“The success of a network will depend by in large how the user views it. You have to give the user something more then he gets at the present time”—John R. Pasta
BoingBoing includes a link to a “1972 documentary on the ARPAnet” – * Computer Networks: The Hearlds of Resource Sharing*. The 30 minute documentary includes interviews with:
- F.J. Corbato, MIT
- J.C.R. Licklider, MIT
- Lawrence G. Roberts, ARPA
- Robert E. Kahn, BBN
- Frank Heart, BBN
- William R. Sutherland, BBN
- Richard W. Watson, SRI
- John R. Pasta, NSF
- Donald W. Davies, National Physical Laboratory (U.K.)
- George W. Mitchell, Federal Reserve System
“Thos who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.”—George Santayana, 1905
My next trip to Silicon Valley must include a visit to the Computer History Museum. More details about the development of ARPANet and the personal computer can be found in M. Mitchell Waldrop’s The Dream Machine: J.C.R. Licklider and the Revolution that Made Computing Personal and Katie Hafner’s Where Wizards Stay Up Late: The Origins of the Internet. George Dyson presented one of my favourite sessions at ETech and his talk from ETech 2005 is available at IT Conversations.