Historic maps of the (proto) internet: cypergeography from 1969 to 1991
June 23, 2017 11:25 AM   Subscribe

An Atlas of Cyberspaces: Historical Maps of Computer Networks A vintage Web 1.0-style webpage with "a range of the historical maps of ARPANET, the Internet, Usenet, and other computer networks, tracing how these pioneering networks grew and developed." See also: ARPANET Maps from December 1969 to July 1977, plus a logical map from March 1977, and a collection of ARPAnet Logical maps for 1969-1979. A number of these maps were pulled from the 1981 ARPANET Completion Report (scanned PDF with OCR).
posted by filthy light thief (5 comments total) 38 users marked this as a favorite
 
For another sense of scale, jump to page III-75 (PDF page 125) in the ARPANET Completion Report, for the graph of "ARPANET HOST INTERNODE TRAFFIC" measured in packets per day, from Jan. 1972 to Jan. 1977.
posted by filthy light thief at 11:26 AM on June 23, 2017


Also, this is tangentially via Dark Roasted Blend, where I saw this "Map of the Internet in 1973," so I went looking for more context.
posted by filthy light thief at 11:43 AM on June 23, 2017


Mm these are delicious. I remember when Martin Dodge first started posting his work in the mid 90s and it seemed so radical. What did it mean to apply cartography to virtual space? He did an excellent job at the time collecting what was done and putting it in context. I still have my copy of his book, written with Rob Kitchin.

Somewhere in a folder I have a bunch of copies of Steve McGeady's old UUCP maps. I don't think they've ever been properly curated.
posted by Nelson at 12:37 PM on June 23, 2017 [1 favorite]


My interest is in hardware, as I worked on telecommunications equipment in the 70's and 80's.
I went down the rabbit-hole after 2 pieces of information.

One came from looking at the 1972 map and trying to figure out all the acronyms.
I saw SDC had a 370-145 (which was brand new at that time) and wondered what an SDC was. I saw it on the second-oldest map, the first expansion.
Wiki's disambiguation #24 shows System Development Corporation which has an interesting history.
Starting as part of RAND, is was sold to Burroughs, then to Sperry, to Unisys, to Paramax, to Loral, to Lockheed Martin, and most recently to L-3 Communications.
...and then it was off the ARPANET maps after July 1976. Surprising.

The other question was what were the hardware connections back before fiber?
Looks like 56KB leased lines, mostly from AT&T Long Lines. I would guess V.35 modems, from what I used to see in data centers.
Also some satellite connections as early as 1975.

In the PDF section on observations, I noted the section on problem determination when a terminal wasn't working.
Always fun. So many vendors to point fingers at each other.
posted by MtDewd at 5:21 AM on June 24, 2017 [2 favorites]


Fingers itch for Telehack now...
posted by Ogre Lawless at 12:39 AM on June 25, 2017


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