It began in 1989, when Geoff Huston started his work at the Australian Vice Chancellor’s Committee with the goal to build a national academic and research network.
Just when the internet was still in its infancy in the U.S. where it all started, Huston was able to complete the construction of the new and rapidly growing network in Australia, only within a few months.
And in just over a year, all Australian universities and major research institutions were connected to the country’s first ISP, the Australian Academic and Research Network.
After that, the project quickly expanded to support the entire Australian internet sector.
And after five years, this network became Australia’s largest private data network.
Here, Huston managed to put his name to the Internet Hall of Fame as a global connector, to honor his "critical role" in bringing the internet to Australia in the 1990s.
But on October 1, 2020. Huston apologized for that.
Huston who has become the chief scientist at the Asia Pacific Network Information Centre (APNIC), said that:
"I'm sorry, I'm really sorry."
"I actually want to apologize for my small part in this mess we find ourselves in, because it all turned out so horrendously badly."
According to him, the internet has become a place full of hatred, haste, lack of regulation and a place where cybersecurity companies are tackling the wrong problems.
"The term 'web security' is the punchline to some demented sick joke."
"We had a lot of really wonderful expectations in the late 80s when we thought computers and communication were going to do wonderful things."
"Where we've ended up is rigged elections, fake news, the destruction of livelihoods, the creation of an entirely new global economy based only on surveillance capitalism."
"[Agile is] the incentive to write even shittier code, even faster, and more of it, because obviously, that's what we need."
"With no desire to actually build truly secure systems, in the rush to digitize our world of services, we're taking extraordinary risks ... We cut corners and built fast, shitty code. Maybe we should have said no and walked away from the keyboard. But I didn't. I'm sorry."
Huston noted that humans are social creatures. Internet pioneers like himself recognized humans' ability to adapt to changes in the way their society communicated.
But the thing is, these people recognized that the change the internet brought to the society, and changed the nature of human.
These people simply didn't take this to heart, Huston said.
"None of us envisioned that perversion of our nobly motivated ambition into the sewage of Twitter, the deluge of waste products from the Facebook factory," he said.
"We only choose to listen to what we agree with these days. The internet's a gigantic vanity-reinforcing distorted TikTok selfie. And for my part in all this, I am sorry."
Internet in Australia was a result of a collective and communal effort by universities and research institutions.
In order to collaborate more efficiently with national and international partners, universities and research institutions work with each other to support their research, by having IT personnel organizing internet connection by developing local networks by themselves.
In Australia, it was the result of the Australian Academic Research Network (AARNet)
The most prominent at that time, was ACSnet (developed at the University of Sydney) and SPEARnet (led by the University of Queensland). They were the ones that put forward the basis of the initial technical architectures for the national network.
The resolution was finally achieved in December 1988, in a social forums established by the networking community.
It was at that time that Geoff Huston presented a multi-protocol approach that was based on ethernet switches and multiple routers.
It was Huston that came up with the idea of using TCP/IP, DECnet, X.25 and OSI. It was Huston and his team that saw the potential of the technology, believing that they will become "the’ protocol in any future internet."
And in 1993, Huston and his team developed what was Australia’s first national network. This network is considered fundamental not only to the AARNET, but also to the modern internet that runs in Australia.
