History and development of the Internet The Internet is a global computer network that connects millions and millions of users around the world. (Leiner, 2). It has become one of the fastest growing forms of communication today. (Marshall, 1). The Internet began as a Cold War experiment by the Department of Defense in the 1950s. (American Academic, 225). The government needed a way to transmit information between the tanks and headquarters, so APRA (Advanced Research Projects Agency) looked for a way to allow signals from the battlefield to reach a headquarters computer using satellites and radio signals. At the same time the nation's command posts were located deep underground in the mountains for fear of nuclear war. (Diamond, 3). Paul Baran, working for the US Air Force, developed a network capable of redirecting itself to circumvent damage caused by an intercontinental ballistic missile impact using "connectivity redundancy". This meant that in the event of a network outage the server rerouted the information to an alternate route through a new technique called "packet switching". Packet switching is a means of breaking the sent message into small packets carrying enough information to search for its destination and sending them separately to the destination server. The message after being split would take separate paths to the destination and then be reassembled by the computer on the server to which the message was sent. This was good because with more than one path for information to travel, the enemy had no central point to target their attack to disrupt the lines of communication and in the event of a line disruption the information could still travel. (Diamond, 4). This interested APRA enough to fund research and development of an experimental computer network with the hope of demonstrating the feasibility of operating computers remotely from the battlefield. Vinton Cerf, also known as "The Father of the Internet", a graduate student working at UCLA became interested in the 4-node APRAnet and in 1973 developed the first TCP/IP (Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol) software. (Leiner, 4). The TCP/IP software converts messages into streams, transmits them to acro... middle of paper ......and the controversial newsgroups (until then the network had kept everything). Some systems had refused to handle controversial newsgroups like net.rec.drugs, so the ".alt" (alternative) hierarchy was created. (Diamond, 12)After the development and merger of APRAnet and Usenet, the Internet began to grow exponentially. (Diamond, 11). The Internet has evolved from a small government project to the fastest growing form of communication it is today. (Blom, 2) Bibliography "Internet". American Academic Encyclopedia. 1996.Diamond, Edwin and Stephen Bates. “The Ancient History of the Internet.” American heritage. October 1995: pp. 34+. In Social Issues Resource Series, Inc. History - Article # 17.Blom, Eric. “Ruts in the Rural Information Highway.” Maine Sunday Telegram (Portland, ME). CDNewsbank. April 12, 1998.Mashall, Joshua Micah. “Will Free Speech Get Caught in the Net?” American Prospect.Gen./February 1998: pp. 46-50. In Social Issues Resource Series, Inc. Internet,Censorship - Article no. 1.Leiner, Barry. "A Brief History of the Internet." December 17, 1998.http://www.isoc.org/internet-history/brief.html