October 22, 1969: The Advanced Research Projects Agency Network (ARPANET) goes online, through the U.S. Department of Defense. It is an early packet-switching network, designed for resource sharing between remote computers, and the first network to implement the TCP/IP protocol suite. The first connections were made between major universities, and the very first was in California, between UCLA and Stanford.
It was designed by Leonard Kleinrock, Paul Baran, Donald Davies, Lawrence Roberts (who worked on the packet-switching methodology), Robert Kahn and Vint Cerf (who developed the protocols).
Although ARPANET was taken offline in 1989, due to successor networks having gone online, it is, essentially, the beginning of the Internet.
In 2000, Vice President Al Gore was running for President, and the Republican Party mocked him for claiming to have invented the Internet. What he actually said, in an interview with Wolf Blitzer on CNN on March 9, 1999, was, "During my service in the United States Congress, I took the initiative in creating the Internet." Which is not the same thing as claiming to have invented it.
On October 2, 2000, Kahn and Cerf released a statement saying the following:
Al Gore was the first political leader to recognize the importance of the Internet and to promote and support its development.
No one person or even small group of persons exclusively "invented" the Internet. It is the result of many years of ongoing collaboration among people in government and the university community. But as the two people who designed the basic architecture and the core protocols that make the Internet work, we would like to acknowledge VP Gore's contributions as a Congressman, Senator and as Vice President. No other elected official, to our knowledge, has made a greater contribution over a longer period of time.
In other words, two of the guys who were part of the invention of the Internet said that Gore was vital as far as its development was concerned. But the American media, in the tank for Gore's opponent, Governor George W. Bush of Texas, never told the truth about it, sticking with the myth that Gore "lied when he said he invented the Internet," when he never said he'd invented it.
Davies died in 2000, Baran in 2011, Roberts in 2018. As of October 22, 2022, Kleinrock, Kahn and Cerf are still alive.
*
October 22, 1969 was a Wednesday. Adam Spiegel, a.k.a. the film director Spike Jonze, and Belgian singer Helmut Lotti were born.
Baseball season ended 6 days earlier, when the New York Mets beat the Baltimore Orioles in Game 5 to win the World Series. Football was in midweek. There were 4 games in the NBA:
* The Philadelphia 76ers beat the Phoenix Suns, 122-119 at The Spectrum in Philadelphia.
* The San Francisco Warriors beat the Atlanta Hawks, 94-93 at the Alexander Memorial Coliseum (now the McCamish Pavilion) in Atlanta.
* The Los Angeles Lakers beat the Cincinnati Royals, 116-109 at the Cincinnati Gardens. Just another day at the office for Wilt Chamberlain: 43 points and 20 rebounds.
* And the Milwaukee Bucks beat the San Diego Rockets, 115-102 at the San Diego Sports Arena (now the Pechanga Arena). Lew Alcindor, the man who would become Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, in only his 3rd professional game, scored 36 points and grabbed 19 rebounds.
There were 3 games in the American Basketball Association:
* The Carolina Cougars beat the Washington Capitols, 122-91 at the original Charlotte Coliseum (now the Bojangles Coliseum). These Capitols moved the next season, becoming the Virginia Squires, and have no connection to either the Washington Capitols who played in the NBA from 1946 to 1951, or to the Washington Capitals who began play in the NHL in 1974. Of course, all 3 teams were nicknamed the Caps for short.
* The Miami Floridians beat the Los Angeles Stars, 119-98 at the Dinner Key Auditorium in Miami. This was about 8 months after Jim Morrison of The Doors was arrested for some alleged naughtiness at a concert there.
* And the Indiana Pacers beat the Denver Nuggets, 117-107 at the Indians State Fairgrounds Coliseum (now the Corteva Coliseum) in Indianapolis.
There were 5 games in the NHL:
* The New York Rangers and the Chicago Black Hawks played to a tie, 1-1 at the new Madison Square Garden.
* The Montreal Canadiens and the St. Louis Blues played to a tie, 3-3 at the Montreal Forum.
* The Philadelphia Flyers beat the Toronto Maple Leafs, 4-3 at Maple Leaf Gardens in Toronto.
* The Boston Bruins beat the Minnesota North Stars, 3-2 at the Metropolitan Sports Center in the Minneapolis suburb of Bloomington, Minnesota.
* The Los Angeles Kings beat the Pittsburgh Penguins, 2-0 at The Forum outside Los Angeles in Inglewood, California.
* And the Detroit Red Wings and the Oakland Seals were not scheduled.
No comments:
Post a Comment