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A brief history of the
Internet
The idea for the Internet can be traced back to August 1962 in a series of memos written
by J.C.R. Licklider working at the MIT. He had the idea then for a 'Galactic Network'
comprising globally connected computers which would allow people to share information
quickly and across vast distances.
The idea was given a practical boost in 1972 when the US Defense Advanced Research
Projects Agency (DARPA) started a research programme to develop techniques and
technologies for interlinking computers. The aim of this project was to develop
communication protocols, or standardised ways of running computers, which would permit
them to talk to each other and to exchange data. ARPANET was the result. This became known
as the internetting project. And the protocol which was eventually developed was given the
name 'TCP/IP Protocol Suite'. This was derived from: Transmission Control Protocol (TCP)
and Internet Protocol (IP), the two initial protocols which were merged to form the suite.
In 1986, the US National Science Foundation (NSF) began developing NSFNET which has grown
into the main hub and brains of the Internet we have today. Specialists in the US Defense
Department and academics in US universities were the first users of the Internet. The
academics used the network to exchange research information and to communicate with each
other via e-mail.
The network was in the beginning strongly grounded on altruistic principles of the
academy, and users would hesitate to even promote the sale of books they had authored on
the Internet fearing censure from the other users who expected the Internet to stay
completely free of commercial interests.
Businesses soon discovered the power of the Internet, and in a short period of less than
10 years changed the Internet from one serving mainly the research community, to one
dominated by big businesses with wares to sell.
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