[ih] Where it All Started: Panel Discussion on the Birth of the European Internet [RIPE NCC - South East Europe 12 Meeting in Athens, Greece]

[Brian E Carpenter]

Patrik,

This reminds me of the later period when CERN had more total Internet capacity than any other site in Europe - until the day that Peter Löthberg proudly announced that he had just installed much more in Stockholm (for EBONE) than we had in Geneva. For me, that marked the real advent of significant non-research & education Internet services in Europe.

CERN in July 1995 had (looking at an ancient email from me to Peter):

"(a) total bandwidth, where we have 20 Mbps plus a 34 Mbps ATM pilot
connection, on 23 active lines.

(b) aggregate traffic, where in June 1995 we had
1321 GBytes (4917 MPackets), of which 60% was transit."

EBONE installed multiple 34 Mbps circuits in 1996 and that marked the start of the real non-academic growth spurt. Peter then got bragging rights over CERN, at least for a while.

It's worth noting, however, the EBONE was never reserved for research & education purposes, even when it started in 1992 with 256 kbps links. I strongly advise people interested in that period to read Olivier Martin's book. (See the first two items at https://ictconsulting.ch/papers.html.)

    Brian


On 18-Jun-24 20:23, Patrik Fältström via Internet-history wrote:
> It is a bit more complicated. When NorduNET was created (and the various local IP based networks in the Nordics, like SUNET) a few commercial companies were connected. When in September 1988 a fixed satellite connection was created between KTH and JvNC, an NSFNet agreement had to be signed, which disallowed non commercial traffic (I was not part of the actual discussion so others might have more details on this — I just took care of some of the technical bits). This triggered a discussion on creation of a commercial Internet provider in Sweden which the incumbent Telia refused to be part of. This in turn triggered Jan Stenbeck to (for the 2nd time) kick the behind of the incumbent (and Sweden), started SwipNet, later incorporated in Tele2, and the rest is history.
> 
> I.e. there was some commercial IP on fixed lines before the connection to NSFNet was created.
> 
> paf
> 
>> 15 juni 2024 kl. 11:36 skrev Johan Helsingius via Internet-history <internet-history at elists.isoc.org>:
>>
>> Daniele,
>>
>> I am well aware of the situation, the PTT monopolies and the "ITU
>> Regime" back in the day. That didn't stop us from running UUCP,
>> with email and netnews - but I agree, it wasn't IP and it wasn't
>> over leased lines.
>>
>>     Julf
>>
>>> On 14/06/2024 17:41, Daniele Bovio via Internet-history wrote:
>>> Julf,
>>> In 1984, when EARN was established, it was illegal in Europe to provide network services amongst different institutions/corporations within countries and across the borders because the PTTs had the monopoly of voice and data transport, so nobody could legally lease circuits amongst an heterogeneous number of sites and offer data transport services. As a matter of fact the EARN management was approached by the CEPT (the European cooperation structure of the PTTs) threatening to shut the operations down exactly for that reason. The EARN Board argued that  the purpose of the network was to allow scientists to communicate with each other, i.e. one homogeneous group: the Research and Academic Community, and eventually after a lot of arguing the CEPT allowed EARN to continue to operate.
>>> Regards
>>> Daniele Bovio
>>> -----Original Message-----
>>> From: Internet-history [mailto:internet-history-bounces at elists.isoc.org] On Behalf Of Olivier MJ Crépin-Leblond via Internet-history
>>> Sent: Thursday, June 13, 2024 4:11 PM
>>> To: Johan Helsingius <julf at julf.com>; internet-history at elists.isoc.org
>>> Subject: Re: [ih] Where it All Started: Panel Discussion on the Birth of the European Internet [RIPE NCC - South East Europe 12 Meeting in Athens, Greece]
>>> Thanks for sharing.
>>> In response to Julf's point --- wasn't it all academic to start with?
>>> In the early days, academia was leading in a few countries and EARN/NETNORTH/BITNET interfacing with local networks like JANET (where I "lived").
>>> The only alternative at the time was UUCP. (we're talking 1985-88) Kindest regards,
>>> Olivier
>>>> On 13/06/2024 14:23, Johan Helsingius via Internet-history wrote:
>>>> Yes, very interesting discussion, but very biased towards the academic
>>>> networks (understandable given the event and the panelists).
>>>>
>>>>      Julf
>>>>
>>>> On 13/06/2024 14:16, Frantisek Borsik via Internet-history wrote:
>>>>> It was share by RIPE on social media yesterday:
>>>>>
>>>>> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RAyxbwZzjTw
>>>>>
>>>>> All the best,
>>>>>
>>>>> Frank
>>>>>
>>>>> Frantisek (Frank) Borsik
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> https://www.linkedin.com/in/frantisekborsik
>>>>>
>>>>> Signal, Telegram, WhatsApp: +421919416714
>>>>>
>>>>> iMessage, mobile: +420775230885
>>>>>
>>>>> Skype: casioa5302ca
>>>>>
>>>>> frantisek.borsik at gmail.com
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