Development of Computer Networks in History of Computing

JCR Licklider's Proposal:
- Suggested an international computer network enabling effective communication through machines.
Time-sharing Systems in 1970s:
- Development of email, multiplayer games, and forums.
- Engelbart's NLS system demonstrated promising capabilities during the Mother of All Demos; however, it was too costly.

Originated at the University of Illinois as a computer-aided instruction project.
Features:
- Networked terminals with 512x512 resolution.
- By 1975, had 950 terminals connected.
- Introduced collaborative online games, email, personal messaging, and proto-blogs.
Ultimately, too expensive for commercialization after the rise of personal computers.

BBS: Small user-hosted systems allowing communal message posting; reached 100,000 systems by 1993.
USENET: Established in 1978, acted as a global BBS with various newsgroups; boasted 265,000 users in early 1990s.

The Advanced Research Projects Agency Network (ARPANET):
- Funded multiple computing centers across the U.S.
- Developed the concept of packet switching, where data is broken into packets sent over a network.
- Inspired by telegraph relay networks.
Early Development:
- Network mail specified in 1971 using '@' sign for identifiers.
- First pilot: connected 4 nodes (UCLA, UC Santa Barbara, University of Utah, Stanford Research Institute) in 1970.
- Promoted by Larry Roberts during the first ICCC in 1972.

Developed for text transmission to modified TVs in the mid-1970s.
Gained traction due to government subsidies, notably in France with the Minitel system.
- French government funded 5 million terminals; popular for sex-chat services.

CompuServe: Initiated from excess capacity on time-sharing systems; grew to 600,000 subscribers by 1990.
Competing platforms included The Source, Prodigy, and America Online (AOL).

Launched in the late 1980s; featured a user-friendly GUI with diverse channels.
Promoted through CD and floppy disk distributions, acquiring 4.5 million subscribers by 1995.
Initially a standalone service, later provided Internet access as it expanded.

Email: Most popular ARPANET feature by 1975, exceeding 1,000 addresses.
- Evolution of communication encouraged rapid responses and language adjustments.

The term Internet signifies the interconnection of diverse networks;
- TCP/IP allowed different computers to communicate using a shared standard.
Expansion occurred mainly in the early 1990s, requiring personal computers to access the network.

Growth in Users (1990-2023):
- 1990: 30 million users
- 1995: 38.7 million users
Global Overview (2023): Over 5 billion users.

NSF Net took the lead after ARPANET, facilitating faster connections (T1 to T3).
The government initiated “Information Superhighway” to support new infrastructures.

Initially, a lack of content moderation with an educated user base.
Peer-to-peer connections without a charge model and an agnostic approach to packet data promoted network neutrality.

Need for direct item addresses led to early indexing services:
- Archie and Gopher as early web crawlers.
World Wide Web developed by Tim Berners-Lee in 1980s, finally proposed in 1989 after five years of research.

DNS introduced in 1983 for aligning IP addresses with human-readable names; managed by ICANN.
Development of Internet Service Providers post-deregulation.

Mosaic launched in 1993, garnered massive popularity leading to Netscape Navigator.
Major companies like Microsoft and AOL shifted strategies in response to web expansion, leading to the Browser Wars.

NSF Net ended in 1995, opening up the infrastructure for commercial advancements and growth in Internet nodes.