Brendan McGoffin
4/15/12
ITEC Presentation
Chapter 10
Introduction: Chapter 10 “Internet Time”
Approx. 40 pgs of material
“I don’t think any of us know where this thing is going anymore but there is something exiciting happening and its big.” -William Wulf May 1993
Microsoft:
“Eating your own dog-food”
Programmers working on a section of a new product were required to submit their work to a central file at the end of each day where overnight it would be compiled along with everyone else’s into a daily “build”. As soon as it became functional members of the programming team were required to use it.
Applications:
Micosoft came out with many applications some bought from smaller companies and reworked and eventually they combined them into a suite called “Microsoft Office” By 1991 over 50 percent of Microsoft’s revenues came from applications, especially Office.
“Bundling”
The windows model was also being challenged by a competing idea, mainly from Lotus that of a single program. Running under DOS that combined spreadsheets, databases, and word processing. Lotus called their program Symphony and Jazz for the Mac.
Ashton-Tate the leading supplier of database software was also developing a similar program called Framework.
In the end it turns out that keeping applications separate while requiring each to adhere to a common graphical interface would prevail.
Microsoft, DOJ, Netscape, and others:
What eventually triggered an antitrust lawsuit was the bundling of a Web browser into Windows.
In December 1994 Microsoft paid Spyglass for a license to use its work as the basis for a Web browser which they named Internet Explorer.
Bundling the sales of two products together was seen as wrong and Microsoft eventually made available parts of the windows code that interacted with applications so developers could develop for windows.
1995 Microsoft announces that it would buy Intuit the maker of the financial program Quicken and one of the few independent suppliers of an application that had a commanding market share. However the DOJ objected and the acquisition was dropped.
1997 The bundling of internet explorer and windows made it impossible for Netscape to sell its browser. However Netscape countered by giving away its browser for free to create a standard among the internet users.
This led to Netscape selling shares to the public in 1995 which started the internet madness when the price took skyrocketed.
However with Internet Explorer 4.0 the users of the PC with windows could not easily access the Web using Netscape or any other browser. Internet Explorer 4.0 violated the Consent Decree by being tied too closely to Windows. Also because IE 4 was bundled with Windows it was practically free which cut off any revenue for other companies like Netscape.
A statement from Judge Jackson in November 1999, “there exists no commercially viable alternative to windows to which customers could switch in response to a substantial and sustained price increase or its equivalent by Microsoft.”
Author points out that, “The above quote sounds close to the statement made by a government economist after the government dropped its suit against IBM”
Hotmail and applications:
In 1995 Microsoft introduced a proprietary network called MSN in 1995 and a groupware communications system called Exchange in 1996. Both were aimed at countering America Online and Lotus Notes.
With the explosion of the web Microsoft purchased a mail program called Hotmail to counter Yahoo that offered mail, news chat, etc.
The Internet goes viral:
Author quotes: how he saw a billboard for and he then realized that the internet was no longer just for military and industry but rather entertainment, consumer spending and popular culture. “The internet had fused computing with the mainstream of social life in America.
Few commercial sites were successful throughout the dot.com boom.
Amazon and eBay however proved to be profitable.
The creators of the Internet probably didn’t think that their invention would allow for the sale of a $4.9 million jet over the internet (Ebay).
Web commercialization carried the communal spirit of the first on-line communities.
Q. Just a quick question, how many of you have bought something online? Did that online store have a comments and reviews section?
When you buy a song on iTunes or Google Play many people first look at the ratings and comments section before buying. This holds true for most consumer online stores. There is a sense of community around the objects being sold. With iTunes Ping it creates a greater sense of community. It is almost like a social networking for music that no one really uses unfortunately.
NSF (National Science Foundation)
With the network now being used for many different activities the NSF (National Science Foundation) assumed responsibility for the internet in 1990. They came up with the “Acceptable Use Policy” to help deal with how commercial firms connected to and used the net along with others. At first they put strict restrictions such as “Extensive use for private or personal business was specifically deemed unacceptable. but by 1992 they lifted them due to the rapidly growing user base.
Q. How does this play into the SOPA and various other internet bills being passed. The government tries to put strict restrictions on the internet but will the users agree and follow them? How much control should the government have over the internet? What are your views on how the government controls the internet, should it be unregulated/semi-regulated/strictly regulated?
With the restrictions lifted the internet became open for all. And there was an incredible rush of people to build companies around the internet. Too many jumped in and the bubble burst in 2001.
Linux and GNU:
Linux was created by LinusTorvalds
-At first it was a better derivative of Minix (A teaching version of Unix) but later became more of a new version of UNIX.
-Many of the properties of Linux were used to correct deficiencies from Minix
“Live Free or Die UNIX
-Trademark of Bell Labs”
Linux was created and molded by many whom Torvalds trusted.
Most members of the Linux development community have “day jobs” where their employers allow them to work on Linux as a perk.
The full set of Unix tools should be called GNU/Linux.
Many of the major players in the computer world run on open source software..
IBM, Google, Apache, etc.
In 2002 IBM devoted 20 percent of its R&D budget toward getting Linux to run on its product line.
Since then IBM has introduced a line of computers that run only Linux
Search Engines:
Search Engines: At first the most successful was Yahoo founded in 1994 by Dave Filo and Jerry Yang
There were also those who preferred brute-force search engines with complex searches using Boolean algebra to find what they wanted.
Google founded by Sergei Brin and Larry Page was successful because of the way it dealt with the retrieval of a keyword and its ranking of sites.
Funny fact about Yahoo: The owners of Yahoo considered buying Google before went public. However, at the time Yahoo decided that a few billion dollars was too much to pay to buy out their competitor .
source:
Fun fact about Google: The Google home page is so sparse because the founders did not know HTML and just wanted to create a quick interface.
Read more:
Bill Joy and Sun Microsystems:
Bill Joy of Sun Microsystems recognized a need for a programming language that would fit the times
In 1991 James Gosling along with a small team of other programmers came up with a language called Oak later renamed “Java” and was publicly announced in March 1995
Java allowed Web desiners to put the “sizzle” in their offerings. Allowed for animation, movement, and interactivity. It could also run only any computer.
“Write it once, run it anywhere: Java”
Worked best for people trying to sell on the internet but on a slow telephone connection surfers experienced the first evidence of gridlock.
GPL (General Public License)
Required anyone that used and modified it put their modifications in the public domain as well. It doesn’t prevent someone from selling the code for a profit but it does prevent them from owning the code portion of what they sell.