<- FYI Index (1..100)
(also RFC 2235)
Network Working Group R. Zakon
Request for Comments: 2235 MITRE
FYI: 32 November 1997
Category: Informational
Hobbes' Internet Timeline
Status of this Memo
This memo provides information for the Internet community. It does
not specify an Internet standard of any kind. Distribution of this
memo is unlimited.
Copyright Notice
Copyright (C) Robert H. Zakon and The Internet Society (1997).
All Rights Reserved.
1. Introduction
This document presents a history of the Internet in timeline fashion,
highlighting some of the key events and technologies which helped
shape the Internet as we know it today. A growth summary of the
Internet and some associated technologies is also included.
2. Hobbes' Internet Timeline
Excerpted from the author's copyrighted work of the same name. The
most current version of Hobbes' Internet Timeline is available at
http://info.isoc.org/guest/zakon/Internet/History/HIT.html
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1950s
1957
USSR launches Sputnik, first artificial earth satellite. In
response, US forms the Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA)
within the Department of Defense (DoD) to establish US lead in
science and technology applicable to the military (:amk:)
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1960s
1962
Paul Baran, RAND: "On Distributed Communications Networks"
- Packet-switching (PS) networks; no single outage point
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1965
ARPA sponsors study on "cooperative network of time-sharing
computers"
- TX-2 at MIT Lincoln Lab and Q-32 at System Development
Corporation (Santa Monica, CA) are directly linked (without
packet switches)
1967
ACM Symposium on Operating Principles
- Plan presented for a packet-switching network
- First design paper on ARPANET published by Lawrence G. Roberts
National Physical Laboratory (NPL) in Middlesex, England develops
NPL Data Network under D. W. Davies
1968
PS-network presented to the Advanced Research Projects Agency
(ARPA)
1969
ARPANET commissioned by DoD for research into networking
- First node at UCLA, Network Measurements Center
[SDS SIGMA 7, SEX] and soon after at:
- Stanford Research Institute (SRI), NIC [SDS940/Genie]
- UCSB, Culler-Fried Interactive Mathematics
[IBM 360/75, OS/MVT]
- Univ of Utah, Graphics [DEC PDP-10, Tenex]
- use of Information Message Processors (IMP) [Honeywell 516
mini computer with 12K of memory developed by Bolt Beranek
and Newman, Inc. (BBN)
First Request for Comment (RFC): "Host Software" by Steve Crocker
Univ of Michigan, Michigan State and Wayne State Univ establish
X.25-based Merit network for students, faculty, alumni (:sw1:)
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1970s
Store-and-forward networks
- Used electronic mail technology and extended it to
conferencing
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1970
ALOHAnet developed by Norman Abrahamson, Univ of Hawaii (:sk2:)
- connected to the ARPANET in 1972
ARPANET hosts start using Network Control Protocol (NCP).
1971
15 nodes (23 hosts): UCLA, SRI, UCSB, Univ of Utah, BBN, MIT, RAND,
SDC, Harvard, Lincoln Lab, Stanford, UIU(C), CWRU, CMU, NASA/Ames
Ray Tomlinson of BBN invents email program to send messages across
a distributed network. The original program was derived from two
others: an intra-machine email program (SNDMSG) and an experimental
file transfer program (CPYNET) (:amk:irh:)
1972
International Conference on Computer Communications with
demonstration of ARPANET between 40 machines and the Terminal
Interface Processor (TIP) organized by Bob Kahn.
InterNetworking Working Group (INWG) created to address need for
establishing agreed upon protocols. Chairman: Vinton Cerf.
Telnet specification (RFC 318)
1973
First international connections to the ARPANET: University College
of London (England) and Royal Radar Establishment (Norway)
Bob Metcalfe's Harvard PhD Thesis outlines idea for Ethernet
(:amk:)
Bob Kahn poses Internet problem, starts internetting research
program at ARPA. Vinton Cerf sketches gateway architecture in March
on back of envelope in hotel lobby in San Francisco (:vgc:)
Cerf and Kahn present basic Internet ideas at INWG in September at
Univ of Sussex, Brighton, UK (:vgc:)
File Transfer specification (RFC 454)
1974
Vint Cerf and Bob Kahn publish "A Protocol for Packet Network
Intercommunication" which specified in detail the design of a
Transmission Control Program (TCP). [IEEE Trans Comm] (:amk:)
BBN opens Telenet, the first public packet data service (a
commercial version of ARPANET) (:sk2:)
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1975
Operational management of Internet transferred to DCA (now DISA)
"Jargon File", by Raphael Finkel at SAIL, first released (:esr:)
Shockwave Rider written by John Brunner (:pds:)
1976
Elizabeth II, Queen of the United Kingdom sends out an e-mail
(various Net folks have e-mailed dates ranging from 1971 to 1978;
1976 was the most submitted and the only found in print)
UUCP (Unix-to-Unix CoPy) developed at AT&T Bell Labs and
distributed with UNIX one year later.
