[ih] Commercial ISPs (Re: Some Questions over IPv4 Ownership)

[Jack Haverty]

Sure doesn't give any insight to me.  But I'm not a lawyer.  Maybe it's
kind of like real estate, where there's a whole industry - Title
Companies - that figure out who owns what.  At least enough to issue
insurance.

/Jack

On Tue, 2010-10-12 at 16:53 -0400, Craig Partridge wrote:
> > But when all these initial non-research-project ISPs and customers were
> > starting out, how were the legal issues framed?  Maybe the old contracts
> > or licenses or MOUs or whatever would shed some light.  /Jack
> 
> CSNET was initially funded as an NSF project in cooperation with DARPA with
> the project requiring that CSNET be self-supporting within a certain number
> of years.
> 
> CSNET had paying customers ("members") from the start -- the NSF money was
> used to cover the shortfall in the initial years.
> 
> So there was a contract with NSF (actually, two contracts, because I believe
> NSF contracted with UCAR and UCAR contracted operations to BBN), and an
> agreement between DARPA and NSF that CSNET could attach to ARPANET and
> relay traffic.
> 
> Not sure that gives any insight into IP addressing...
> 
> Thanks!
> 
> Craig
> 
> > 
> > On Tue, 2010-10-12 at 16:10 -0400, Craig Partridge wrote:
> > > > On 10/12/2010 15:00 EDT, Ofer Inbar wrote:
> > > > > On Mon, Oct 11, 2010 at 08:03:49PM -0700,
> > > > > jfh <jack at 3kitty.org> wrote:
> > > > >> Somewhere along the line, commercial ISPs popped into being.  I'm
> > > > >> not sure who was first, but my recollection is that this happened as
> > > > >> spinoffs from NSFNet and/or CSNet.  Again, there must have been some
> > > > >> kind of agreements between those commercial entities and a piece of
> > > > >> the government, detailing the rules about ownership.  These first
> > > > >> ISPs were different because they were not research collaborators.
> > > > >> They were in business simply to make money selling Internet service.
> > > > > 
> > > > > Software Tool & Die's (aka "the World") was the first commercial
> > > > > consumer ISP, and UUNET was the first commercial IP network provider -
> > > > > who sold IP service to STD.
> > > > 
> > > > The way I remember it:
> > > > 
> > > > STD provided Internet services but they were not a network.
> > > > 
> > > > UUNET was a non-profit exchange, not a network, until 1990 (?)
> > > > 
> > > > PSINet was started as a network, with NYSERNet members as an instant
> > > > installed base, in 1989.
> > > 
> > > CSNET started in 1981 with a goal of achieving profitability within a few
> > > years (which it achieved).  NSFNET modeled the NSF regional networks, in
> > > part, on the CSNET model.
> > > 
> > > Thanks!
> > > 
> > > Craig
> > 
> ********************
> Craig Partridge
> Chief Scientist, BBN Technologies
> E-mail: craig at aland.bbn.com or craig at bbn.com
> Phone: +1 517 324 3425