• The Internet– So simple even a child can use it. But how do we define it? A

magical portal? A gathering place? A series of tubes?

• Since there’s no tubes, let’s come up with a better definition:– The Internet is a worldwide network of computers.

• That’s it. But this network has changed the world.

• It can now be found in almost any place on the planet, even a taco stand in Mexico.

• But it’s more than that – it’s also changed how we communicate. Instead of mass communication, we’re now communicating between some or many.

• OK, some basics:– Internet site -- Where

an institution or individual establishes its Web presence.

– This could be anything from the federal government or Exxon to your own personal blog.

– This is the site of an Internet company in Israel.

• To see how the Internet began, we need to understand about early computers, which sometimes took up a whole room. This is a Univac from 1951.

• Semiconductors changed that.

• They are small silicon chips that digitize any data as a stream of on-off switches -- 1 for on, 0 for off.

• Walter Brattain, Jack Bardeen and William Shockley devised them in 1947.

• Semiconductors allowed data to be sent fast. Microchips allowed them to work even faster with little space.

• Jack Kilby, a Dallas resident from Texas Instruments, invented the microchip as well as the pocket calculator.

• He won the Nobel Prize for Physics in 2000.

• Compression– Technology that makes

a message more compact by deleting nonessential underlying code.

– Used in phone wires, allowing 51 calls to be carried on same wire.

– Dramatically increased nation’s phone capacity without adding a single wire.

• Miniaturization– Computers went from

the size of a room to fitting on your lap because of miniaturization.

– One corporation says one day all information from past 10,000 years will be stored in a six-foot cube. Library of Congress would take up two inches of space.

• ARPAnet– Advanced Research

Projects Agency Network created by Pentagon in 1969 to exchange information between contractors and universities.

– This is a 1971 map of the network.

• NSFnet– National Science

Foundation took over from Pentagon in 1983

– Expanded no. of universities, institutions could have access to this “supercomputer” to exchange information.

– By 1988, user numbers doubled in three months.

• Data packets– Made Internet system

work more efficiently.

– Data packets are clumps of digital data broken out of a larger package for transmission.

– The packets are disassembled and reassembled in a way to maximize efficiency.

• Vint Cerf, Bob Kahn– The problem with the

Internet at the time was allowing all the networks to talk to each other.

– These two UCLA researchers devised the Transmission Control Protocol, or TCP, that connects individual computer systems to the Internet.

• Fiber optics– Developed by Corning

Glass in 1960s.

– Fiber-optic cable are glass strands that can carry data as light, which could be sent theoretically at speed of light, or 186,000 miles per second.

– Not only improved Internet, but cable TV and phone service too.

• Streaming– Fiber optics allowed

much larger amounts of material to be sent.

– It paved the way for streaming video.

– Streaming is a technology that allows playback of a message to begin before all the components have arrived.

• Commercialization– Mead Data Central, an

Ohio company, was one of first to find a profit source on Net.

– In 1973, it started Lexis, which was a database of legal decisions for lawyers to have quick access.

– Nexis in 1978 added databases of newspapers, magazines.

• Internet Service Providers– In 1980s, companies

began starting up that would allow the public to access this network of supercomputers for a fee.

– CompuServ was the first, and Prodigy was an early favorite.

– Soon, though, America Online, or AOL, became the dominant company because of its ease of use.

• Did Al Gore invent the Internet?– No.

– But he was a vocal proponent of it as a senator in the 1980s.

– In 1991, he spearheaded a bill that would expand fiber-optic network and encourage the Internet, or “information superhighway” as he called it, to thrive.

– In 1999, Gore said he “took the initiative in creating the Internet,” which people mistook for inventing it.

• Tim Berners-Lee– British engineer who in

1991 devised a system that would give an address to every Internet site in the world.

– System had three parts:• Universal resource

locators, or URL

• Hypertext transfer protocol, or HTTP

• Hypertext markup language, or HTML

• HTTP is the coding that allows computers to connect.

• It begins the URL, which is the address of the site itself.

• HTML is the language that’s used as code for Web pages, telling it when to bold or italicize text, or even what color or where images or video should be.

• These are HTML earrings. Head defines what the document contains.

• Hypertext was created by Ted Nelson.

