This was a very enjoyable and informative read about internet history (In case anyone avoided it for the click bait-y title, that’s the topic). The picture of the teletype in the end (an AUTODIN machine) gave me a pang of nostalgia. No, I wasn’t around at that time - but I was around when e-mail was still kind of novel. When this whole internet thing felt a bit like ham radio - MY GOD I’m talking with STRANGERS from the OTHER SIDE OF THE WORLD. Or, I’m reading someones writing, from halfway across the world! I’m sucking bits from some computer in California while sitting in Bangalore, India.
Nowadays I log into powerful computers in Massachusetts from a a laptop, sitting in a living room in Germany and don’t really think about it much. All those bits, flying through the air, into a home, router then through a fiber under the ocean, climbing back out, through tunnels under Boston, and into the old office. And I don’t give it a seconds thought.
I miss that sense of wonder. Articles like this bring it back.
This was a very enjoyable and informative read about internet history (In case anyone avoided it for the click bait-y title, that’s the topic). The picture of the teletype in the end (an AUTODIN machine) gave me a pang of nostalgia. No, I wasn’t around at that time - but I was around when e-mail was still kind of novel. When this whole internet thing felt a bit like ham radio - MY GOD I’m talking with STRANGERS from the OTHER SIDE OF THE WORLD. Or, I’m reading someones writing, from halfway across the world! I’m sucking bits from some computer in California while sitting in Bangalore, India.
Nowadays I log into powerful computers in Massachusetts from a a laptop, sitting in a living room in Germany and don’t really think about it much. All those bits, flying through the air, into a home, router then through a fiber under the ocean, climbing back out, through tunnels under Boston, and into the old office. And I don’t give it a seconds thought.
I miss that sense of wonder. Articles like this bring it back.