[ih] Domain Names

[Richard Bennett]

We're coming up on the 25th anniversary of the first domain name 
registration, that of symbolics.com on March 15, 1985. Not the first 
domain name created, but the first one registered in the fledgling 
domain name system. Since I'm too old to remember that era, I'm 
wondering if anybody has any salient observations about what the 
Internet was like before the domain name system was created. How did 
people keep track of everything?

I seem to remember a cumbersome system of bang addresses for e-mail that 
apparently arose out of UUCP, but wasn't there a more elegant system of 
naming for ARPANET and the fledgling Internet before 1985? I have the 
feeliing that there will be some events to commemorate the rise of the 
Dot Com era, and it would be nice if some of the facts were more or less 
in order.

Thanks,

RB

-- 
Richard Bennett
Research Fellow
Information Technology and Innovation Foundation
Washington, DC