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Inventing the Internet
Abbate J., MIT Press, Cambridge, MA, 1999. Type: Book (9780262011723)
Date Reviewed: Aug 1 1999

Abbate explores how collaboration and conflict among a remarkable group of agencies and individuals resulted in the Internet as we know it today. She focuses on the cultural and social factors that influenced the Internet’s design and use. She chronicles the road from a single experimental network serving a dozen sites in the United States in the 1960s to a globe-spanning World Wide Web system linking millions of computers in the 1990s.

Throughout the book, the author focuses on what she identifies as the most important social and cultural factors that shaped the Internet. In chapter 1, Abbate describes the development of packet switching, the main technique used in the Internet, as a case study of how technologies are socially constructed. Chapter 2 depicts the creation of the ARPANET and discusses the significance of the US Department of Defense’s Advanced Research Projects Agency’s unique system-building strategies. In chapter 3, the author recounts the struggles of the ARPANET’s early users to find some practical applications for this infrastructure and their eventual success with electronic mail. Chapter 4 describes the unusual convergence of defense and research interests that resulted in the creation of the Internet and discusses the overlooked role of the military in the transition from ARPANET to Internet technology. In chapter 5, Abbate places the Internet in the context of contemporary networking efforts around the world, examining the ways in which technical standards can be used as social and political instruments. Chapter 6 surveys the complex events and interactions that transformed the Internet into a commercially based popular medium in the 1990s and the accompanying fragmentation of control among diverse communities of producers and users. The author concludes that the emergence of new applications such as the World Wide Web continues the trend of informal, decentralized, user-driven development that characterized the Internet’s earlier history.

In telling the story of the Internet, the author also fills the gap in historical writing regarding computers. While much of the literature on the history of computing has focused on changes in hardware, the achievements of individual inventors, and the strategies of commercial firms, few authors have looked at the social shaping of computer communications as well as the origins of computer technologies. Abbate successfully demonstrates that social dynamics came into play during their creation, and that users can take an active role in defining their features.

This book should be a required text for introductory courses on computer technology design as a basis for the history of computer technology. Even individuals interested in computer technology as a hobby or just curious about the Internet’s origins will find this book understandable, fascinating, and educational.

Reviewer:  Laurie Finn Review #: CR122458 (9908-0588)
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