The History of the Internet

The History of the Internet

The Internet is the latest and most powerful invention that has expanded the world’s communication. It has greater effects on our civilization than any other previous inventions. It has reached every corner of the globe. It has interconnected the world and created an electronic village. Unlike any previous human inventions, the Internet is a wide common resource for all people. Anyone can say whatever he/she wants to say and this can be heard by anyone else with access to the Internet. Cairncross (2001) states “never has anyone invention shot from obscurity to global flame in quite this way” (p.75). According to Cairncross, in 1990, only a few academics had heard of the Internet. In 1995, it was possible to write a book on the future of the computer and communications industries without mentioning the Internet. However, by 2000, “perhaps 385 million people around the world had acquired a new global source of information on a giant scale” (p.75). Thanks to the Internet, the 21st century people live in a world-wide community. In this community, there is no domination of one language or culture over another. Nothing can govern the type of information permissible on the Internet. The Internet has really become important for all of the people in the world. In order to understand the evolution of the Internet, a short history of the people and communities that brought the Internet may be useful as well as essential. In the following paragraphs we will provide a brief introduction about the history of the Internet; why it was started and how it came to be.

Before the Internet, personal computers did not exist. The size of the computers was very large. At that time, these giant computers “cost hundreds of thousands of dollars, filled entire rooms, and they were very complicated and very expensive to run” (Wolinsky, 1999, p.7).

In 1957, there was a great deal of tension between the former Soviet Union and the United States. Although the two countries were not involved in a real war, the US government was concerned about a possibility of a nuclear attack. This period is known as the Cold War. After the Soviet Union had launched the first space satellite, Sputnik, on October, 1957, the US government decided to catch up with the Soviet Union technology. It managed to “connect major computing centers around the United States so that they could work together and communicate” (Wolinsky, 1999, p.