|
Gianfranco Capriz
- Internet-wise
I am a Neandertaler, a specimen of the extinct breed of professors of an
established discipline, who, over half a century ago, forecasted that computers
would change scientific endeavours, if not the world, and, criticized right
and left, abetted the strangely evolved Cro-Magnon enthusiastic hominids
working on the new machinery, indifferent to academic careers.
- To prove
my addiction, Internet-wise, I can quote a visit at Arlington, more than
thirty years ago, to Bob Kahn, in his ARPA office, in an attempt (welcomed
by Bob but failed then because of Italian academic meanness) to insure
a connection of the Institute CNUCE to ARPANET via the mighty but rarely
used transatlantic cable serving the seismic net installed along all of
Norway to monitor soviet atomic tests.
- The connection
was assured otherwise years later, so the effort was not fully in vain.
As I mentioned Paleolithic eras , but contrariwise am conscious of telematic
speeds (silica still involved) , the good wish I express is that Internet
becomes the noosphere toward which Teilhard de Chardin imagined the world
would finally evolve.
VINT
CERF
- The Internet
Society was founded, in part, in the believe that a society would emerge
from the spread of access to the Internet. In this, we have not been disappointed.
- Our friends
in Italy grasped this concept early and participated in the evolution of
the Packet Satellite network that formed one of the three networks that
made up the prototype Internet in the 1980s.
- As participants
in the early stages of the Internet Society, the Italian technical community
helped to shape the Internet and the Internet Society, as it continues
to do, today.
GIOVANNI
DEGLI ANTONI
- The Internet
exists!
- People
speak about it, judge it, promote it; others criticize it.
- Then there
are those who want to regulate it. Why?
- To limit
the freedom to communicate!
- In the
labyrinth of the Internet you can find everything and anything: truth and
contradictions; and use that some considers illegal.
- Outside
the labyrinth.
- Those
who write the laws know full well how to break them.
- "The
Internet is for everyone".
- Everyone's
right to freedom judged by everyone.
- Not delegated
to others ...
- The "Internet
Society"!
ROBERT
KAHN
- The SATNET
became one of the three initial networks in the then nascent Internet.
- Prior
to this, there was a single point-to-point connection at lower speed between
the ARPANET in the US and an ARPANET node in Norway.
- A 9.6
Kbps line was connected between the node in Norway and another ARPANET
node in London.
- Germany
and Italy were the fourth and fifth participants in the project.
- CNUCE
in Pisa was the lead participant in Italy.
FRANCO
FILIPPAZZI
- Amongst
the many reflections that spring to mind on the anniversary of the Internet
Society, one is the relativity of the concept of time.
- Twenty
years is just a jot in the story of humanity, but these last 20 years have
changed the world more than many past centuries.
- And the
fundamental factor in this change has been Information and Communication
Technologies. What changes will take place in the next twenty years as
a result of ICT? Certainly they will be many and major.
- But making
prediction is difficult - as G.B.Shaw said - especially predictions about
the future.
JOY
MARINO
- Whatever
the Internet is… I must confess that after 20-25 years of daily use, I
still can't sum it up in a few words. It is communication: breaking all
barriers of space (it is everywhere), time (from one-to-one instantaneously
to one-to-many in deferred time, plus communication with the past and future
enabled by digitization of archived material), and of wealth (because the
unit cost is infinitesimal and decreasing).
- Communication
has become the mirror of our humanity, expressing all our finer qualities
and all our warts too: solidarity, altruism, the ability to socialize,
to lie or to prevaricate, the desire to share and the temptation to possess
and exclude, open-source "giving" the drive to donate and the
mania for buying and selling.
- So it
came to pass that starting out as "Internet plumbers", a profession
I am proud to belong to, we have had to learn sociology, marketing, ethics,
finance, governance and many other disciplines, without forgetting the
changes brought about in us by the mere fact of being able to interact
- freed from distance, time and cost - with two billion people.
- I could
stop there, except meanwhile "the machines have started talking to
one another", opening up horizons worthy of Von Neumann, or even Asimov
or Gibson.
- We have
created a complex living organism, which like all life forms is evolving
continuously.
ANGELO
RAFFAELE MEO
- When I
begin lessons with my students about the Internet, I think of that passage
in the gospel according to John, where he describes the "Miraculous
catch" or maybe better the "Miraculous net": "Simon
Peter pulled the net to shore, filled with 153 great fish, and though there
were so many, the net did not break".
- The net
that brought the second millennium to a close brought about not one, but
3 miracles.
- The first
was technological: two billion fish: there was a time - some of us can
remember - when getting 153 hosts to communicate was quite a task.
- The second
was the socio-economic miracle represented by a "miraculous"
product that defied the dogmas of competition and market.
- The third
was the net itself. It will soon become obvious that the Internet is the
most important invention of all time; never before has man had a tool so
powerful and effective for sharing and expanding knowledge.
- Today
the Demon, incarnated as the captains of industry and the gurus of hyper-liberal
economics, wants to destroy the miracle in the name of an ancient dogma:
"Privatize, privatize, privatize".
- In the
face of such a threat, all we can say to the Internet is: "Resist,
Resist, Resist".
STEFANO
TRUMPY
- This major
anniversary makes me realize the amazing impact that technological innovation
has had and will have on human society.
- The Internet
grew out of research networks, as a tool to improve efficiency, international
collaboration and cooperation among researchers. Today the Internet, the
means by which all networks are joined, is one of the most powerful symbols
of modern civilization and the engine of the Information Society.
- So important
and omnipresent is the Internet that Internet governance was set up, dealing
with technological issues, including legal and regulatory questions, economic
aspects, the impact on modern society and the daily life of individuals.
- The Internet
as a tool for a new humanism? I'd like to think so… and every day I am
more and more amazed at what it can do.
ENZO
VALENTE
- The Internet
is a discovery, not an invention.
- It is
like fire: once it is discovered, you can no longer say it doesn't exist.
Nor can anyone tell you to put it out.
- Prometheus
belonged to the world of scientific research, as his name ("forethinker")
tell us, he thought and reasoned about what he observed.
- And Zeus,
who had the power at the time, tried to inflict the harshest punishment
on him, but he couldn't prevent men from benefitting from Prometheus' discoveries.
- But, like
fire, the Internet must be controlled. Controlled by those who use it.
- The Internet
must be for all and all must become its vestals and Research Retwork continue
its watch dog function.
|