1977
THEORYNET created by Larry Landweber at Univ of Wisconsin providing
electronic mail to over 100 researchers in computer science (using
a locally developed email system and TELENET for access to server).
Mail specification (RFC 733)
Tymshare launches Tymnet
First demonstration of ARPANET/Packet Radio Net/SATNET operation of
Internet protocols with BBN-supplied gateways in July (:vgc:)
1979
Meeting between Univ of Wisconsin, DARPA, NSF, and computer
scientists from many universities to establish a Computer Science
Department research computer network (organized by Larry Landweber)
USENET established using UUCP between Duke and UNC by Tom Truscott,
Jim Ellis, and Steve Bellovin. All original groups were under net.*
hierarchy.
First MUD, MUD1, by Richard Bartle and Roy Trubshaw at U of Essex
ARPA establishes the Internet Configuration Control Board (ICCB)
Packet Radio Network (PRNET) experiment starts with DARPA funding.
Most communications take place between mobile vans. ARPANET
connection via SRI.
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1980s
1981
BITNET, the "Because It's Time NETwork"
- Started as a cooperative network at the City University of New
York, with the first connection to Yale (:feg:)
- Original acronym stood for 'There' instead of 'Time' in
reference to the free NJE protocols provided with the IBM
systems
- Provides electronic mail and listserv servers to distribute
information, as well as file transfers
CSNET (Computer Science NETwork) built by a collaboration of
computer scientists and Univ of Delaware, Purdue Univ, Univ of
Wisconsin, RAND Corporation and BBN through seed money granted by
NSF to provide networking services (especially email) to university
scientists with no access to ARPANET. CSNET later becomes known as
the Computer and Science Network. (:amk,lhl:)
Minitel (Teletel) is deployed across France by France Telecom.
True Names written by Vernor Vinge (:pds:)
1982
DCA and ARPA establish the Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) and
Internet Protocol (IP), as the protocol suite, commonly known as
TCP/IP, for ARPANET. (:vgc:)
- This leads to one of the first definitions of an "internet" as
a connected set of networks, specifically those using TCP/IP,
and "Internet" as connected TCP/IP internets.
- DoD declares TCP/IP suite to be standard for DoD (:vgc:)
EUnet (European UNIX Network) is created by EUUG to provide email
and USENET services. (:glg:)
- original connections between the Netherlands, Denmark, Sweden,
and UK
External Gateway Protocol (RFC 827) specification. EGP is used for
gateways between networks.
1983
Name server developed at Univ of Wisconsin, no longer requiring
users to know the exact path to other systems.
Cutover from NCP to TCP/IP (1 January)
CSNET / ARPANET gateway put in place
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ARPANET split into ARPANET and MILNET; the latter became integrated
with the Defense Data Network created the previous year.
Desktop workstations come into being, many with Berkeley UNIX which
includes IP networking software.
Networking needs switch from having a single, large time sharing
computer connected to the Internet at each site, to instead
connecting entire local networks.
Internet Activities Board (IAB) established, replacing ICCB
Berkeley releases 4.2BSD incorporating TCP/IP (:mpc:)
EARN (European Academic and Research Network) established. Very
similar to the way BITNET works with a gateway funded by IBM.
FidoNet developed by Tom Jennings.
1984
Domain Name System (DNS) introduced.
Number of hosts breaks 1,000
JUNET (Japan Unix Network) established using UUCP.
JANET (Joint Academic Network) established in the UK using the
Coloured Book protocols; previously SERCnet.
Moderated newsgroups introduced on USENET (mod.*)
Neuromancer written by William Gibson
1985
Whole Earth 'Lectronic Link (WELL) started
Information Sciences Institute (ISI) at USC is given responsibility
for DNS root management by DCA, and SRI for DNS NIC registrations
Symbolics.com is assigned on 15 March to become the first registered
domain. Other firsts: cmu.edu, purdue.edu, rice.edu, ucla.edu
(April); css.gov (June); mitre.org, .uk (July)
100 years to the day of the last spike being driven on the cross-
Canada railroad, the last Canadian university is connected to BITNET
in a one year effort to have coast-to-coast connectivity. (:kf1:)
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1986
NSFNET created (backbone speed of 56Kbps)
- NSF establishes 5 super-computing centers to provide
high-computing power for all (JVNC@Princeton, PSC@Pittsburgh,
SDSC@UCSD, NCSA@UIUC, Theory Center@Cornell).
