Lawmakers in USA yesterday
introduced a proposal to make scientific papers funded
with taxpayer money available for free on the Internet. The bill adds to
a recent flurry of debate about
so-called public access policies.
A good lesson for all lawmakers to learn. Let science be without fetters.
* Other current content:
To bridge the digital divide, public sector telecom operator BSNL
recently launched the extremely low cost tablet bundled with its
connection. BSNL tablet, Penta IS701R, is manufactured by Noida based
Pantel Technologies, is a Wifi model, and is priced at Rs 3,499.
The importance of communication must be understood by everyone, irrespective of the age. We need to communicate effectively at work place, at home, to our distant friends or relatives. Internet has made the world smaller and opened new channels of communication. Some people believe that internet friendship or relationship is meaningless, as it can be ‘deleted’ just by pressing a ‘button’. I don’t believe. Cheaters don’t require internet to cheat on the relationship. Remember the story of Raja Harishchandra? He kept the promise made in the dream. So it all depends on how much we remain ‘committed’ to our relationship, whether internet or otherwise. I find commitment is a personality trait.
I am not an expert but experience tells me that for any meaningful communication or dialogue between two individuals, two essential conditions must be fulfilled.
Firstly, a good healthy relationship based on understanding and mutual trust. That will create a climate and desire to communicate with each other.
Secondly, once the communication begins, for its sustenance, a minimum level of response must be maintained by both sides.
If any one of these conditions is not met, the communication is likely to diminish, vitiate or terminate.
On September 2, two computers at University of California, Los Angeles, exchange meaningless data in first test of Arpanet, an experimental military network 1972
Ray Tomlinson brings email to the network, choosing @ as a way to specify email addresses belonging to other systems 1973
Arpanet gets first international nodes, in England and Norway 1974 Vint Cerf and Bob Kahn develop communications technique called TCP, allowing multiple networks to understand one another, creating a true internet 1983
Domain name system is proposed. Creation of suffixes such as ‘.com’, ‘.gov’ and ‘.edu’ comes a year later
1988
One of the first internet worms, Morris, cripples thousands of computers
1990
Tim Berners- Lee creates the World Wide Web while developing ways to control computers remotely
1993
Marc Andreessen and colleagues at University of Illinois create Mosaic, the first web browser to combine graphics and text on a single page
1994
Andreessen and others on the Mosaic team form a company to develop the first commercial web browser, Netscape. Two immigration lawyers introduce the world to spam, advertising their green card lottery services
1999
Napster popularizes music file-sharing and spawns successors that have permanently changed the recording industry
2000
The dot-com boom of the 1990s becomes a bust as technology companies slide
2004
Mark Zuckerberg starts Facebook at Harvard University
2005
Launch of YouTube video-sharing site 2007
Apple releases iPhone, introducing millions more to wireless internet access
World internet population surpasses 250 million in 1999, 500 million in 2002, 1 billion in 2006 and 1.5 billion in 2008
Just imagine how would it be if there was no Internet today?
