[ih] infrastructure history [was: who invented the Internet]

[Larry Sheldon]

On 7/25/2012 7:09 PM, Miles Fidelman wrote:
> It really is disturbing how some folks pretend that government had no
> role in <name your infrastructure>.
>
> Seems to me that there's an ongoing historical pattern:
>
> Roads
> Waterworks
> Railroads (land grants, Army protection)
> Telegraph (right-of-way grants, Army protection)
> Telephone (right-of way grants)
> Airplanes and Airlines (defense purchases spawned the aircraft industry,
> Air Mail spawned air freight and passenger service)
> Radio and Telephone (airwave grants)
> and so on......
>
> Miles Fidelman

The question here is "what is 'government'?".

Is it some ethereal source of funding and wisdom the alone gets things done?

Or is it the product of individuals pooling resources toward some common 
goal?

I think for a long time it tends to the former, and most of what gets 
done, gets done in spite of it, not because of it.

Most of the things in the list were first done by individuals and small 
groups of individuals, much of it in bitter opposition to the government.

Some of the stuff in that list is proof of just how satupid and 
short-sighted government can be and is.
-- 
Requiescas in pace o email           Two identifying characteristics
                                         of System Administrators:
Ex turpi causa non oritur actio      Infallibility, and the ability to
                                         learn from their mistakes.
ICBM Data:  http://g.co/maps/e5gmy        (Adapted from Stephen Pinker)