- This allows an explosion of connections, especially from
universities.
NSF-funded SDSCNET, JVNCNET, SURANET, and NYSERNET operational
(:sw1:)
Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) and Internet Research Task
Force (IRTF) comes into existence under the IAB. First IETF meeting
held in January at Linkabit in San Diego
The first Freenet (Cleveland) comes on-line 16 July under the
auspices of the Society for Public Access Computing (SoPAC). Later
Freenet program management assumed by the National Public
Telecomputing Network (NPTN) in 1989 (:sk2,rab:)
Network News Transfer Protocol (NNTP) designed to enhance Usenet
news performance over TCP/IP.
Mail Exchanger (MX) records developed by Craig Partridge allow
non-IP network hosts to have domain addresses.
The great USENET name change; moderated newsgroups changed in 1987.
BARRNET (Bay Area Regional Research Network) established using high
speed links. Operational in 1987.
1987
NSF signs a cooperative agreement to manage the NSFNET backbone
with Merit Network, Inc. (IBM and MCI involvement was through an
agreement with Merit). Merit, IBM, and MCI later founded ANS.
UUNET is founded with Usenix funds to provide commercial UUCP and
Usenet access. Originally an experiment by Rick Adams and Mike
O'Dell
Email link established between Germany and China using CSNET
protocols, with the first message from China sent on 20 September.
(:wz1:)
1000th RFC: "Request For Comments reference guide"
Number of hosts breaks 10,000
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Number of BITNET hosts breaks 1,000
1988
2 November - Internet worm burrows through the Net, affecting
~6,000 of the 60,000 hosts on the Internet (:ph1:)
CERT (Computer Emergency Response Team) formed by DARPA in response
to the needs exhibited during the Morris worm incident. The worm is
the only advisory issued this year.
DoD chooses to adopt OSI and sees use of TCP/IP as an interim. US
Government OSI Profile (GOSIP) defines the set of protocols to be
supported by Government purchased products (:gck:)
Los Nettos network created with no federal funding, instead
supported by regional members (founding: Caltech, TIS, UCLA, USC,
ISI).
NSFNET backbone upgraded to T1 (1.544Mbps)
CERFnet (California Education and Research Federation network)
founded by Susan Estrada.
Internet Relay Chat (IRC) developed by Jarkko Oikarinen (:zby:)
First Canadian regionals join NSFNET: ONet via Cornell, RISQ via
Princeton, BCnet via Univ of Washington (:ec1:)
FidoNet gets connected to the Net, enabling the exchange of e-mail
and news (:tp1:)
Countries connecting to NSFNET: Canada (CA), Denmark (DK), Finland
(FI), France (FR), Iceland (IS), Norway (NO), Sweden (SE)
1989
Number of hosts breaks 100,000
RIPE (Reseaux IP Europeens) formed (by European service providers)
to ensure the necessary administrative and technical coordination
to allow the operation of the pan-European IP Network. (:glg:)
First relays between a commercial electronic mail carrier and the
Internet: MCI Mail through the Corporation for the National
Research Initiative (CNRI), and Compuserve through Ohio State Univ
(:jg1,ph1:)
Corporation for Research and Education Networking (CREN) is formed
by merging CSNET into BITNET
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AARNET - Australian Academic Research Network - set up by AVCC and
CSIRO; introduced into service the following year (:gmc:)
Cuckoo's Egg written by Clifford Stoll tells the real-life tale of
a German cracker group who infiltrated numerous US facilities
CERT advisories: 7
Countries connecting to NSFNET: Australia (AU), Germany (DE),
Israel (IL), Italy (IT), Japan (JP), Mexico (MX), Netherlands (NL),
New Zealand (NZ), Puerto Rico (PR), United Kingdom (UK)
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1990s
1990
ARPANET ceases to exist
Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) is founded by Mitch Kapor
Archie released by Peter Deutsch, Alan Emtage, and Bill Heelan at
McGill
Hytelnet released by Peter Scott (Univ of Saskatchewan)
The World comes on-line (world.std.com), becoming the first
commercial provider of Internet dial-up access
ISO Development Environment (ISODE) developed to provide an
approach for OSI migration for the DoD. ISODE software allows OSI
application to operate over TCP/IP (:gck:)
CA*net formed by 10 regional networks as national Canadian backbone
with direct connection to NSFNET (:ec1:)
The first remotely operated machine to be hooked up to the
Internet, the Internet Toaster, (controlled via SNMP) makes its
debut at Interop.
