[LINK] RFC: The Web in Oz, 1992-94

[Roger Clarke]

Thanks Tom.  Of direct use to the paper are:

-   "on 21 July 1994 I presented my first web page to the Canberra branch
     meeting, "HI-TECH TOURIST ON THE EUROPEAN INFORMATION HIGHWAY ...":
     http://www.tomw.net.au/hitech.html
     (You certainly beat *me* by a couple of months.
     I'd like to see the bit about 'I started my site in Aug 94' beaten
     to such a pulp that it doesn't need to be in there, because earlier
     small-time publishers have been identified - supported by evidence)

-   http://www.acs.org.au/president/1998/past/dodweb.htm
     "The Defence Home Page was launched on 2 March 1995"

You've also jogged my memory - I need to mention Peter Talty in the 
para. on PIEnet.

These kinds of details are hard to run to ground, and my knowledge of 
the scene in 1992-94 isn't comprehensive enough to ensure coverage of 
all of the pioneers.

More like this please everyone!  If you're shy, email me off-list.

Look at it this way - few people ever invest the effort to write 
history, so this paper may be the best thing ever written on this 
topic
(on account of being the *only* paper ever written).


And I'll have to update my Oz Internet history sometime with this:

-   http://www.tomw.net.au/irc/irc12c.html
     "On 23 January 1994, Mr. Peter Talty, Chairman of the ACS Canberra Branch,
      announced that ACS members in Canberra would have full Internet 
access in March"

-   http://www.tomw.net.au/cn95pt1.html
     "On 8th November 1994 the Australian Computer Society switched on a
     network service for about 2,000 Members across the country"

     A mere 8-month delay is about the industry-average, after all.

     And the fact that the Web was still merely one of the available
     services as late as 23 April 1995, is of interest as well

_______________________________________________________________________

At 8:33 +1100 16/12/11, Tom Worthington wrote:
>On 14/12/11 16:22, Roger Clarke wrote:
>>  I'm trying to finalise my long-intended history of the first couple
>>  of years of 'the Web in Oz'. ...
>
>The Canberra Branch of the Australian Computer Society set up a dial up
>service for members in 1993. This was expanded to a national service in
>1995. It was the intuitive of Mr. Peter Talty, Chairman of the ACS
>Canberra Branch. Details are in "The ACS-link Project - a Case Study",
>Peter Talty BA MACS, ACS Canberra Branch Conference: MULITNET'95:
>http://www.tomw.net.au/cn95pt1.html
>
>This provided such miracolous services as:
>
>* Easy-to-use menu access to thousands of "Gopher" information services,
>* On-line searches of millions of documents using the Wide Area
>Information Service,
>* Access to millions of files through File Transfer Protocol,
>* Interactive "Telnet" access to tens of thousands of computer services.
>See the launch announcement: http://www.tomw.net.au/irc/irc12c.html
>
>You will note no mention of the web.
>
>This was later replaced with a national service "ACS-link":
>http://groups.google.com/group/aus.general/browse_thread/thread/ab58eed87421ac0b/f621ebd60d318b9a?hl=en&ie=UTF-8&q=%22australian+computer+society%22+dialup+canberra&pli=1
>
>
>ACS-link (Australian Computer Society Inc.)
>Ph: (02) 211 5855
>Fx: (02) 281 1208
>E-mail: i... at acs.org.au
>Features: e-mail, conferencing, full range Internet services, ACS
>Information services (detailed libraries
>incl. IT Practitioners Handbook) SLIP, PPP, IRC, Messenger;
>Costs: Once only service connection fee of $50 for ACS members only (5
>hours peak time usage or 10
>hours non-peak usage free of network charges).
>
>This service was important as it exposed pubic servants in Canberra, and
>IT professionals across Australia, to the practicalities of the
>Internet. Myself and other ACS members demonstrated the Internet and the
>web at ACS meetings and conferences.
>
>As an example, on  21 July 1994 I presented my first web page to the
>Canberra branch meeting, "HI-TECH TOURIST ON THE EUROPEAN INFORMATION
>HIGHWAY: and Recent Developments on the Global Information
>Infrastructure": http://www.tomw.net.au/hitech.html
>
>You will notice the web pages lack back-links from the subsidiary pages,
>as I did not know how to do them at the time. Later I went on a web
>course at the ANU run by Tony Barry and with that knowledge set up the
>Defence department's home page:
>http://www.acs.org.au/president/1998/past/dodweb.htm
>
>
>
>--
>Tom Worthington FACS CP, TomW Communications Pty Ltd. t: 0419496150
>PO Box 13, Belconnen ACT 2617, Australia  http://www.tomw.net.au
>Liability limited by a scheme approved under Professional Standards
>Legislation
>
>Adjunct Senior Lecturer, Research School of Computer Science,
>Australian National University http://cs.anu.edu.au/courses/COMP7310/
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-- 
Roger Clarke                                 http://www.rogerclarke.com/
			            
Xamax Consultancy Pty Ltd      78 Sidaway St, Chapman ACT 2611 AUSTRALIA
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Visiting Professor in the Cyberspace Law & Policy Centre      Uni of NSW
Visiting Professor in Computer Science    Australian National University