Ain't that amazing that most human inventions were created to either satisfy military or a porn industry.
Bruce Sterling: Internet (1993)
21–30 of 60 posts
Re: Bruce Sterling: Internet (1993)
#22Earlier quoted context omitted.
Not sure if you're just being ironic but Al Gore never claimed to have created or invented the internet. Here's what he said: > During my service in the United States Congress, I took the initiative in creating the Internet. I took the initiative in moving forward a whole range of initiatives that have proven to be important to our country's economic growth and environmental protection, improvements in our educationa…
Yes, I was being ironic. But those quotes don't help his case much. Saying "I took the initiative in creating the Internet" is, with or without context, just laughable.
With a context, its not laughable to me. I don't have too much respect to Al Gore, but I don't believe he was so dumb or thought his audience is so that actually anyone would believe he "created" internet from a technical point of view. But he did, unfortunately, took a part in creating internet from a legal point of view.
Re: Bruce Sterling: Internet (1993)
#23Earlier quoted context omitted.
> How did we lose the freedom, the idea that everyone is an equal peer? It's not lost in any real sense, you just have a romanticised picture of "the good old days". Look up the the term BOFH for a reality-check. A dial-up ISP would be oversubscribed and thus effectively throttled, just like today. Downloading too much on your university account, especially in peak hour, would get you banned. If you want total freedo…
$1,000 for a leased line half a mile away last time I checked, that excludes set up fee.
Exactly. In 1995:
The cost of access to the Internet via 56 kbit/s or 64 kbit/s leased lines varies enormously throughout the OECD area (Table 9). In countries such as Canada and Finland it is possible to get extremely inexpensive access to the Internet via 56 kbit/s and 64 kbit/s leased line connections. In fact, the price quoted for a 56 kbit/s leased line access to the Internet by the Helix Internet, an IAP in British Columbia, was less expensive than a listed 56 kbit/s leased line charge, over two kilometres, from the PTO used in OECD comparisons in the “Communications Outlook” to represent Canada.
The reason Helix can offer a less expensive service is because it purchases capacity from a reseller of BC-Tel’s network in British Columbia. If best practice pricing is defined as the lowest available prices then the suppliers in Canada (US$7 000) and Finland (US$6 000) appear to have set the current benchmarks. This finding is confirmed from within the Internet access industry by EUnet’s Wim Vik who says Finland has the least expensive prices in Europe because of the competitive provision of infrastructure.viii In fact very little separates the prices of these countries when it is considered the Canadian charge includes a router at the customer site. By way of contrast with the low prices found in Finland and Canada, ten OECD countries had a leased line basket price per annum higher than US$10 000, five a basket price higher that US$20 000 and a further three with charges higher than US$30 000. Overall the average price for leased line access to the Internet in countries with telecommunication infrastructure competition was 44 per cent less expensive than countries with monopoly provision of infrastructure.
http://www.oecd.org/sti/broadband/2758588.pdf
Don't forget inflation. In 1995 your $1000 was worth only $652. What was considered "extremely cheap" in 1995 is 10x more expensive than what you seem to imply is prohibitively expensive today. And never mind the speed - your leased line is probably 100mbps, that's 1800x faster than 56kbps.
EDIT: Strictly speaking off-topic, but in the spirit of this thread: I typed "what did a leased line internet conneciton cost in 1995" into Google, it transparently fixed my spelling mistake and gave my this PDF as the first hit. This is truly an awesome time to be alive.
Re: Bruce Sterling: Internet (1993)
#24It hurts to read this. How did we lose the freedom, the idea that everyone is an equal peer? Was it just the realities of money, that an end user would rather pay a tiny fraction of the real cost of being truly on line and pay instead with their freedom? We used to laugh at AOLers because they weren't experiencing the real internet, because they sold themselves out to an online service. Are today's ISPs with their fi…
Wow, what's with all the frowns and sad faces? The Internet is perhaps the most incredible invention of humanity ever. Billions of people are connected to each other like never before, any information is at our fingertips, anyone who wants to create a web site is free to do so and post whatever they want (except maybe in China), commerce is available to the individual on a global basis, etc etc. Whining about the "go…
Billions of people are connected to each other like never before
All controlled by about 5 corporations at the top.
