From
an useless data exchange to a communication revolution
Despite the decentralized structure of Internet and the promises of freedom
and openness, nowadays near all the service provided is in the hand of a few owners,
configuring the network as an oligopoly of empowered companies. As well, even
though it is passing through an evolution process in terms of accessibility by
digital inclusion policies, there is still a big dark hole that impedes full access
to the network
By JANDRE BATISTA from Pelotas, BRAZIL
Open,
good. Closed, bad. The logic of George Orwell's classic book, "The Animal
Farm", as it is usually appointed, was the main logic for the construction
of World Wide Web, one of the most important elements of the Internet as we know
today. Tim Berners-Lee, 20 years ago, in the physical research center CERN (European
Organization for Nuclear Research) made possible the emergence of a communication
system capable of mixing the key concept of a transmitter and a receiver in an
horizontal communication perspective. However, if we go a bit further, 2009 also
expresses another remarkable countdown: 40 years ago, on September 2nd 1969, a
long distance data exchange made between two computers happened for the first
time in the University of California. By that time no one could possible imagine
that a non-sense information exchanged by two computers would mean 40 years later
a communication revolution comparable to the invention of the scripture or the
abstraction of mathematics and its potential useful contributions.
Following
several technological revolutions' logic, the Internet, the base of the World
Wide Web, has had its steps directed by an imminent international conflict. In
the same way war has made the man think and revolutionize his technological context
as a strategy of survival, some technological creations, in contrast, brought
good consequences. In this case, the ARPANet, a defense tool originally created
by the Advanced Research Projects Administration from the United States' Department
of Defense - an organ created in response to the soviet's special program, the
Sputnik - was the tool that made possible for you today, for example, get to know
information about what's going on in the other side of the world, share data with
friends in a few seconds or access cultural goods you just want to enjoy in this
exact moment.
Regarding
the contribution of Internet in the political sphere, it's interesting to try
to imagine the way we would be political engaged and how we could protest, if
we lived in a place where the journalists simply couldn't do their jobs and even
more, the citizen's liberty of expression were censured (as a example of what's
going on in Iran - but yet we get to know what's happening there by social media
updates and news that came from other parts of the world). In this situation,
how would you be informed 40 years ago? The way Internet changed the society for
a global communication sphere is at least relevant and each day still transforms
more our contemporary culture.
How everything started
In
the social-political context of the Cold War, the revolution started by breaking
information in packets and sending it forward through a computer network. The
architecture of the system have allowed computers to send information encoded
(in packets of data) while other computers connected to the network would be capable
of receiving and putting all the data together, in a decentralized data exchange
structure. The main idea of the program was make the information survive in a
network even if its infrastructure was destroyed by a nuclear attack.
At
first, the Arpanet was a restricted network, but little by little the universities
started to have an important role carrying out the program to its actual configuration.
Inside Arpanet many of the now common conventions were created: the "@"
and the dot com for commercial use were some of them. By 1975 there were two thousands
users connected in high tech institutions. By that time, e-mail was the main use
of the network and near no people by far was concerned about defense. While the
Pentagon was focused on this matter, the Universities were interested in the possibility
of free access. In 1979 appeared the first commercial access provider, "The
Private Club", from Time/Warner. Following this, the American Online and
Prodigy also got ahead this market slice.
While this commercial oriented
movement expanded, in 1989 Tim-Berners-Lee made real the possibility of an open
and free network where all the information could be shared and everything would
be linked, by creating the World Wide Web, the graphic version of the Internet,
accessible from a computer browser. He made the Internet more usable. How evaluate
The Time magazine, comparing the contribution of Berners-Lee to the humanity to
(almost) the invention of print by Gutenberg, "he (Berners-Lee) took a powerful
communication system that only the elite could use and turned it into a mass medium".
With the logic of the hypertext, people now can jump from one body of information
to another and gather all the data they need by just following (hyper)links.
Does
it really mean to all?
Despite
the decentralized structure of Internet and the promises of freedom and openness,
nowadays near all the service provided is in the hand of a few owners, configuring
the network as an oligopoly of empowered companies. As well, even though it is
passing through an evolution process in terms of accessibility by digital inclusion
policies, there is still a big dark hole that impedes full access to the network
(in 2008, 1,5 billion of people had access to the Internet, according to the International
Union of the Telecommunications, while there are over 6 billion people in the
whole planet) which is undoubtedly related to economical factors.
Further,
some practices such as the mass send of SPAM messages and some government's politics
of restriction of Internet access have threatened the health nature of the system.
Internet is defined by its users. In the same way people have the possibility
to access any information, or become more political engaged, there's still a lot
of useless information on the Internet, as well as new digital boundaries are
created and maintained, blocking the access to certain services or information.
Open,
good. Closed, bad. The logic of George Orwell's classic book, "The Animal
Farm", as it is usually appointed, was the main logic for the construction
of World Wide Web, one of the most important elements of the Internet as we know
today. Tim Berners-Lee, 20 years ago, in the physical research center CERN (European
Organization for Nuclear Research) made possible the emergence of a communication
system capable of mixing the key concept of a transmitter and a receiver in an
horizontal communication perspective. However, if we go a bit further, 2009 also
expresses another remarkable countdown: 40 years ago, on September 2nd 1969, a
long distance data exchange made between two computers happened for the first
time in the University of California. By that time no one could possible imagine
that a non-sense information exchanged by two computers would mean 40 years later
a communication revolution comparable to the invention of the scripture or the
abstraction of mathematics and its potential useful contributions. 
Regarding
the contribution of Internet in the political sphere, it's interesting to try
to imagine the way we would be political engaged and how we could protest, if
we lived in a place where the journalists simply couldn't do their jobs and even
more, the citizen's liberty of expression were censured (as a example of what's
going on in Iran - but yet we get to know what's happening there by social media
updates and news that came from other parts of the world). In this situation,
how would you be informed 40 years ago? The way Internet changed the society for
a global communication sphere is at least relevant and each day still transforms
more our contemporary culture.
At
first, the Arpanet was a restricted network, but little by little the universities
started to have an important role carrying out the program to its actual configuration.
Inside Arpanet many of the now common conventions were created: the "@"
and the dot com for commercial use were some of them. By 1975 there were two thousands
users connected in high tech institutions. By that time, e-mail was the main use
of the network and near no people by far was concerned about defense. While the
Pentagon was focused on this matter, the Universities were interested in the possibility
of free access. In 1979 appeared the first commercial access provider, "The
Private Club", from Time/Warner. Following this, the American Online and
Prodigy also got ahead this market slice.
Despite
the decentralized structure of Internet and the promises of freedom and openness,
nowadays near all the service provided is in the hand of a few owners, configuring
the network as an oligopoly of empowered companies. As well, even though it is
passing through an evolution process in terms of accessibility by digital inclusion
policies, there is still a big dark hole that impedes full access to the network
(in 2008, 1,5 billion of people had access to the Internet, according to the International
Union of the Telecommunications, while there are over 6 billion people in the
whole planet) which is undoubtedly related to economical factors.