CERT advisories: 12, reports: 130
Countries connecting to NSFNET: Argentina (AR), Austria (AT),
Belgium (BE), Brazil (BR), Chile (CL), Greece (GR), India (IN),
Ireland (IE), Korea (KR), Spain (ES), Switzerland (CH)
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1991
Commercial Internet eXchange (CIX) Association, Inc. formed by
General Atomics (CERFnet), Performance Systems International, Inc.
(PSInet), and UUNET Technologies, Inc. (AlterNet), after NSF lifts
restrictions on the commercial use of the Net (:glg:)
Wide Area Information Servers (WAIS), invented by Brewster Kahle,
released by Thinking Machines Corporation
Gopher released by Paul Lindner and Mark P. McCahill from the Univ
of Minnessota
World-Wide Web (WWW) released by CERN; Tim Berners-Lee developer
(:pb1:)
PGP (Pretty Good Privacy) released by Philip Zimmerman (:ad1:)
US High Performance Computing Act (Gore 1) establishes the National
Research and Education Network (NREN)
NSFNET backbone upgraded to T3 (44.736Mbps)
NSFNET traffic passes 1 trillion bytes/month and 10 billion
packets/month
Defense Data Network NIC contract awarded by DISA to Government
Systems Inc. who takes over from SRI in May
Start of JANET IP Service (JIPS) which signalled the changeover
from Coloured Book software to TCP/IP within the UK academic
network. IP was initially 'tunnelled' within X.25. (:gst:)
CERT advisories: 23
Countries connecting to NSFNET: Croatia (HR), Czech Repulic (CZ),
Hong Kong (HK), Hungary (HU), Poland (PL), Portugal (PT), Singapore
(SG), South Africa (ZA), Taiwan (TW), Tunisia (TN)
1992
Internet Society (ISOC) is chartered
Number of hosts breaks 1,000,000
First MBONE audio multicast (March) and video multicast (November)
RIPE Network Coordination Center (NCC) created in April to provide
address registration and coordination services to the European
Internet community (:dk1:)
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IAB reconstituted as the Internet Architecture Board and becomes
part of the Internet Society
Veronica, a gopherspace search tool, is released by Univ of Nevada
World Bank comes on-line
Japan's first ISP, Internet Initiative Japan (IIJ), is formed by
Koichi Suzuki
The term "Surfing the Internet" is coined by Jean Armour Polly
(:jap:)
Internet Hunt started by Rick Gates
CERT advisories: 21, reports: 800
Countries connecting to NSFNET: Antarctica (AQ), Cameroon (CM),
Cyprus (CY), Ecuador (EC), Estonia (EE), Kuwait (KW), Latvia (LV),
Luxembourg (LU), Malaysia (MY), Slovakia (SK), Slovenia (SI),
Thailand (TH), Venezuela (VE)
1993
InterNIC created by NSF to provide specific Internet services:
(:sc1:)
- directory and database services (AT&T)
- registration services (Network Solutions Inc.)
- information services (General Atomics/CERFnet)
US White House comes on-line (http://www.whitehouse.gov/):
- President Bill Clinton: president@whitehouse.gov
- Vice-President Al Gore: vice-president@whitehouse.gov
Worms of a new kind find their way around the Net - WWW Worms (W4),
joined by Spiders, Wanderers, Crawlers, and Snakes ...
Internet Talk Radio begins broadcasting (:sk2:)
United Nations (UN) comes on-line (:vgc:)
US National Information Infrastructure Act
Businesses and media really take notice of the Internet
Mosaic takes the Internet by storm; WWW proliferates at a 341,634%
annual growth rate of service traffic. Gopher's growth is 997%.
