Robert H'obbes' Zakon
Internet Evangelist
Murphy's note: This is a very detailed timeline of the development of the internet. Don't let jargon or technical issues get in your way of getting a feel for how the internet came into being.
Internet growth:
Date Hosts | Date Hosts Networks Domains
----- --------- + ----- --------- -------- ---------
12/69 4 | 07/89 130,000 650 3,900
06/70 9 | 10/89 159,000 837
10/70 11 | 10/90 313,000 2,063 9,300
12/70 13 | 01/91 376,000 2,338
04/71 23 | 07/91 535,000 3,086 16,000
10/72 31 | 10/91 617,000 3,556 18,000
01/73 35 | 01/92 727,000 4,526
06/74 62 | 04/92 890,000 5,291 20,000
03/77 111 | 07/92 992,000 6,569 16,300
12/79 188 | 10/92 1,136,000 7,505 18,100
08/81 213 | 01/93 1,313,000 8,258 21,000
05/82 235 | 04/93 1,486,000 9,722 22,000
08/83 562 | 07/93 1,776,000 13,767 26,000
10/84 1,024 | 10/93 2,056,000 16,533 28,000
10/85 1,961 | 01/94 2,217,000 20,539 30,000
02/86 2,308 | 07/94 3,212,000 25,210 46,000
11/86 5,089 | 10/94 3,864,000 37,022 56,000
12/87 28,174 | 01/95 4,852,000 39,410 71,000
07/88 33,000 | 07/95 6,642,000 61,538 120,000
10/88 56,000 | 01/96 9,472,000 93,671 240,000
01/89 80,000 | 07/96 12,881,000 134,365 488,000
| 01/97 16,146,000 828,000
| 07/97 19,540,000 1,301,000
*** see Note below ***
Hosts = a computer system with registered ip address (an A record)
Networks = registered class A/B/C addresses
Domains = registered domain name (with name server record)
Note: A more accurate survey mechanism was developed in 1/98; new and
some corrected numbers are shown below. For further info, see
Sources section.
Date Hosts | Date Hosts | Date Hosts
----- ----------- + ----- ----------- + ----- -----------
01/95 5,846,000 | 01/97 21,819,000 | 01/99 43,230,000
07/95 8,200,000 | 07/97 26,053,000 | 07/99 56,218,000
01/96 14,352,000 | 01/98 29,670,000 |
07/96 16,729,000 | 07/98 36,739,000 |
Worldwide Networks Growth: (I)nternet (B)ITNET (U)UCP (F)IDONET (O)SI
____# Countries____ ____# Countries____
Date I B U F O Date I B U F O
----- --- --- --- --- --- ----- --- --- --- --- ---
09/91 31 47 79 49 02/94 62 51 125 88 31
12/91 33 46 78 53 07/94 75 52 129 89 31
02/92 38 46 92 63 11/94 81 51 133 95 --
04/92 40 47 90 66 25 02/95 86 48 141 98 --
08/92 49 46 89 67 26 06/95 96 47 144 99 --
01/93 50 50 101 72 31 06/96 134 -- 146 108 --
04/93 56 51 107 79 31 07/97 171 -- 147 108 --
08/93 59 51 117 84 31
Date Sites | Date Sites | Date Sites
----- ---------- + ----- ---------- + ----- ----------
06/93 130 | 04/97 1,002,512 | 10/98 3,358,969
09/93 204 | 05/97 1,044,163 | 11/98 3,518,158
10/93 228 | 06/97 1,117,255 | 12/98 3,689,227
12/93 623 | 07/97 1,203,096 | 01/99 4,062,280
06/94 2,738 | 08/97 1,269,800 | 02/99 4,301,512
12/94 10,022 | 09/97 1,364,714 | 03/99 4,389,131
06/95 23,500 | 10/97 1,466,906 | 04/99 5,040,663
01/96 100,000 | 11/97 1,553,998 | 05/99 5,414,325
06/96 252,000 | 12/97 1,681,868 | 06/99 6,177,453
07/96 299,403 | 01/98 1,834,710 | 07/99 6,598,697
08/96 342,081 | 02/98 1,920,933 | 08/99 7,078,194
09/96 397,281 | 03/98 2,084,473 | 09/99 7,370,929
10/96 462,047 | 04/98 2,215,195 | 10/99 8,115,828
