1. Politics 117 The regulation of the Internet

2. Did Al Gore invent the Internet?

3. What is the Internet anyway? Is it a corporation? Is it an anarchist collective? Is it a non-profit? Is it a government agency? Is it a bunch of computers? Is it a lot of wires?

4. “The Internet is a global system of interconnected computer networks that use the standard Internet Protocol Suite (TCP/IP) to serve billions of users worldwide.”

5. Section 230(e)(1) of the Communications Act: – “(1) INTERNET—The term ‘Internet’ means the international computer network of both Federal and non-Federal interoperable packet switched data networks.”

6. Advanced Research Projects Agency, 1958 Created within the Department of Defense (DoD) to establish US lead in science and technology applicable to the military, at least in theory In practice ARPA researchers did whatever they wanted, which sometimes had little to do with military goals

8. Sputnik, 1957 flopnik

9. The Manchester Mark I (above) Big ugly computers and the geeks who loved them Eniac

10. Time sharing: Networks in which many people can use a computer system simultaneously Batch processing: One person takes a batch of programs and runs them through a computer

11. Larry Roberts’ ARPAnet plan

12. AT&T’s John DeButts

13. AT&T: the regulated monopoly, circa 1965 Completely dominates telephony; few independents left Offers POTS (plain old telephone service) Discourages and blocks technological advances not controlled by AT&T

14. Section 202 of the Communications Act: – It shall be unlawful for any common carrier to make unjust or unreasonable discrimination in charges, practices, classifications, regulations, facilities, or services for or in connection with like communications service, directly or indirectly, by any means or device, or to make or give any undue or unreasonable preference or advantage to any particular person, class of persons, or locality... “

15. AT&T cases before FCC, 1948-1968 Hush-A-Phone (1948-1956): Court rules customers can attach Hush-A-Phones to their phones Carterfone (1968): FCC rules that public can connect their own two way radio equipment, or other phone accessories, to their telephones

16. The Rand Corporation Founded in 1946 Think tank for the Air Force Most famous resident: Herman Kahn, author of On Thermonuclear War

17. Paul Baran

18. Davies concept of “packet switching” Digital messages divided up into “packets” Move through a set of “nodes” Would be part of British government’s “modernization” plan But rejected by the British post office Davies’ node model for Britain

19. Computers, circa 1966; LGP-30 (above); PDP-1 (right above); Honeywell DDP-516 (right below), which would be used as Interface Message Processors (IMPs)

20. Leonard Kleinrock with the first node of the ARPANET in 1970, an SDS-7 at the Stanford Research Institute (left) connected to a Sigma-7 (below) at UCLA

21. The Internet is a set of protocols for moving digital data from one point to another A protocol is a set of rules for correct behavior Protocols of diplomacy: – Proper greeting – Establish recognition – Standard formats for exchanging information – Standard formats for agreements or agreeing on what has or has not been decided – Standard procedures for concluding the meeting – Proper exit

22. Internet protocols Telnet: Rules for interacting with a computer through a teletype machine or terminal SMTP: Rules for sending email POP3: Rules for receiving email FTP: File Transfer Protocol: rules for sending and receiving files HTTP: Allows you to view Web pages TCP/IP: Super rules for sending “packets” through different networks

23. File Transfer Protocol and Telnet

24. 1971, ARPANET demonstrated at Washington, DC Viewers could use the PARRY chatterbot program THX-1138, 1971

25. SENDMSG READMAIL NAME@MACHINE

26. Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol (TCP/IP) TCP: Transmission Control Protocol, is the de facto standard for sending information across the Internet Your data packets have to conform to TCP standards IP: assigns Internet Protocol numbers to hosts

27. AT&T consent decree, 1956 To stop anti-trust suit, AT&T restricts its activities to those related to running the national telephone system, and special projects for the federal government. AT&T opens first trans-Atlantic telephone cable

28. Unix operating system, 1969 Leased to the public, cheap, to comply with 1956 Consent Decree No manual No tech support No upgrades No returns Lots of luck

29. Internic to Icann Agencies in charge of domain names and numbers Created the edu, gov, mil, com, org, and net conventions ICANN now run by the Department of Commerce

30. Internet privatized in 1995 1991: National Science Foundation issues “Project Development Plan” 1991: Al Gore’s High Performance Computing Act jump starts ISP technology 1995: NSF releases Internet to the public