CERT advisories: 18, reports: 1300
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Countries connecting to NSFNET: Bulgaria (BG), Costa Rica (CR),
Egypt (EG), Fiji (FJ), Ghana (GH), Guam (GU), Indonesia (ID),
Kazakhstan (KZ), Kenya (KE), Liechtenstein (LI), Peru (PE), Romania
(RO), Russian Federation (RU), Turkey (TR), Ukraine (UA), UAE (AE),
US Virgin Islands (VI)
1994
ARPANET/Internet celebrates 25th anniversary
Communities begin to be wired up directly to the Internet
(Lexington and Cambridge, MA, USA)
US Senate and House provide information servers
Shopping malls arrive on the Internet
First cyberstation, RT-FM, broadcasts from Interop in Las Vegas
The National Institute for Standards and Technology (NIST) suggests
that GOSIP should incorporate TCP/IP and drop the "OSI-only"
requirement (:gck:)
Arizona law firm of Canter & Siegel "spams" the Internet with email
advertising green card lottery services; Net citizens flame back
NSFNET traffic passes 10 trillion bytes/month
Yes, it's true - you can now order pizza from the Hut online
WWW edges out telnet to become 2nd most popular service on the Net
(behind ftp-data) based on % of packets and bytes traffic
distribution on NSFNET
Japanese Prime Minister on-line
UK's HM Treasury on-line
New Zealand's Info Tech Prime Minister on-line
First Virtual, the first cyberbank, open up for business
Radio stations start rockin' (rebroadcasting) round the clock on
the Net: WXYC at Univ of NC, WJHK at Univ of KS-Lawrence, KUGS at
Western WA Univ
Trans-European Research and Education Network Association (TERENA)
is formed by the merger of RARE and EARN, with representatives from
38 countries as well as CERN and ECMWF. TERERNA's aim is to
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"promote and participate in the development of a high quality
international information and telecommunications infrastructure for
the benefit of research and education"
CERT advisories: 15, reports: 2300
Countries connecting to NSFNET: Algeria (DZ), Armenia (AM), Bermuda
(BM), Burkina Faso (BF), China (CN), Colombia (CO), Jamaica (JM),
Lebanon (LB), Lithuania (LT), Macau (MO), Morocco (MA), New
Caledonia, Nicaragua (NI), Niger (NE), Panama (PA), Philippines
(PH), Senegal (SN), Sri Lanka (LK), Swaziland (SZ), Uruguay (UY),
Uzbekistan (UZ)
1995
NSFNET reverts back to a research network. Main US backbone traffic
now routed through interconnected network providers
The new NSFNET is born as NSF establishes the very high speed
Backbone Network Service (vBNS) linking super-computing centers:
NCAR, NCSA, SDSC, CTC, PSC
Hong Kong police disconnect all but 1 of the colony's Internet
providers in search of a hacker. 10,000 people are left without Net
access. (:api:)
RealAudio, an audio streaming technology, lets the Net hear in near
real-time
Radio HK, the first 24 hr., Internet-only radio station starts
broadcasting
WWW surpasses ftp-data in March as the service with greatest
traffic on NSFNet based on packet count, and in April based on byte
count
Traditional online dial-up systems (Compuserve, America Online,
Prodigy) begin to provide Internet access
A number of Net related companies go public, with Netscape leading
the pack with the 3rd largest ever NASDAQ IPO share value (9
August)
Thousands in Minneapolis-St. Paul (USA) lose Net access after
transients start a bonfire under a bridge at the Univ of MN causing
fiber-optic cables to melt (30 July)
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Registration of domain names is no longer free. Beginning 14
September, a $50 annual fee has been imposed, which up until now
was subsidized by NSF. NSF continues to pay for .edu registration,
and on an interim basis for .gov
The Vatican comes on-line
The Canadian Government comes on-line
The first official Internet wiretap was successful in helping the
Secret Service and Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) aprehend three
individuals who were illegally manufacturing and selling cell phone
cloning equipment and electronic devices
Operation Home Front connects, for the first time, soldiers in the
field with their families back home via the Internet.
Richard White becomes the first person to be declared a munition,
under the USA's arms export control laws, because of an RSA file
security encryption program emblazoned on his arm (:wired496:)
CERT advisories: 18, reports: 2412
Country domains registered: Ethiopia (ET), Cote d'Ivoire (CI), Cook
Islands (CK) Cayman Islands (KY), Anguilla (AI), Gibraltar (GI),
Vatican (VA), Kiribati (KI), Kyrgyzstan (KG), Madagascar (MG),
Mauritius (MU), Micronesia (FM), Monaco (MC), Mongolia (MN), Nepal
(NP), Nigeria (NG), Western Samoa (WS), San Marino (SM), Tanzania
(TZ), Tonga (TO), Uganda (UG), Vanuatu (VU)
Technologies of the Year: WWW, Search engines Emerging
Technologies: Mobile code (JAVA, JAVAscript), Virtual environments
(VRML), Collaborative tools
1996
Internet phones catch the attention of US telecommunication
companies who ask the US Congress to ban the technology (which has
been around for years)
The controversial US Communications Decency Act (CDA) becomes law
in the US in order to prohibit distribution of indecent materials
over the Net. A few months later a three-judge panel imposes an
injunction against its enforcement. Supreme Court unanimously rules
most of it unconstitutional in 1997.
