Posted by compiler-guy 4 days ago
— Vint Cerf, Tracking the Internet into the 21st Century <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hf0rjtnwC9A>
Al Gore Jr.'s father, the Sr., was instrumental in enacting the US Interstate Highway system:
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albert_Gore_Sr.#U.S._Senate
Which transformed the economy for physical goods. Jr saw parallels with the transportation of information, and coined a term (in 1978!) about it:
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Information_superhighway
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al_Gore_and_information_techno...
Absolutely correct — and that's not sarcasm or irony. (Gore never claimed to have "invented the Internet"; that was a calumny spread by Republicans.)
It’s astonishing, I know, but the heavily-parroted meme was always reductive and is, at this point, misnformation.
So, eleven.
The Dream Machine is a history book by M. Mitchell Waldrop that tells the story of JCR Licklider.
These women played a critical role in creating the Internet we have today.
https://web.archive.org/web/20131104212006/http://deafness.a...
> He is routinely referred to as "the father of the internet,"
There is no one else who is referred to that way. If you google "father of the Internet", Vint pops up.
https://www.inmesol.com/blog/fathers-internet/
> Vinton Cerf (Connecticut, 1943) Considered to be the founding father of the Internet.
I originally took a cue from the Wikipedia page, which says, in the opening sentence, that he is recognized as one of “the fathers of the Internet”.
I’ve since tweaked the title again to be more ambiguous, but, honestly!
> but, honesty!
Honestly I expect more maturity and less hostility from mods.
I characterize it as fulminating due to the use of capitalization (which is specifically against the guidelines), along with an overall belligerent tone.
It’s just not a cutthroat enough topic to get too insistent about. We can discuss these things in a conversational style, which is what HN is meant to be for.
Edit: I see from looking over your comments in the thread that you have a personal connection to ARPANET and Vint Cerf. That’s great and we sincerely appreciate you sharing your personal insights here. We just really want HN to be a place for curious conversation rather than belligerence, which is how your first reply came across. I can understand it may not have seemed that way to you when you wrote it and I’m sorry if there’s been a misunderstanding.
BTW if I google father of the internet I get Cerf and Kahn or it says "a father"
And none of this is really relevant because it's TFA that should determine HN titles. But for better or worse the mod has made his decision, so this is moot -- I won't comment on it further.
And man, for someone who calls something "nitpicking" to dig so deep into it ...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vint_Cerf
> Widely known as one of the “Fathers of the Internet,
https://www.internethalloffame.org/vint-cerf/
> Together with Vint Cerf, Kahn is known as "the father of the Internet." https://computerhistory.org/profile/robert-kahn/
So much for "but no one ever calls him father of the Internet."
It’s widely recognized that the internet has multiple fathers.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Where-Wizards-Stay-Up-Late/dp/06848...
(Well actually I'm listening to it not reading, maybe that's why I can't keep track of the protagonists!)
Not everyone "in the files" is in the files. For instance, Rebecca Watson is "in the Epstein Files" because Lawrence Kraus and Richard Dawkins wrote to Epstein to complain about her.