[Air-l] Origin of the term "Internet" ?

[Robert Cannon]

--- Sue Cranmer <sue at jcranmer.freeserve.co.uk> wrote:
> Interesting discussion. How do aiorlisters then see
> the comparison between
> the the 'Internet' or 'internet' and the
> 'telephone'?

That's a good question and I have wondered about that.

http://www.cybertelecom.org/notes/att.htm

The telephone was of course invented in 1876 by Elisha
Gray of Oberlin.  Too bad for Elisha that Alexander
Graham Bell beat him to the patent office.  Bell did
not believe that he was inventing a "telephone"; he
believe he was inventing a "voice telegraph."

Now at this time there were multiple competing
telegraph networks.  "Telegraph" was not the name of
one network; "Western Union" was.

Likewise, with the invention of the telephone, there
was competition between telephone networks.  Western
Union bought Edison's patent for a telephone and
immediately opened a competing telephone network -
until Bell sued.  Bell did not have enough money to
build a nationwide singular telephone network, so he
licensed his technology and set up multiple local
telephone companies known as Bell Operating Companies.
  Long distance was not immediately possible, so
again, you had multiple "telephone" networks, not one
with the name "Telephone."

Then the Bell Patents expired and you immediately had
competition from indies.  By 1904 you have 5000+
independent telephone networks competing with the Bell
networks.  In one city you may have multiple telephone
networks that competed but did not interconnect - so a
business would have to have two or more phones to be
reached by everyone.  This was known as Dual Service.

Finally, by 1934, AT&T had become the government
sanctioned monopoly and had become THE telephone
network.

The point is that there is a significant difference in
the evolution of telephone and the Internet.  There
were always multiple telephone (and telegraph)
networks; there was no time where there was one
telephone network named The Telephone network.

There are also multiple computer networks with no one
network called The Computer Network.  But there is one
The Internet.  It has a birth on a specific date; it
has a common addressing scheme (you either have an
address and are reachable or your dont); and it has a
consistent (changing but you can always draw a line
around it) subscribership.

It's a good question, comparing the telephone
telegraph and the Internet.  But I think the real
comparison here is the telephone, telegraph, and
computer networks.  AT&T was one telephone network;
The Internet is one computer network.


B

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