9,272 organizations find themselves unlisted after the InterNIC
drops their name service as a result of not having paid their
domain name fee
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Various ISPs suffer extended service outages, bringing into
question whether they will be able to handle the growing number of
users. AOL (19 hours), Netcom (13 hours), AT&T WorldNet (28 hours -
email only)
New Yorks' Public Access Networks Corp (PANIX) is shut down after
repeated SYN attacks by a cracker using methods outlined in a
hacker magazine (2600)
Various US Government sites are hacked into and their content
changed, including CIA, Department of Justice, Air Force
MCI upgrades Internet backbone adding ~13,000 ports, bringing the
effective speed from 155Mbps to 622Mbps.
The Internet Ad Hoc Committee announces plans to add 7 new generic
Top Level Domains (gTLD): .firm, .store, .web, .arts, .rec, .info,
registrars worldwide.
A malicious cancelbot is released on USENET wiping out more than
25,000 messages.
The WWW browser war, fought primarily between Netscape and
Microsoft, has rushed in a new age in software development, whereby
new releases are made quarterly with the help of Internet users
eager to test upcoming (beta) versions.
Restrictions on Internet use around the world:
- China: requires users and ISPs to register with the police
- Germany: cuts off access to some newsgroups carried on
Compuserve
- Saudi Arabia: confines Internet access to universities and
hospitals
- Singapore: requires political and religious content providers
to register with the state
- New Zealand: classifies computer disks as "publications" that
can be censored and seized
- source: Human Rights Watch
vBNS additions: Baylor College of Medicine, Georgia Tech, Iowa
State Univ, Ohio State Univ, Old Dominion Univ, Univ of CA, Univ of
CO, Univ of Chicago, Univ of IL, Univ of MN, Univ of PA, Univ of
TX, Rice Univ
CERT advisories: 27, reports: 2573
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Country domains registered: Qatar (QA), Vientiane (LA), Djibouti
(DJ), Niger (NE), Central African Republic (CF), Mauretania (MF),
Oman (OM), Norfolk Island (NF), Tuvalu (TV), French Polynesia (PF),
Syria (SY), Aruba (AW), Cambodia (KH), French Guiana (GF), Eritrea
(ER), Cape Verde (CV), Burundi (BI), Benin (BJ) Bosnia-Hercegovina
(BA), Andorra (AD), Guadeloupe (GP), Guernsey (GG), Isle of Man
(IM), Jersey (JE), Lao (LA), Maldives (MV), Marshall Islands (MH),
Mauritania (MR), Northern Mariana Islands (MP), Rwanda (RW), Togo
(TG), Yemen (YE), Zaire (ZR)
Technologies of the Year: Search engines, JAVA, Internet Phone
Emerging Technologies: Virtual environments (VRML), Collaborative
tools, Internet appliance (Network Computer)
1997
2000th RFC: "Internet Official Protocol Standards"
71,618 mailing lists registered at Liszt, a mailing list directory
The American Registry for Internet Numbers (ARIN) is established to
handle administration and registration of IP numbers to the
geographical areas currently handled by Network Solutions
(InterNIC), starting March 1998.
Early in the morning of 17 July, human error at Network Solutions
causes the DNS table for .com and .net domains to become corrupted,
making millions of systems unreachable.
Longest hostname registered with InterNIC:
CHALLENGER.MED.SYNAPSE.UAH.UALBERTA.CA
101,803 Name Servers in whois database
CERT advisories thus far: 23
Country domains registered: Falkland Islands (FK), East Timor (TP),
Congo (CG), Christmas Island (CX), Gambia (GM), Guinea-Bissau (GW),
Haiti (HT), Iraq (IQ), Lybia (LY), Malawi (MW), Martinique (MQ),
Montserrat (MS), Myanmar (MM), French Reunion Island (RE),
Seychelles (SC), Sierra Leone (SL), Sudan (SD), Turkmenistan (TM),
Turks and Caicos Islands (TC), British Virgin Islands (VG)
Technologies of the Year: Push, Multicasting Emerging Technologies:
Push, Streaming Media [:twc:]
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Growth
Internet growth:
Date Hosts | Date Hosts Networks Domains
----- --------- + ----- --------- -------- ---------
1969 4 | 07/89 130,000 650 3,900
04/71 23 | 10/89 159,000 837
06/74 62 | 10/90 313,000 2,063 9,300
