INTRO: We all know the founders of the biggest companies
and services in the world. Apple is Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak. Microsoft is Bill Gates and
Paul Allen. Google is Larry Page and Sergey Brin, and so on and so forth. We also know that
electricity was discovered by Benjamin Franklin and the telephone was invented by Alexander Graham
Bell and light bubl was invented by Thomas Edison and Nikola Tesla. Yet, virtually none of us know
the inventors of the network that we spend the vast majority of our time on: the internet. The
internet was created by two computer scientists named Vinton Cerf and Bob Kahn, and the network
was launched on January 1, 1983. Since then, the internet has become an integral part of our lives,
yet this duo doesn’t dominate the billionaires list or Forbes magazines and interviews. No one
would probably even recognize them on the street which is ironic given how influential they are.
So, here’s how Vint Cerf and Bob Kahn created the internet and what they’re up to today.
VINT CERF:
Taking a look back, Vint Cerf was born on June 23, 1943 in New Haven, Connecticut. His father
worked at an aeronautics company which gave Vint an interest in engineering from very early on.
In fact, when he was in high school, he would get a job at Rocketdyne where he got an opportunity to
work on the Apollo program. He wrote statistical analysis software that helped test the F-1 engines
that was used by famous Saturn V. So, by the time Vint graduated high school, he was already more
accomplished than most of us ever will be, but he was just getting started. Vint would go on
to attend Stanford University where he majored in mathematics. He would complete this degree in 1965
and go on to join IBM as a systems engineer. He didn’t stick around here for long though as his
true passion was research. So, he would return to school to further his education. This time,
Vint went to UCLA where he pursued a masters in computer science. This experience was especially
important because this is where he would meet the other inventor of the internet: Bob Kahn. Anyway,
Vint would finish his masters in 1970 and he would pursue a PhD in computer science also from UCLA.
It doesn’t look like Vint really wanted to leave this lifestyle because he would
just become an assistant professor at Stanford after graduating in 1972. For the next 4 years,
he would spend the vast majority of this time on researching packet network interconnection
protocols and creating the TCP/IP protocol suite. He would eventually leave academia in 1976
at age 33, but his new job wasn’t all that different. He would join
DARPA where he continued the same research for the next 6 years. But unlike academia,
Vint had the opportunity to implement his research into real projects at DARPA. For example,
the Department of Defense would use the 4th version of TCP/IP for all military computer
networking purposes. Vint ended up working for DARPA up until 1982 at which point he switched
over to MCI Digital Information Services and this is when the internet would officially go live.
BOB KAHN:
Moving on Bob Kahn’s back story, Bob was born on December 23, 1938 in New York. Like many of the
people that we cover on this channel, Bob was quite curious and intelligent from a very young
age. Despite this, Bob was never able to fully explore his interests throughout his childhood
due to his family’s situation. You see, his mom was suffering from an undisclosed heart condition
which meant that Bob had to spend much of his freetime caring for his mother. In fact, this was
one of the main reasons that he would attend local colleges for his bachelors. First, he attended
Queens college for two years before he transferred over to the City College of New York where he
earned his bachelors in electrical engineering. By the time he completed his bachelors,
Bob says that it was clear to him that he was not a big fan lab work, but he did find math quite
intriguing. But ironically, in January of 1960, Bob would get a job at Bell Labs which literally
has lab in the name. He didn’t stick around for very long though. He was applying to master’s
programs and would be accepted into Princeton. Princeton was a big jump up from City College,
but Bob was up for the challenge. In fact, he thrived under the pressure and would even end
up running the graduate school’s seminar series. Bob would end up getting his masters in electrical
engineering in 1962 and he would instantly turn around and pursue a PhD in electrical engineering.
After completing his PhD in 1964, like Vint, Bob would become an assistant professor but
he would teach at MIT instead of Stanford. Bob wasn’t a big fan of being a professor though.
He felt that the job “a little stultifying” which means that it stifled enthusiasm,
initiative, and freedom of action. So, he only did this for two years though before he switched
over to an engineering consulting firm called BB&N where he served as senior scientist. At the time,
BB&N was working on a new computer network called ARPANET which was being funded by DARPA. Bob
didn’t know it at the time, but this is what would eventually lead to the creation of the internet.
CREATING THE INTERNET:
The characteristic that made ARPANET unique was that it relied on a packet switching.
