October 29th…

Your efforts today may seem small, or trivial. It may even seem like the day was not successful. You just can’t imagine your potential impact on the future.

-SecureSteve

An ordinary day

To many, October 29th, 2019 may have seemed like any ordinary day. Many people woke up, hit the snooze button, woke up again, and started their day. Perhaps they hit the gym, or got the kids out of bed. Perhaps they grabbed some breakfast, or simply popped a Pop Tart in the microwave for three seconds, and were off to continue their day.

For those that arrived at work, it may have felt like an ordinary day of meetings and general “jobbing”. Perhaps a crazy customer got under their skin, or maybe an awesome customer sent back some kudos. Perhaps they finally cleared out their inbox, or got after those files they’ve been meaning to handle. Perhaps, just an ordinary day.

It is possible a student went to their early class, and took some good notes. They may have gone to visit their Teaching Adviser’s office hours, just to make sure they understood their professor’s lecture. A team of students may have gathered in the student union to tackle their homework for the week. Some students may have skipped all classes because it was a nice fall day. Possibly just be an ordinary day.

Just an ordinary day 50 years ago, too…

Nothing about October 29th may seem exceptional. Fifty years ago, some people likely felt similar about their accomplishments for the day. They may not have felt that what they did that day was anything out of the ordinary. Yet, in hindsight, something simple signified the beginning of something amazing that truly impacted the world.

We don’t know what Charley Kline or Bill Duvall had for breakfast that day. It likely was not Monster Energy. It was the late sixties, so maybe they had coffee and a quick puff of the magic dragon, and they were off. Yet, something crazy was about to happen. One wonders if they knew it at the time.

STEM leaves an impact

The year was 1969, and up until this point, there was not “really” a way for one computer to talk to multiple other computers. The concept of a “network” was something that major companies like IBM and AT&T thought was useless. That’s right, “useless”. Yet, on October 29th, 1969, the first concept of a network, the basic building block of the modern Internet, was utilized.

Earlier that year, a small research company, Bolt, Beranek and Newman (BBN), won a $1 Million dollar contract to build a network between the 4 total computers of the Pentagon’s Advanced Research Project Agency, or ARPA (Initial computers were located at the Stanford Research Institute, UCLA, UC Santa Barbara, and Utah). These machines were the size of a small apartment, with under-floor air conditioning. A far cry from the laptops and tablets we commonly use today.

The device that BBN built for network communication was called an IMP (Interface Message Processor). This was as big as two full size gym lockers. Not exactly the size of your home wireless router…

Don’t act like you’re not impressed

What happened next can only be described as…anti-climatic. Charley Kline and his UCLA computer science professor Leonard Klinerock attempted to send the message “LOGIN” to Bill Duvall and the computer at the Stanford Research Institute (SRI). The computer at UCLA crashed after sending the characters “L” and “O”. That’s basically it. Yup, the first message across the first real network was “LO”, followed by a system crash. Yikes. Alexander Graham Bell at least had a complete message during his first telephone call: “Mr. Watson–come here–I want to see you.”

So… that’s what happened. Yup, that’s it. After years of research, millions of dollars of investment, and countless nerd-hours, JUST two letters were sent across a network on October 29th, 1969. Amazingly, 105 days prior to this event, men landed on the moon!

The UCLA team did manage to send the rest of the word within the following hour, so there is that 🙂 Yet, take a look at what happened afterwards:

Just remember this

Innovation is not always fast, nor linear. Since July 16, 1969, just twelve men have touched the surface of the moon. Since October 29th, 1969, millions of users have accessed the Internet, and there are billions of connected devices today. If you’ve made it this far, you’re literally reading this on the internet! Let’s give credit where credit is due.

There also is a lesson here. Your efforts today may seem small, or trivial. It may even seem like the day was not successful. You just can’t imagine your potential impact on the future.

Isn’t history amazing?