03/77 111 | 01/91 376,000 2,338
08/81 213 | 07/91 535,000 3,086 16,000
05/82 235 | 10/91 617,000 3,556 18,000
08/83 562 | 01/92 727,000 4,526
10/84 1,024 | 04/92 890,000 5,291 20,000
10/85 1,961 | 07/92 992,000 6,569 16,300
02/86 2,308 | 10/92 1,136,000 7,505 18,100
11/86 5,089 | 01/93 1,313,000 8,258 21,000
12/87 28,174 | 04/93 1,486,000 9,722 22,000
07/88 33,000 | 07/93 1,776,000 13,767 26,000
10/88 56,000 | 10/93 2,056,000 16,533 28,000
01/89 80,000 | 01/94 2,217,000 20,539 30,000
| 07/94 3,212,000 25,210 46,000
| 10/94 3,864,000 37,022 56,000
| 01/95 4,852,000 39,410 71,000
| 07/95 6,642,000 61,538 120,000
| 01/96 9,472,000 93,671 240,000
| 07/96 12,881,000 134,365 488,000
| 01/97 16,146,000 828,000
| 07/97 19,540,000 1,301,000
Worldwide Networks Growth: (I)nternet (B)ITNET (U)UCP (F)IDONET (O)SI
____# Countries____ ____# Countries____
Date I B U F O Date I B U F O
----- --- --- --- --- --- ----- --- --- --- --- ---
09/91 31 47 79 49 02/94 62 51 125 88 31
12/91 33 46 78 53 07/94 75 52 129 89 31
02/92 38 46 92 63 11/94 81 51 133 95 --
04/92 40 47 90 66 25 02/95 86 48 141 98 --
08/92 49 46 89 67 26 06/95 96 47 144 99 --
01/93 50 50 101 72 31 06/96 134 -- 146 108 --
04/93 56 51 107 79 31 07/97 171 -- 147 108 --
08/93 59 51 117 84 31
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RFC 2235 Hobbes' Internet Timeline November 1997
WWW Growth:
Date Sites | Date Sites | Date Sites
----- ---------- + ----- ---------- + ----- ----------
06/93 130 | 08/96 342,081 | 04/97 1,002,612
12/93 623 | 09/96 397,281 | 05/97 1,044,163
06/94 2,738 | 10/96 462,047 | 06/97 1,117,255
12/94 10,022 | 11/96 525,906 | 07/97 1,203,096
06/95 23,500 | 12/96 603,367 | 08/97 1,269,800
01/96 100,000 | 01/97 646,162 | 09/97 1,364,714
06/96 252,000 | 02/97 739,688 |
07/96 299,403 | 03/97 883,149 |
USENET Growth:
Date Sites ~MB ~Posts Groups | Date Sites ~MB ~Posts Groups
---- ----- --- ------ ------ + ---- ------- --- ------ ------
1979 3 2 3 | 1987 5,200 2 957 259
1980 15 10 | 1988 7,800 4 1933 381
1981 150 0.05 20 | 1990 33,000 10 4,500 1,300
1982 400 35 | 1991 40,000 25 10,000 1,851
1983 600 120 | 1992 63,000 42 17,556 4,302
1984 900 225 | 1993 110,000 70 32,325 8,279
1985 1,300 1.0 375 | 1994 180,000 157 72,755 10,696
1986 2,200 2.0 946 241 | 1995 330,000 586 131,614
~ approximate: MB - megabytes per day, Posts - articles per day
---------------------------------------------------------------------
3. Sources
Hobbes' Internet Timeline was compiled from a number of sources,
with some of the stand-outs being:
Cerf, Vinton (as told to Bernard Aboba). "How the Internet Came to
Be." This article appears in "The Online User's Encyclopedia," by
Bernard Aboba. Addison-Wesley, 1993.
Hardy, Henry. "The History of the Net." Master's Thesis, School of
Communications, Grand Valley State University.
http://www.ocean.ic.net/ftp/doc/nethist.html
Hardy, Ian. "The Evolution of ARPANET email." History Thesis, UC
Berkeley.
http://server.berkeley.edu/virtual-berkeley/email_history
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RFC 2235 Hobbes' Internet Timeline November 1997
Hauben, Ronda and Michael. "The Netizens and the Wonderful World of
the Net."
http://www.columbia.edu/~hauben/netbook/
Kulikowski, Stan II. "A Timeline of Network History." (author's
email below)
Quarterman, John. "The Matrix: Computer Networks and Conferencing
Systems Worldwide." Bedford, MA: Digital Press. 1990
"ARPANET, the Defense Data Network, and Internet". Encyclopedia of
Communications, Volume 1. Editors: Fritz Froehlich, Allen Kent.
New York: Marcel Dekker, Inc. 1991
Internet growth summary compiled from:
- zone program reports maintained by Mark Lottor at:
ftp://ftp.nw.com/pub/zone/
- connectivity table maintained by Larry Landweber at:
ftp://ftp.cs.wisc.edu/connectivity_table/
WWW growth summary compiled from:
- Web growth summary page by Matthew Gray of MIT:
http://www.mit.edu/people/mkgray/net/web-growth-summary.html
- Netcraft at http://www.netcraft.com/survey/
USENET growth summary compiled from Quarterman and Hauben sources
above, and news.lists postings. Lots of historical USENET postings
also provided by Tom Fitzgerald (fitz@wang.com).
