[ih] Installed base momentum (was Re: Design choices in SMTP)

[Jack Haverty]

IMHO by the early 90s, TCP had already won the competition, and 
organizations everywhere were working on transitioning to the Internet, 
or perhaps more commonly their own TCP-based corporate intranet, perhaps 
as a multiprotocol internet for a while.   Other networking technologies 
still existed in the installed base, but TCP was getting all of the 
attention.

The Web emergence in the mid 90s was possibly more a result of TCP's 
success in enabling universal connectivity rather than a cause of TCP's 
success.  Once it became obvious that TCP had "won", a company or 
technology vendor had to adapt to it, rather quickly, or die.

There were earlier technologies that provided collaborative services 
similar to those of the Web.   Lotus Notes is one I remember. Perhaps 
also services like Compuserve or LexisNexis.  IIRC, Notes was based on 
dial-up connections, not TCP.  IBM bought Lotus.   I don't know if Notes 
became part of SNA.   But they're both pretty much gone while the Web, 
based on TCP, explodes in size and reach. LexisNexis is still there, 
living on the Web.

Jack


On 2/13/23 13:03, Steven Ehrbar wrote:
> On Mon, Feb 13, 2023 at 12:40 PM Jack Haverty via Internet-history
> <internet-history at elists.isoc.org> wrote:
>> They all competed in the same market conditions.  TCP
>> didn't just become one of the "top three" in the competitive space.   It
>> became pretty much the ony one left standing.  Why did TCP/IP win?
> Because TCP/IP _didn't_ compete in the same market conditions. With
> the World Wide Web/Mosaic/Netscape in the mid-90s, TCP/IP went out and
> took over a completely different market than institutional networks,
> the market for home computers users accessing public services. And
> then all the personal computers in corporate networks had to be TCP/IP
> enabled to access the public services being built for home users.
> After which, the choice for corporations was no longer between using
> TCP/IP or some other protocol in any given department; it was whether
> they'd use TCP/IP or _both_ TCP/IP and some other protocol in any
> given department. And while installed base meant a lot of companies
> did the "both" for a while, the benefits of transitioning to just one
> were obvious.