Four Important Innovations that led to the INTERNET

There are many innovations that led to the Internet that we know today. You could survey a group and you may get many different answers based on knowledge, background, history, and much more. The four innovations that stick out to me the most are the World War, ARPANET, Email, and Microsoft’s first operating system. Of course you could go back as early as a television supporting that the screen for a computer may have derived from that invention. As far as I am know the internet became big in the Cold War era.

The World War definitely started the whole internet talk and curiosity. After the United States dropped the Atomic bomb on Japan they had to sit back and think themselves. They needed a communication system that could withstand a nuclear attack. They had to work around telephones because, as we know once one telephone pole is down many connections are interrupted. According to Adams and Clark’s chapter one reading, the Research and Development (RAND) Corporation put together the first galactic network. They thought up a process that would bypass a system if it was down and take another route to get communication across a medium. There was much success behind this idea that led to networks.

The first host of a network was known as ARPANET. ARPANET as read about by Adams and Clark was first connected on September 2, 1969. This was a huge success because; with much research this network proved that the RAND galactic network actually worked. Within the next two months The Stanford Research Group, the University at Santa Barbara, and the University at Utah were all added to this network. This was the first network that would make the internet such a huge network today. When we use computers today we use many networks and we do not think about it. In 1969 having four groups on a network was a huge accomplishment. Now all the research and money that was spent on a communication system that could withstand a nuclear attack was paying off.

The next big innovation that led to the internet today was email. Email today is used so effortlessly and means so much to this fast paced environment we live in today. I think that in 1973 in Adam and Clark’s reading that when 75% of all network activity was email it made people think. ARPANET was not too thrilled that all this time was being spent on email but it opened up a whole new wave of communication as we know today. Not only were people working (not much) on the ARPANET system but they were communicating with one another about ordinary life. This was supposed to be a network that was built to withstand nuclear warfare not possesses the characteristics of a telephone. The email system today is big in many companies, schools, families, and social groups. Email is a quick and easy way to communicate with someone without spending money on minutes or gas. I do not think the backers on this research project foresaw this “email” thing to become so big. It did not take long for one person to create another account on ARPANET and start typing away to a colleague. Emails became a more personable way to interact with many people and bond.

Putting this all together and bringing it to the public was a huge technological advance. Of course we all know the name Bill Gates and his many accomplishments. An enormous contribution that he brought to society was the first operating system. Yes there was MSDOS. Then there was windows that made using a computer so much more user friendly. It molded the computer and user to work with one another. As stated by Wikipedia Microsoft’s first operating system was created and released in 1985. This operating system as we all know today has come out with many more versions and is still a significant part of the computer as we know it. Being the first operating system to be so use friendly it created a bigger market for computers. You no longer had to be a rocket scientist to operate or communicate on a computer. This operating system organized many assets of a computer so we could easily manage our systems. Microsoft’s newest operating system in Vista which people now have to adjust to. This may be a minor innovation to some but to the general public I think this was huge.

We can go on and on about what led to the internet as we know today but these are some that have had an impact on what we have today. The internet is used by so many people today and has come so far. I am sure if this same question is asked ten years from now there would be some different opinions to what led to the internet. Thinking about an ordinary day without the internet is a lost thought to many. We use this technology for so many dependent tasks such as paying bills, communicating with family and friends, being part of social networks and as big as companies run on the internet. Thinking if this is still going to be the technology of the future is sort of farfetched right now but a century ago computers were not even a thought.