Re: Bruce Sterling: Internet (1993)
#25Apparently, the opening part about the internet spawning from a RAND Corporation study is just a myth:
http://inventors.about.com/library/inventors/bl_Charles_Herz...
Re: Bruce Sterling: Internet (1993)
#26It hurts to read this. How did we lose the freedom, the idea that everyone is an equal peer? Was it just the realities of money, that an end user would rather pay a tiny fraction of the real cost of being truly on line and pay instead with their freedom? We used to laugh at AOLers because they weren't experiencing the real internet, because they sold themselves out to an online service. Are today's ISPs with their fi…
What are you talking about? The internet has been a great success for the masses: Wikipedia, Google, Youtube, Facebook all bring an immeasurable benefit to it's users. Of course not everything is perfect, but I much rather have today's internet than the internet of 1993
I would postulate that if Wikipedia, Youtube and Facebook went permanently offline tomorrow, absolutely nothing of significance would change either online or in the society. People would still find ways to do the same things, maybe even better ways.
The Internet of the 90s wasn't as widespread, but it had a much greater impact on areas of life and people it touched.
If anything, your list shows how centralized the Internet has become. After all, you didn't name technologies, you named brands/services.
Re: Bruce Sterling: Internet (1993)
#27Earlier quoted context omitted.
What are you talking about? The internet has been a great success for the masses: Wikipedia, Google, Youtube, Facebook all bring an immeasurable benefit to it's users. Of course not everything is perfect, but I much rather have today's internet than the internet of 1993
I would postulate that if Wikipedia, Youtube and Facebook went permanently offline tomorrow, absolutely nothing of significance would change either online or in the society. People would still find ways to do the same things, maybe even better ways. The Internet of the 90s wasn't as widespread, but it had a much greater impact on areas of life and people it touched. If anything, your list shows how centralized the In…
This was part of the point I wanted to emphasize.
This article talks at how amazing usenet was with it's millions of words a day.
Now any article would take of the valuation of usenet with it's millions of words a day. Someone making a modern usenet wouldn't open their protocol in fear of losing advertising money.
Would twitter, snapchat, etc have their valuations if they released fully open protocols (both client and server)?
Re: Bruce Sterling: Internet (1993)
#28> The standard fee is about $40 a month -- about the same as TV cable service.
I mean WOW! Americans were able to get internet at 40$ / month in '93? I recall, in 2003, my folks had to pay huge telephone bills even when my internet usage didn't exceed more than 2 hrs a day (dial-up times).
Re: Bruce Sterling: Internet (1993)
#29Earlier quoted context omitted.
Wow, what's with all the frowns and sad faces? The Internet is perhaps the most incredible invention of humanity ever. Billions of people are connected to each other like never before, any information is at our fingertips, anyone who wants to create a web site is free to do so and post whatever they want (except maybe in China), commerce is available to the individual on a global basis, etc etc. Whining about the "go…
Billions of people are connected to each other like never before All controlled by about 5 corporations at the top.
Did anyone ever really think it would be any different?
At least we're still allowed to rent servers without a license, and make our own webpages.
Re: Bruce Sterling: Internet (1993)
#30> Learning the Internet now, or at least learning about it, is wise. By the turn of the century, "network literacy," like "computer literacy" before it, will be forcing itself into the very texture of your life. Wow, the prediction is a decade off... but 100% correct for those who live in the developed world! It's funny, because EXACTLY the same could be said right now about cryptocurrencies, blockchains, and Distrib…
How is it a decade off? Internet was ubiquitous in developed countries already a decade ago.
Rather, in the developed world we are now online 24/7 - with the rise of 3/4G smartphones. However, this is only so since 2009 - 2013 for most people.