• His 1962 book Literary Machines envisioned a time when people wouldn’t read in a linear way but interrupt themselves with related thoughts.

• The Internet allowed that to happen, and his term “hypertext” stuck.

• Web browsers– In 1993, Marc

Andreessen developed Mosaic, the first Web browser.

– The software easily allowed access to anyone’s Web sites.

– Later, he co-founded Netscape, the first browser that could be used on a Mac or a PC.

• Dot-com boom– Dot-com became

shorthand for Internet commercial sites because they ended in .com.

– The 1990s saw an explosion of new material and new interest in the Internet.

– As a result, investors poured in money and many millions were made.

• Dot-com bust– In 1999-2000, a

number of those Internet startups went under, causing a national recession.

• Google– The Bay Area

company bucked that trend not by adding new content, but by searching for other content.

– With the Internet growing exponentially, Google made it easy for people to search for what they wanted.

– Ads sold with searches helped make Google $50 billion in 2007.

• Wireless– Anyone could hook up to

the Internet, but in recent years, wireless technology has taken off.

– Wireless fidelity, or wi-fi, allows computers to receive Internet access through radio waves.

– Now Starbucks, hotels, conference rooms, libraries, rest stops have wireless. Even this room probably has it.

• Muni Wireless– Some see wireless

technology as a service to buy and sell on the open market.

– However, others see wireless as a public utility, such as electricity and water.

– Some communities have established citywide wireless access, including Addison, Texas, north of Dallas.

• Bandwidth– The space available in

a medium to carry messages.

– As more people use the Internet, bandwidth must expand to accommodate demand.

– Ultrawideband, or UWB, uses existing frequencies but with much less power.

• Mesh networking– Future wireless options

include dynamic routing, where every device acts as a sender and receiver for other devices.

– Mesh networking, another name for dynamic routing, could be 15 times faster than DSL service.

• Blogs– A Web site, generally,

personal in nature, on a narrow subject – short for “Web log”

– Blogs have put a great deal of power into the hands of regular people. Anyone can create a blog and have a voice on anything: movies, politics, the media – you name it.

• Josh Marshall– Author and creator of

liberal blog talkingpointsmemo.com.

– In 2002, Marshall hammered Senate leader Trent Lott for comments about Strom Thurmond.

– The writing created a groundswell against Lott, who ended up resigning his leadership position.

• Matt Drudge– Creator of the blog The

Drudge Report, which has become influential in Washington

– Broke story of Monica Lewinsky scandal affecting President Clinton in 1998

– Popularized aggregates of news, meaning list of links to other sites about what’s happening

• Markos Moulitsas– Better known to the

blogging world as “Kos” of the site Daily Kos.

– An Army vet and Web designer, he started a blog to galvanize liberals in 2002.

– Has now become most influential liberal blog, which includes fundraising for Democratic candidates

• Adam Brickley– Started Web site in

2007 helping draft Sarah Palin for Vice President, a year before she was actually picked.

– Blog started to raise profile of Palin.

– Once chosen as Republican VP nominee, Palin thanked Brickley for his work.

• Democracy vs. Accuracy– Blogging’s strength is that it’s the essence of democracy –

everyone can have a voice. It is Milton’s “marketplace of ideas” in its purest form.

– Weakness is that anyone can say anything, whether it’s true or not. As a result, it’s easy to mislead users with false information. Users have to determine whether a site or even a posting is believable.

• YouTube– Created in 2005 by three

former PayPal employees.

– Allowed users to display their own videos.

– Caused a pop culture sensation in mere months.

– Also led to constant fights over copyright infringement.

– Bought by Google in 2006 for $1.65 billion.

• YouTube Debate– Became so popular that CNN joined YouTube in a

2007 presidential debate. Questions were posted on YouTube by regular citizens.

• Convergence– Melding of print, electronic, photographic,

other media together into digitized form

• Digital Divide– The gap in accessing

information between those who can afford Internet and those who can’t.

– 72 percent of adult Americans have broadband access

– However, 46 percent of low-income Americans have it.

– In some parts of the world, the technology is unavailable.

• $100 laptop– One idea for bridging

the digital divide is the $100 laptop.

– The idea comes from a U.S. nonprofit called One Laptop Per Child that aims to give children around the world access to information.