simultaneously
Yeah? Did we lose this along the way?
Is anybody multipathing regular v4/6 across the public Internet today?
They're like the Wright Brothers (Score:3)
of the Digital Age.
Re: (Score:2)
That's odd, I thought it was the commercial media that got all bought up by right-wing billionaires that changed and became very slanted, while the BBC, CBC and NPR just stayed as they always had been.
Re: (Score:2)
"Woke" is what sociopaths yell when they want to discount or shame the idea of sympathy or empathy.