[ih] XEROX/PUP and Commercialization (was Re: FYI - Gordon Crovitz/WSJ on "Who Really Invented the Internet?")

[John Day]

No, OSI committed suicide in 1979, when they decided to do the work 
jointly with the ITU.  It was just a matter of time after that.  The 
rest was just noise.

OSI was killed by its own internal conflicts.

At 9:51 -0500 2012/07/30, Guy Almes wrote:
>Bill et al.,
>   Just a short note apropos both (a) the unfortunate government 
>drive to OSI of the 1980s and (b) Milo's distinctive sense of humor.
>
>   At a late-1980s (or so) meeting of engineers from agency networks 
>and some NSFnet regional folks, we were obliged to go around the 
>table, reporting on how our networks were responding to the mandate 
>to support the (at least connectionless) OSI protocols.
>   People were routinely making polite and overly optimistic 
>statements about how progress was being made, until it was Milo's 
>turn to report for NASA.
>   "NASA", said Milo with a mostly straight face, "is going to OSI 
><pause>, and to Mars, <pause> and to Pluto.  But not necessarily in 
>that order."
>   From that moment, the meeting engaged in a greater degree of truth 
>telling, and I personally reckon the doom of OSI from that moment.
>
>	-- Guy
>
>On 7/30/12 8:23 AM, Bill Ricker wrote:
>>
>>
>>On Mon, Jul 30, 2012 at 12:06 AM, Dave Crocker <dhc2 at dcrocker.net
>><mailto:dhc2 at dcrocker.net>> wrote:
>>
>>     In any event, your extended list of government proactive efforts for
>>     TCP/IP usage are well-taken.
>>
>>     But to riff off of a phrase that Marshall Rose coined -- with enough
>>     thrust, pigs /can/ fly -- some of the alternatives would have
>>     required planetary levels of thrust.
>>
>>
>>
>>Most on the list will remember, but so far only a side reference to
>>AutoDIN-II has acknowledged that US Government support for further
>>development of TCP/IP was once not a forgone conclusion.  Shortly after
>>the TCP/IP Flagday, much of the US Government was actively hostile to
>>TCP/IP and proactively supporting OSI.
>>
>>The ISO OSI "ISORM" was mandated for civil and military procurements,
>>much as ADA was for military. I've never been clear on whether this was
>>a DOD peace treaty with NBS/NIST, or an attempt to bring NATO on-board
>>for air-land-battle interop without offending them with US-centric
>>standards, or undue influence from vendors who had greater sway in
>>ANSI/ISO commitees than in NWG's where vendor advantage was not a proper
>>concern. Probably an unholy combination. Some latterday supporters of
>>TCP/IP were in the day actively selling the on-paper elegant, in
>>practice baroque or not yet implemented, vendor-sponsored OSI style,
>>calculating how much thrust their pig would require.
>>
>>(I was a couple doors down from Mike Padlipsky in the mid-80's -- I was
>>on the periphery of the ADA vs MLS and Kernel vs Crypto battles -- so
>>had a ring-side seat as one of Mike's confidants. I am the party guilty
>>of referring his Tea Bag Papers to the PH Field-Editor, which Mike then
>>expanded into /The Elements of Networking Style/. Hence my life sentence
>>as Literary Heir.)
>>
>>Cheers (as Mike taught us to say),
>>
>>Bill Ricker
>>custodian of the Padlipsky Archive
>>@n1vux bill.n1vux at gmail.com <mailto:bill.n1vux at gmail.com>