nanog mailing list archives
RE: Purpose of the Internet
From: "Borchers, Mark" <mborchers () splitrock net>
Date: Thu, 14 Mar 2002 13:00:26 -0600
This is a great book, BTW. All network engineers should read it.
Just happen to have it handy. Both of the earlier posters were correct. The book cites both Bob Taylor's priority on R&E networks and Baran's goal of a resilient communications system that could survive a nuclear holocaust. *Inspiration* - instead of measuring nuclear weapon destructive power in megatons, it would perhaps be useful to express it in megabackhoes. I suspect
this misunderstanding grew out of the idea that some of the original papers on packet switching used as one of their criteria, that the networks be highly survivable.
With regards to the purpose of the internet, I recall reading in the Prologue to _Where Wizards Stay Up Late_, by Katie Hafner and Matthew Lyon, a true anecdote about Bob Taylor. The authors quote Mr. Taylor as refuting that the purpose of the arpanet was to provide communications in spite of a nuclear attack.
Current thread:
- Purpose of the Internet Alan Hannan (Mar 13)
- Re: Purpose of the Internet Joel Jaeggli (Mar 14)
- RE: Purpose of the Internet Daniel Golding (Mar 14)
- <Possible follow-ups>
- FW: Purpose of the Internet Lixia Zhang (Mar 14)
- RE: Purpose of the Internet Borchers, Mark (Mar 14)
- more on the ICANN saga Jon King (Mar 14)
- Re: more on the ICANN saga Simon Higgs (Mar 14)
- Re: more on the ICANN saga Randy Bush (Mar 14)
- more on the ICANN saga Jon King (Mar 14)