11/96 525,906 | 05/98 2,308,502 | 11/99 8,844,573
12/96 603,367 | 06/98 2,410,067 | 12/99 9,560,866
01/97 646,162 | 07/98 2,594,622 |
02/97 739,688 | 08/98 2,807,588 |
03/97 883,149 | 09/98 3,156,324 |
Sites = # of web servers (one host may have multiple sites by
using different domains or port numbers)
USENET Growth:
Date Sites ~MB ~Posts Groups | Date Sites ~MB ~Posts Groups
---- ----- --- ------ ------ + ---- ------- --- ------ ------
1979 3 2 3 | 1987 5,200 2 957 259
1980 15 10 | 1988 7,800 4 1933 381
1981 150 0.05 20 | 1990 33,000 10 4,500 1,300
1982 400 35 | 1991 40,000 25 10,000 1,851
1983 600 120 | 1992 63,000 42 17,556 4,302
1984 900 225 | 1993 110,000 70 32,325 8,279
1985 1,300 1.0 375 | 1994 180,000 157 72,755 10,696
1986 2,200 2.0 946 241 | 1995 330,000 586 131,614
~ approximate: MB - megabytes per day, Posts - articles per day
Security (CERT) Incidents:
1988 1989 1990 1991 1992 1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999
+ ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ----
Inc | 6 132 252 406 773 1334 2340 2412 2573 2134 3734 6844(-3Q)
Adv | 1 7 12 23 21 19 15 18 27 28 13 17
Vul | 171 345 311 262 268(-3Q)
(Inc)idents, (Adv)isories, (Vul)nerabilities
If you are interested in translating to another language or format, email me first
Hobbes' Internet Timeline was compiled from a number of sources, with some
of the stand-outs being:
Cerf, Vinton (as told to Bernard Aboba). "How the Internet Came to Be."
This article appears in "The Online User's Encyclopedia," by Bernard Aboba.
Addison-Wesley, 1993.
Hardy, Henry. "The History of the Net." Master's Thesis, School of
Communications, Grand Valley State University.
http://www.ocean.ic.net/ftp/doc/nethist.html
Hardy, Ian. "The Evolution of ARPANET email." History Thesis, UC Berkeley.
http://server.berkeley.edu/virtual-berkeley/email_history
http://www.ifla.org/documents/internet/hari1.txt
Hauben, Ronda and Michael. "The Netizens and the Wonderful World of the Net."
http://www.columbia.edu/~hauben/netbook/
Kulikowski, Stan II. "A Timeline of Network History." (author's email below)
Quarterman, John. "The Matrix: Computer Networks and Conferencing Systems
Worldwide." Bedford, MA: Digital Press. 1990
"ARPANET, the Defense Data Network, and Internet". Encyclopedia of
Communications, Volume 1. Editors: Fritz Froehlich, Allen Kent.
New York: Marcel Dekker, Inc. 1991
Internet growth summary compiled from:
- Zone program reports maintained by Mark Lottor at:
ftp://ftp.nw.com/pub/zone/
Note: A more accurate host counting mechanism was used starting
with 1/98 count.
- Connectivity table maintained by Larry Landweber at:
ftp://ftp.cs.wisc.edu/connectivity_table/
- ARPAnet maps published in various sources
WWW growth summary compiled from:
- Web growth summary page by Matthew Gray of MIT:
http://www.mit.edu/people/mkgray/net/web-growth-summary.html
- Netcraft at http://www.netcraft.com/survey/
USENET growth summary compiled from Quarterman and Hauben sources above,
and news.lists postings. Lots of historical USENET postings also provided
by Tom Fitzgerald (fitz@wang.com).