This is when a large piece of data is split up into smaller chucks called packets which are
then sent over the network. These packets are then combined to create the original piece of
data at the destination. The researchers found that this was far more efficient and reliable,
and packet switching has since become a standard for transferring data over networks. Bob’s role
in this project was to link up host computers from institutions to this network. And as you
might’ve guessed, one of the institutions that were involved in this project was UCLA. Bob
would travel to UCLA in September of 1969 to setup Arpanet Nodes at the university which led him to
meeting Vint Cerf. Anyway, a few years later in 1972, Bob would help organize the world’s first
International Conference on Computer Communication which is when ARPANET would be revealed to the
public. After the public reveal, Bob would leave BB&N and join DARPA full-time. There,
he was tasked with linking together military radio networks from around the world. In other words, he
had to create a network of networks hence the name internet. Bob would recruit help from Stanford
professor Vint Cerf and together they would work on creating this network of networks. This was
actually extremely challenging because the duo had to connect more networks than they ever imagined.
When Bob was given the job, he thought he had to figure out how to connect 5 to 10 big networks,
but he actually had to connect hundreds of thousands which eventually turned into millions.
Using ARPANET didn’t seem feasible for such a large task especially if they wanted
it to last a long time, so the duo started working on their own protocol called TCP/IP.
TCP stands for Transimission Control Protocol and it’s responsible for splitting up the data
at the source and reassembling the packets of data at the destination.
Meanwhile, IP stands for Internet Protocol and it’s responsible for ensuring that the packets
of data are actually sent to the right destination. Over the next several years,
Bob and Vint would perfect data transfers using packet switching and they would eventually launch
TCP/IP guidelines in 1980. TCP/IP wasn’t the only protocol that trying to link up these networks.
Some other famous protocols include FTP or File Transfer Protocol and NCP or Network
Control Protocol. But, in the end, it was TCP/IP that would become the standard for ARPANET. The
switch to TCP/IP took place on January 1, 1983 and this was marked as the day the internet was born.
ADOPTION:
While the internet was officially live, there was still a long way to go in making this technology
accessible to the public and that’s exactly what this duo would start working on next. By the time,
ARPANET adopted the TCP/IP protocol, Vint had already left DARPA and was working at MCI Digital.
There, Vint would begin working on the world’s first commercial email service that would work
through the internet. Meanwhile, Bob would stick around at DARPA a little longer. But,
he too would leave in 1985 to found the Corporation for National Research Initiatives.
This was a non-profit group that was dedicated to making the internet accessible to the public.
They accomplished this by sourcing funding for projects that made the internet user friendly
through tools like browsers. Vint would soon join this organization as vice president in 1986
and help with the fundraising effort. The Reagan administration was rather supportive of this
initiative, but the real money ended up coming from the private sector as opposed to government.
By 1990, the private sector had donated $500 million. And these funds would eventually be
used to launch the world’s first internet browser and ATM in 1990 with the help of
AT&T and loads of other programmers and the rest is history. Moving on, in 1992,
Bob and Vint would create the Internet Society together which was yet another non-profit
dedicated to promoting development and adoption of the internet. Despite founding something that
was so influential neither Bob nor Vint really made that much money from founding the internet
itself. You see, no one really runs the internet. It’s more of a decentralized network of networks
thats run by thousands of companies, universities, and governments from around the world. So,
there was really no way to monetize the internet itself which is quite ironic given that dozens of
multi hundred billion dollar companies were built off the internet. At one point, in 1988, Vint did
try to privatize the internet, but the internet was already too decentralized by this point, so
his efforts weren’t that successful. Fortunately though, Vint would end up joining Google in 2005
as a vice president and this made him quite wealthy. Today, he’s worth roughly $45 million.
Bob, however, would just stick around at his non-profits and he still works there to this day.
There’s no verifiable net worth for Bob, but some sources put it at around $8 million.
Obviously neither of these guys are struggling for money, but given that people like Jeff Bezos,
Mark Zuckerberg, Larry Page, and Sergey Brin are all worth $100 billion each, this is nothing.
VINT & BOB TODAY:
While Vint nor Bob never got the financial benefits that they deserved, they did get
plenty of awards. These guys have won so many awards that if we went through them all, it
would likely take an hour, so we’ll just stick to the two most notable awards. In December of 1997,
Bob and Vint were awarded the National Medal of Technology from President Bill Clinton.
And several years later in 2005, both Vint and Bob would be awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom
from President Bush. I think we can all agree that these two more than deserved these medals.
Anway today, Vint serves in a bunch of advisory roles all over the place.
For example, he serves as a Commisioner for the Broadband Commision for Digital Development.
Similarly, he serves on the board of advisors of Scientists and Engineers for America. Vint also
regularly gives interviews and speeches regarding his thoughts about the future of the internet.
There’s plenty of these on YouTube if you’re interested. Meanwhile, Bob has chosen to lead a
much more subtle life. He doesn’t serve on a bunch of boards and do interviews all the time. But,
he does still work at his non-profits and is still committed to making the internet as accessible
as possible. And that’s what happened to the internet’s founders. Did you know about Vint
and Bob before this video? Comment that down below. Also, drop a like if you Vint and Bob
deserve more recognition. And of course, consider checking out our discord community to suggest
future video ideas and consider subscribing to see more questions logically answered.