David and all other folks, I think we glue to closely to the facts if we conceive Internet development in the short development steps you propose. We should look at other communication systems, how they emerged (or better said: were develeped) and then draw conclusions. Also, the way you propose to conceive the Internet is a rationalisation of what happened seen from today. But this excludes the social generation, the corporate and individual struggles, strategies, coalitions etc. that shaped today's outcome. So, a look into neighbouring disciplines with a more long-term view would be a help. Look how Large technical systems developed, for instance. Look into Hughes, Networks of power. A large technical systems, Hughes writes, shows several development phases: invention, development, innovation, transfer (into new countries), growth. Hughes' seminal book gives you an idea of the development phases of electric power network in Great Britain, Germany and the U.S. from the beginning into the 1930s. There are other studies about the telegraph, the telephone, the railroads, gas networks, videotext, etc. The theory was conceived with industrial society as a background but has been transferred to more recent technologies, such as videotext or the telephone. I guess there were more attemps to create different kinds of Internets, with different actor sets and strategies behind than just three: the scientific, the non-commercial and the commercial stage. I would say, there are different kinds of actor sets, with their respective objectives and associated strategies who continously struggle and usually only get partial victories. They struggle about power, about prestige, about wealth through invention, regulation, system development, business models, etc. As a result, like in real life, the Internet version the winner does not take all, but supplements in one, replaces competitors completely in other parts of the Internet. So, there still is a scientists' Internet, with altruism, exchange etc. as a basic principle. It became less important in numbers and in influence but still exists. And there is a social network continously growing strong, unimpeded I guess from the Internet bust but fuelled by the growing number of private users, of civil society actors, associations etc. And there is the commercial Internet which got a severe blow - but not the others. And there is a what we call in Europe public Internet, e-government or e-administration. Which is the result of public action and, even in the US, integrates several of the most visited sites. And you might add several forms of large-scale intranets: the military Internet, and public security Internets, banking and other corporate Internets. Thus, to understand the history of the Internet, I propose to study at least 5 development paths and write their development history: the scientific, the social/associative, the commercial, the public/administrative, the military and other large intranets. David, is this an answer ? Frank david silver wrote:

Hi Folks,

i just returned after giving a class lecture which featured an abbreviated history of the internet and found barry's post quite interesting. besides information about his and caroline haythornthwaite's book, he included the following excerpt from the introduction:

***

Excerpts from the Editors' Introduction, Barry Wellman and Caroline Haythornthwaite:

_The Internet in Everyday Life_ is about the second age of the Internet as it descends from the firmament and becomes embedded in everyday life. The first age of the Internet was a bright light shining above everyday concerns. In the euphoria, many analysts lost their perspective. The rapid contraction of the dot.com economy has brought down to earth the once-euphoric belief in the infinite possibility of Internet life.

***

i'm curious about this notion of two stages of the internet. if i'm reading the paragraph correctly, the authors suggest the net has had two stages: before and after the dot.com crash. i'm interested in hearing what others think about this concept of a two-staged internet history.

in my own lecture this morning, i tracked a number of stages, all of which contain, i believe, significant differences between them. for example (and this is the abridged version):

1960s/early 1970s - ARPANET

1975 - a more social internet with lists like SF-Lovers

1979 - a more public internet (here i'm defining the internet more expansively) with the introduction of usenet groups

late 1980s/early 1990s - mass influx of users via prodigy/compuserve/aol

1991 - a more distributive (and later graphical) turn with berners-lee's world wide web, followed by mosaic (1993), and netscape (1994)

1995 - netscape goes public, wall street goes crazy, dot.com daze begins

etc etc etc.

(like all historical stages, these are complex and reflect an interesting intersection among social and cultural contexts, technological developments, economic conditions, etc.)

thoughts?

david silver http://faculty.washington.edu/dsilver/

_______________________________________________ Air-l mailing list Air-l@aoir.org http://www.aoir.org/mailman/listinfo/air-l

-- ---------------------------- Frank Thomas FTR Internet Research 321, boulevard de la Boissière 93110 Rosny-sous-Bois France tél. 0033.1.48.94.36.90

you may find useful the following timeline http://estia.arch.auth.gr/cyberspace/cyberspace_timeline.htm Vassilys ----- Original Message ----- From: "david silver" <dsilver@u.washington.edu> To: <air-l@aoir.org> Sent: Tuesday, November 26, 2002 2:12 AM Subject: [Air-l] Internet History/Stages, was Internet in Everyday Life

Hi Folks,

i just returned after giving a class lecture which featured an abbreviated history of the internet and found barry's post quite interesting. besides information about his and caroline haythornthwaite's book, he included the following excerpt from the introduction:

***

Excerpts from the Editors' Introduction, Barry Wellman and Caroline Haythornthwaite:

_The Internet in Everyday Life_ is about the second age of the Internet as it descends from the firmament and becomes embedded in everyday life. The first age of the Internet was a bright light shining above everyday concerns. In the euphoria, many analysts lost their perspective. The rapid contraction of the dot.com economy has brought down to earth the once-euphoric belief in the infinite possibility of Internet life.

***

i'm curious about this notion of two stages of the internet. if i'm reading the paragraph correctly, the authors suggest the net has had two stages: before and after the dot.com crash. i'm interested in hearing what others think about this concept of a two-staged internet history.

in my own lecture this morning, i tracked a number of stages, all of which contain, i believe, significant differences between them. for example (and this is the abridged version):

1960s/early 1970s - ARPANET

1975 - a more social internet with lists like SF-Lovers

1979 - a more public internet (here i'm defining the internet more expansively) with the introduction of usenet groups

late 1980s/early 1990s - mass influx of users via prodigy/compuserve/aol

1991 - a more distributive (and later graphical) turn with berners-lee's world wide web, followed by mosaic (1993), and netscape (1994)

1995 - netscape goes public, wall street goes crazy, dot.com daze begins

etc etc etc.

(like all historical stages, these are complex and reflect an interesting intersection among social and cultural contexts, technological developments, economic conditions, etc.)

thoughts?

david silver http://faculty.washington.edu/dsilver/

_______________________________________________ Air-l mailing list Air-l@aoir.org http://www.aoir.org/mailman/listinfo/air-l

========================================== Dr. Vassilys Fourkas Research Associate Spatial Development Research Unit (SDRU) Department of Urban and Regional Planning and Development School of Architecture PO BOX 491 Aristotle University of Thessalonica Thessalonica, 54124 Greece Tel: 0030 310 995584 Fax: 0030 310 995592 Email: vfourkas@estia.arch.auth.gr URL: http://estia.arch.auth.gr