Where Wizards Stay Up Late

The Origins Of The Internet

by

Paperback, 304 pages

English language

Published Jan. 21, 1998 by Simon & Schuster.

ISBN:
978-0-684-83267-8
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OCLC Number:
65164090

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4 stars (2 reviews)

Twenty five years ago, it didn't exist. Today, twenty million people worldwide are surfing the Net. Where Wizards Stay Up Late is the exciting story of the pioneers responsible for creating the most talked about, most influential, and most far-reaching communications breakthrough since the invention of the telephone.

In the 1960's, when computers where regarded as mere giant calculators, J.C.R. Licklider at MIT saw them as the ultimate communications devices. With Defense Department funds, he and a band of visionary computer whizzes began work on a nationwide, interlocking network of computers. Taking readers behind the scenes, Where Wizards Stay Up Late captures the hard work, genius, and happy accidents of their daring, stunningly successful venture.

5 editions

reviewed Where Wizards Stay Up Late by Katie Hafner

Review of 'Where Wizards Stay Up Late' on 'Goodreads'

5 stars

This book is recognized as one of the seminal histories of the early Internet, and deservedly so. Starting with the origins of the Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA)in Eisenhower's Defense Department and walking through the Sixties and Seventies as the ARPANet is built, grows, and eventually dismantled. Interviews with many of the pioneers make this book as entertaining as it is informative.

Where Wizards Stay Up Late is focused on the engineers, academics and government bureaucrats that built the machines that connect together. It is less about the human connections built as the Internet grew.

I could go on, but if you have any interest in this topic, this book should be at the top of your list.

avatar for TNLNYC

rated it

3 stars

Subjects

  • History of engineering & technology
  • Internet
  • Science/Mathematics
  • Internet (Computer network)
  • Computers
  • Computer - Internet
  • Internet - General
  • Networking - General
  • Computers / General
  • COMPUTERS-COMMUNICATIONS/NETWORKING
  • Computer networks
  • Social aspects
  • History
  • Computers And Society
  • Technology And Social Change
  • Computer Industry
  • COMPUTERS-GENERAL INFORMATION