The Story of the Internet

讀完了這本小說，發現它說的並非只是the story of the internet；從第一個computer network的催產(因為那時美蘇冷戰，科學的競賽，美國輸蘇聯，第一個人造衛星的發射)，到internet的出生，personal computer的發展，World Wide Web的出現，Netscape為網路的browser，Yahoo!的誕生；感覺像是近代電腦的發展史!當然沒有最原始的東西，又怎會有更後面的發展?科技就是從最基礎的開始，慢慢向上疊高!
牛頓說:「如果我看的比別人遠,是因為我站在巨人的肩上。 」
現在的我們又站在哪裡呢?摩天大樓的頂端吧!
有些書中所提人物的對話，讓我覺得好笑，有些卻又覺得很有道理；書中的人物都是engineers或scientists，所以更心有戚戚焉吧!
其實也許你們會很難理解，做實驗或像書中的人多是寫程式；那種成品出來就像是自己的孩子(想不出更好的形容詞XD)若被別人盜用，感覺還真不是滋味；若是被人買下，雖然可能拿到很多錢，卻又擔心自己原來的構想會被改到完全不存；最後可能決定不賣，像Yahoo!。
其實很多東西一開始的構想，不過是自己希望能將使用的方式變的更方便、普及至一般民眾的家中或只是自己的興趣；結果卻成為一種流行!
書是2000年出的，現在已過了五年；現今的部落格blog，就像當初的Internet一般，大量的被使用，也許在過不久，關於"部落格"的書也會出現!(之前有在ebrary發現一本關於Google的書)
We've got a problem.
What's that?
We're throwing money away.We're paying different people all over the USA to do exactly the same work.
What's wrong with them? Haven't they heard of the telephone? Don't they go to conferences? We pay for them to go to conferences. Why don't they just tell each other what they're doing?
That's not the probelm. Of course our people talk to each other. The trouble is that their computers don't.
Their computers don't talk? What do you mean?
'A million dollars!' he said to himself.'And that only took twenty minutes! Why didn't I ask for more?'
'It's a little like seeing your parents invite to dinner someone else that you've never met. You don't pay much attention until you discover that they actually want you to marry this strange person'
Ray Tomlinson has left his mark on every single one of the billions of e-mails that have been sent since 1972. He was the person who chose the "@" sign which means 'at' in e-mail address.
'Well, at that time no one had an "@"sign in their names, says Tomlinson. 'I'm not sure that that is still true, because there are a lot of strangely spell names out there now.'
Internet meant ' a network of networks'.
Yahoo!'s creators, Jerry Yang and Dave Filo, met at Standford University. Today Jerry says' I wasn't really ready to work. I had a good degree but I didn't have the experience and I wasn't grown-up enough for it. I wasn't even twenty-one. So I looked for ways to stay in school.' Dave Filo felt the same way. Dave was a little older than Jerry and in fact he had once been Jerry's teacher-'He gave me a B!' complains Jerry, who uesd to getting As.
Jerry gratefully remembers that Dave did all the work: 'He wrote the whole program. I didn't do anything. So I knew then that I was going to work with him more often.'
Dave is a brilliant engineer, Jerry is a brilliant talker. Dave is messy, Jerry is neat. When one can't do something, the other probably can. But Jerry say that Yahoo! started because he always felt 'about half a step behind' Dave on the Internet: ' Dave alwasys had this talent for finding things. I was always trying to find out how he knew everything.'
After a few weeks, Jerry decided to change the name of the site Jerry's Guide to the World Wide Web to David and Jerry's Guide to the World Wide Web.
'Why are you changing it' said Dave. 'I don't want my name on it!'
' I know,' said Jerry. 'That's why I did it. Now you'll have to think of a better name.'
At first Dave only knew that the name had to start with Y-A. Lots of his favorite computer programs were' Ya-something', because the authors were often too exhausted to invent an original name by the the time they had finished the program. So they just called it ' Yet Another' news-reader, or ' Yet Another' e-mail program.
Dave and Jerry sat down with a dictionary.
'Ya-'
'Yataghan!'
'Yataghan??'
'Yes." A type of Turkish short sword with a double curved balde".'
'How about "Yankee"?'
'Or"Yang"?'
'Very funny.'
Eventually they decided on ' Yahoo' just liked the sound of it.