I must confess that I directly participated, aided and abetted Eternal September.
By summer 1992, I had landed my first-ever job with InterNIC Information Services. They were part of a trio (with the obscure Database Services and the notorious Registration Services by Network Solutions). IS's mission was to serve as a clearinghouse for information to the Research and Education communities who comprised the Internet in the early 90s. My crumudgeonly supervisor had an MLS degree.
Of course, due to our (800) toll-free number being published by a few very annoying national media outlets, our scope crept into the consumer dialup market. Thereafter, my job duties consisted chiefly of pulling every voicemail message as quickly as humanly possible, then photocopying or printing via SPARCprinter a document known as PDIAL, and then quickly cramming it into an envelope or FAX machine, then probably either rebooting the SPARC machine to unjam the printer, or going to listen to more voicemails.
PDIAL was a compendium of all known methods for getting onto the Information Superhighway at up to 14.4Kbit/s. Of course it included AOL and all the other walled garden, pseudo-ISPs.
So if you ever meet someone who pioneered the commercialized, privatized Internet in 1992-93, I may have been the dude who gave them directions.
By summer 1992, I had landed my first-ever job with InterNIC Information Services. They were part of a trio (with the obscure Database Services and the notorious Registration Services by Network Solutions). IS's mission was to serve as a clearinghouse for information to the Research and Education communities who comprised the Internet in the early 90s. My crumudgeonly supervisor had an MLS degree.
Of course, due to our (800) toll-free number being published by a few very annoying national media outlets, our scope crept into the consumer dialup market. Thereafter, my job duties consisted chiefly of pulling every voicemail message as quickly as humanly possible, then photocopying or printing via SPARCprinter a document known as PDIAL, and then quickly cramming it into an envelope or FAX machine, then probably either rebooting the SPARC machine to unjam the printer, or going to listen to more voicemails.
PDIAL was a compendium of all known methods for getting onto the Information Superhighway at up to 14.4Kbit/s. Of course it included AOL and all the other walled garden, pseudo-ISPs.
So if you ever meet someone who pioneered the commercialized, privatized Internet in 1992-93, I may have been the dude who gave them directions.