[ih] what is and isn't the web, was Rise and Fall of the Gopher Protocol

[Paul Vixie]

Ofer Inbar wrote:
> SMTP and NNTP came with no auth or access control or any sort of
> security that I recall in the early days, and weren't they both
> designed consciously and deliberately for a distributed network
> with independent management of each node?

at the time smtp was defined, everyone who could make a tcp/ip 
connection to you was trustworthy. government agencies and contractors 
including universities. there was no reason to authenticate or secure it 
at that stage. the idea of netcom or alternet where someone who could 
make tcp/ip sessions toward your server might have nothing to lose (in 
terms of their internet access or their government contract) was rarely 
considered, and when it was considered, one set of folks said it was a 
bad idea and the network should remain mostly closed, and another set of 
folks said it was a great idea and we should not make the rest of 
humanity jump through any special authentication hoops in order to 
access our services. so, all of us were wrong, about everything, but 
differently.

-- 
P Vixie