[ih] Ken Olsen's impact on the Internet

[John Day]

At 11:41 -0600 2011/02/14, Larry Sheldon wrote:
>On 2/14/2011 9:26 AM, Miles Fidelman wrote:
>>Eric Gade wrote:
>>>On Mon, Feb 14, 2011 at 1:43 PM, Miles Fidelman
>>><mfidelman at meetinghouse.net <mailto:mfidelman at meetinghouse.net>> wrote:
>>>
>>>OSI was an attempt to impose a classical, top-down, standards approach
>>>
>>>It is my understanding that a top-down process is fairly uncommon as
>>>far as the formation of international technical standards are
>>>concerned, and that OSI was abberant in this regard.
>>Really? With the exception of IETF standards, I've seen pretty much
>>everything else get written by committee, then promulgated, then fixed
>>in later revisions.
>>
>>As far as I can tell, the bottom-up model, based on "rough consensus and
>>running code," as well as multiple interoperable implementations - with
>>a very slow progression from experimental to recommended to mandatory -
>>is unique to IETF.
>
>That would be an interesting thing to study.  Seems  to me, just off 
>the top of my head, that an awful lot of the important inventions 
>went from "wow, look at how neat this is" to "I wonder if there is a 
>way to make use of (aka if there is a way to turn a buck or bead or 
>clam or ...) this.  Not the other way around.
>
>Who do you reckon was funding the Committee To Develop A Way To Cook Meat?
>--

You miss the point.  It is not about developing technology but 
standards.  Why would one want to standardize cooking meat?

In networks, it was clear at the beginning that standards were necessary.

Note that computer standards were done before networks but were not 
that important nor followed that closely.  FORTRAN and COBOL differed 
immensely between systems.  There was no real agreement on character 
set.  But the ARPANET needed a NWG immediately what it came up with 
had to be followed closely or nothing worked.

In general, companies detest standards and see them as a necessary evil.