CERT growth summary compiled from CERT reports at ftp://ftp.cert.org/
CERT stats are also now being made available by CERT at
http://www.cert.org/stats/cert_stats.html
Many of the URLs provided by Arnaud Dufour (arnaud.dufour@hec.unil.ch)
Country-specific Internet Histories:
- Australia - "A Brief History of the Internet in Australia" by Roger Clarke
http://www.anu.edu.au/people/Roger.Clarke/II/OzIHist.html
- Australia - "It Started with a Ping" by Jennie Sinclair
http://www.aarnet.edu.au/corporate/history/sinclair.html
- Brazil - "Linha to Tempo da Internet no Brasil" by Érico Guizzo
http://www.lsi.usp.br/~emguizzo/inetbr/
- UK - "Early Experiences with the ARPANET and INTERNET in the UK" by Peter Kirstein
http://www.cs.ucl.ac.uk/staff/jon/arpa/internet-history.html
Additional books of interest:
- "Weaving the Web : The Original Design and Ultimate Destiny of the World Wide Web by its Inventor"
by Tim Berners-Lee
- "Where Wizards Stay Up Late: The Origins of the Internet"
by Katie Hafner & Matthew Lyon
http://www.fixe.com/wizards/
- "Nerds 2.0.1: A Brief History of the Internet"
by Stephen Segaller
- "Architects of the Web: 1,000 Days That Built the Future of Business"
by Robert H. Reid
- "Netizens: On the History and Impact of Usenet and the Internet"
by Michael Hauben et al
- "Exploring the Internet: A Technical Travelogue"
by Carl Malamud
Early works of interest:
- "As We May Think" by Vannevar Bush, 1945
http://www.theatlantic.com/unbound/flashbks/computer/bushf.htm
- "Man-Computer Symbiosis" by J.C.R. Licklider, 1960
http://gatekeeper.dec.com/pub/DEC/SRC/research-reports/abstracts/src-rr-061.html
If you have any old Internet/ARPAnet/*net paraphernalia/reports you no longer
want, drop me an email; if it's free, I'll likely take it off your hands.
---
Contributors to Hobbes' Internet Timeline have their initials next to the
contributed items in the form (:zzz:) and are:
ad1 - Arnaud Dufour (arnaud.dufour@hec.unil.ch)
amk - Alex McKenzie (mckenzie@bbn.com)
bb1 - Billy Brackenridge (billyb@microsoft.com)
clg - C. Lee Giles (giles@research.nj.nec.com)
dk1 - Daniel Karrenberg (Daniel.Karrenberg@ripe.net)
ec1 - Eric Carroll (eric@enfm.utcc.utoronto.ca)
esr - Eric S. Raymond (esr@locke.ccil.org)
feg - Farrell E. Gerbode (farrell@is.rice.edu)
gck - Gary C. Kessler (kumquat@hill.com)
glg - Gail L. Grant (grant@glgc.com)
gmc - Grant McCall (g.mccall@unsw.edu.au)
gst - Graham Thomas (G.S.Thomas@uel.ac.uk)
irh - Ian R Hardy (hardy@uclink2.berkeley.edu)
jap - Jean Armour Polly (mom@netmom.com)
jg1 - Jim Gaynor (gaynor@agvax.ag.ohio.state.edu)
kf1 - Ken Fockler (fockler@hq.canet.ca)
lb1 - Larry Backman (backman@ultranet.com)
lhl - Larry H. Landweber (lhl@cs.wisc.edu)
mpc - Mellisa P. Chase (pc@mitre.org)
pb1 - Paul Burchard (burchard@cs.princeton.edu)
pds - Peter da Silva (peter@baileynm.com)
ph1 - Peter Hoffman (hoffman@ece.nps.navy.mil)
rab - Roger A. Bielefeld (rab@hal.cwru.edu)
sc1 - Susan Calcari (susanc@is.internic.net)
sk2 - Stan Kulikowski (stankuli@uwf.bitnet) - see sources section
sw1 - Stephen Wolff (swolff@cisco.com)
tb1 - Tim Burress (tim@twics.com)
tp1 - Tim Pozar (pozar@kumr.lns.com)
twc - Thomas W. Creedon - K'o Wei Li (tcreedon@yahoo.com)
vgc - Vinton Cerf (vcerf@isoc.org) - see sources section
wz1 - W. Zorn (zorn@ira.uka.de)
zby - Zenel Batagelj (zenel.batagelj@uni-lj.si)
:-) :-) :-) :-) :-) :-) ;-) Help the Author (-: (-: (-: (-: (-: (-: (-: Thank you to the thousands of Net folks who contributed information to help the author's genealogical search, yielding 45 new Zakon's from around the world!
Archive-name: Hobbes' Internet Timeline v5.0 Archive-location: http://www.isoc.org/zakon/Internet/History/HIT.html Last-updated: 1 January 199A Maintainer: Robert H'obbes' Zakon, zakon@isoc.org Description: An Internet timeline highlighting some of the key events and technologies which helped shape the Internet as we know it today.