Cerf: Turning Off Pieces of the 'Net 'Not Sensible'
In an exclusive interview, the Internet 'father' explains how he helped commercialize the Web and what he's doing now at Google.
Thu, September 17, 2009
InfoWorld — Vinton Cerf probably needs no real introduction, having been a codesigner of the basic architecture of the Internet and of the TCP/IP protocol that makes the Internet possible. He is even known as a "father of the Internet." Cerf appeared at an IEEE event in Silicon Valley last night to celebrate the 40th anniversary of DARPAnet, a forerunner to the Internet, and the 125th anniversary of IEEE itself. InfoWorld Editor at Large Paul Krill spoke with Cerf about a variety of Internet topics, including government legislation that could give the president greater authority over the Internet. Cerf also discussed his career with the now world-changing Internet.
The Web At 40: Online World Stills Surprises 'Net Pioneer
The Internet is Incomplete, Says Its Co-Designer, Vinton Cerf
InfoWorld: When you participated in development of Internet technologies, did you think the Internet would ever materialize into what it's become today?
Cerf: The honest short answer, of course, is no, but the honest longer answer is we did know -- Bob Metcalfe and I, anyway -- knew in 1973 that we had an incredibly powerful technology here. We'd already had a lot of experience with Doug Engelbart's work at SRI and a lot of other things that we don't have time to go into, so we both knew that whatever it is that was going to happen, we had very powerful stuff. Then the question was would it be something that could be rolled out to the rest of the world? We didn't know for sure but when we worked on it, we decided not to patent, not to copyright, not to control, but to share everything we knew about the Internet design to the general public all around the world. What's amazing is that it was a Defense Department project and we were in the middle of the Cold War. In spite of all that, we made all of this completely available to everybody and the only reason it was possible is nobody paid any attention to us.
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InfoWorld: Legislation has been proposed that would give the government power to take control over private networks on the Internet in the event of an emergency. Do you think the government has too much control over the Internet? [Editor's note: The bill in question recently has been revised, appearing to tone down language pertinent to presidential powers.]