Related Timelines:
- DNS: http://www.wia.org/dns-law/pub/timeline.html"
- JAVA: http://java.sun.com/events/jibe/timeline.html
- BBN: http://www.bbn.com/timeline/
Additional books of interest:
- "Where Wizards Stay Up Late: The Origins of the Internet"
Katie Hafner & Matthew Lyon
- "Architects of the Web: 1,000 Days That Built the Future of
Business", Robert H. Reid
- "Netizens: On the History and Impact of Usenet and the
Internet", Michael Hauben et al
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RFC 2235 Hobbes' Internet Timeline November 1997
4. Acknowledgements
Contributors to Hobbes' Internet Timeline have their initials next
to the contributed items in the form (:zzz:) and are:
ad1 - Arnaud Dufour (arnaud.dufour@hec.unil.ch)
amk - Alex McKenzie (mckenzie@bbn.com)
dk1 - Daniel Karrenberg (Daniel.Karrenberg@ripe.net)
ec1 - Eric Carroll (eric@enfm.utcc.utoronto.ca)
esr - Eric S. Raymond (esr@locke.ccil.org)
feg - Farrell E. Gerbode (farrell@is.rice.edu)
gck - Gary C. Kessler (kumquat@hill.com)
glg - Gail L. Grant (grant@glgc.com)
gmc - Grant McCall (g.mccall@unsw.edu.au)
gst - Graham Thomas (G.S.Thomas@uel.ac.uk)
irh - Ian R Hardy (hardy@uclink2.berkeley.edu)
jap - Jean Armour Polly (mom@netmom.com)
jg1 - Jim Gaynor (gaynor@agvax.ag.ohio.state.edu)
kf1 - Ken Fockler (fockler@hq.canet.ca)
lhl - Larry H. Landweber (lhl@cs.wisc.edu)
mpc - Mellisa P. Chase (pc@mitre.org)
pb1 - Paul Burchard (burchard@cs.princeton.edu)
pds - Peter da Silva (peter@baileynm.com)
ph1 - Peter Hoffman (hoffman@ece.nps.navy.mil)
rab - Roger A. Bielefeld (rab@hal.cwru.edu)
sc1 - Susan Calcari (susanc@is.internic.net)
sk2 - Stan Kulikowski (stankuli@uwf.bitnet) - see sources section
sw1 - Stephen Wolff (swolff@cisco.com)
tp1 - Tim Pozar (pozar@kumr.lns.com)
twc - Thomas W. Creedon - K'o Wei Li (tcreedon@mitre.org)
vgc - Vinton Cerf (vcerf@isoc.org) - see sources section
wz1 - W. Zorn (zorn@ira.uka.de)
zby - Zenel Batagelj (zenel.batagelj@uni-lj.si)
5. Security Considerations
Security issues are not discussed in this document, though
references are made to security events which have taken place.
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RFC 2235 Hobbes' Internet Timeline November 1997
6. Author's Address
Robert H. Zakon
Internet Evangelist
The MITRE Corporation
1820 Dolley Madison Blvd
McLean, Virginia, USA 22102
Phone: (703) 883-7790
EMail: zakon@info.isoc.org
7. Disclaimer
The views expressed in this document are the author's and are not
intended to represent in any way The MITRE Corporation or its
opinions on this subject matter.
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RFC 2235 Hobbes' Internet Timeline November 1997 8. Full Copyright Statement Copyright (C) Robert H. Zakon and The Internet Society (1997). All Rights Reserved. This document and translations of it may be copied and furnished to others, and derivative works that comment on or otherwise explain it or assist in its implmentation may be prepared, copied, published and distributed, in whole or in part, without restriction of any kind, provided that the above copyright notice and this paragraph are included on all such copies and derivative works. However, this document itself may not be modified in any way, such as by removing the copyright notice or references to the Internet Society or other Internet organizations, except as needed for the purpose of developing Internet standards in which case the procedures for copyrights defined in the Internet Standards process must be followed, or as required to translate it into languages other than English. The limited permissions granted above are perpetual and will not be revoked by the Internet Society or its successors or assigns. This document and the information contained herein is provided on an "AS IS" basis and THE INTERNET SOCIETY AND THE INTERNET ENGINEERING TASK FORCE DISCLAIMS ALL WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO ANY WARRANTY THAT THE USE OF THE INFORMATION HEREIN WILL NOT INFRINGE ANY RIGHTS OR ANY IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. Zakon Informational [Page 22]