BIG^(TM) : The Basic Internet Guide
A Sourcebook for Learning Web Essentials
in the School, the Home and the Office
by Andis Kaulins, J.D. Stanford University
Lecturer a.D. University of Trier, Author Langenscheidt Fachverlag
(in collaboration with Chris Loehr, Erlangen)
Copyright © 2002, 2003, 2004 by Andis Kaulins. All rights reserved.

PART 1
Essential Internet Knowledge

Chapter 1
The Origins of the Digital Revolution

Page 4 - The Internet, NSF, Domains, CERN, WWW

Histories and timelines of the Internet are found at ISOC (The Internet Society).⁸

Numerous technical and other developments had to occur for the modern Internet to develop out of the original Arpanet, chief among which was the writing of the TCP Protocol by Vinton G. Cerf and Robert E. Kahn (A Protocol for Packet Network Intercommunication, IEEE Transactions on Communication, May 1974) setting out how information packets were to be delivered online. Such standards were later documented in updated form as RFC's (Requests for Comments), which themselves became Internet standards.

As written at freesoft.org:

"Requests For Comments, or RFCs, form the basis of the Internet's technical documentation....
Once issued, RFCs do not change. Protocol revisions are documented by issuing new RFCs. The older RFCs are still available, but are said to be obsoleted by the newer RFCs....
There are more than 2000 RFCs in existence, dating back to the formative stages of the ARPANET in the 1970s. Every RFC ever issued is included on this website. Newly published RFCs are mirrored here within 24 hours of their appearance on ftp.isi.edu."

NSF - NASA - The "Internet" surfaces - 1st Web Domains

In 1981 the National Science Foundation (NSF) of the United States "provided seed money for the Computer Science Network (CSNET) to connect U.S. computer science departments." See the legal basis for the connection of the NSF to the Internet.

In 1986 the National Science Foundation (NSF) and NASA took significant steps toward birth of the modern Internet. As written at NASA:

NASA provides seed money to connect Earth scientists with TCP/IP to 10 sites with a digital 56-kbps backbone using router technology. NASA Science Network (NSN) formed.
NASA, DOE, NSF and DARPA agree to establish 2 Federal Internet Exchanges (FIX-East and FIX-West). NASA provides seed money to host the FIXes. The Internet is born.
NSFNET and 5 NSF-funded supercomputer centers created. NSFNET backbone is 56 kbps.

The term "Internet" was first used in 1974 by Cerf and Kahn but came into popular use only at the end of the 1980's. The web domain name system was introduced in 1984. Electronic commerce on the Internet did not yet exist because commercial transactions required more security than the Internet could provide. Indeed, up to 1991 the NSF prohibited the use of the Internet for profit. This position was changed in 1991 because of financing considerations and because of strong public pressure to make the system available for commercial purposes.

Beginning of The World Wide Web (WWW)

In 1989 Tim Berners-Lee , then at CERN⁹ and now of the World Wide Web Consortium (w3C), proposed the original HTML (HyperText Markup Language) to link documents at physics research facilities. Berners-Lee is regarded to be the major founder of the World Wide Web. Berners-Lee, together with Robert Cailliau, wrote the first WWW browser and server together with definitions of URLs, HTTP and HTML. In 1993 Marc Andreesen and Eric Bina designed the graphics-oriented Mosaic browser (later the Netscape browser) which initially helped to make the World Wide Web popular. Browsers are the motor of the WWW.

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