Contextual Studies DTP

Entry 5 – Digital Invention – Flick December 16, 2009

Where did the need for email come from?

In the 1940s large companies and government agencies in the United States began installing massive computers in multiple sites. Advances through to the 1960′s led to scientists experimenting with connecting these computers together creating the first networks, then joining these networks together. These were used by programs to share tasks by talking to each other at a very basic level. Before long networks we’re linked together over larger distances using phone networks and the programmers and operators discovered that communicating with each other was becoming difficult.

Who invented email?

In the late 1960′s computer researchers found ways of sending messages to each other by making text appear on a remote screen or printer, but this was effectively just printing to a remote printer. In 1972 Ray Tomlinson decided to develop a system where messages could be sent, stored, and retrieved just like the postal service, and addressed using user_name@computer_name

Where was email first popularized

Soon after, ARPANET, the predecessor of the internet was created and adopted by the US military. By 1974 the US Military and Government had hundreds of users and military communication was revolutionized. By 1976 Arpanet had become the internet and email was adopted by commercial companies, and began expanding internationally. Email had become the single largest application on the fledgling internet, accounting for 75% of network traffic even then.