Path: utzoo!attcan!telly!lethe!torsqnt!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!cs.utexas.edu!rutgers!mit-eddie!bu-cs!kwe
From: kwe@bu-cs.BU.EDU (kwe@bu-it.bu.edu (Kent W. England))
Newsgroups: comp.protocols.tcp-ip
Subject: Re: Remote database services ???
Message-ID: <38688@bu-cs.BU.EDU>
Date: 22 Sep 89 17:49:39 GMT
References: <8079@oregon.uoregon.edu> <575@wet.UUCP>
Reply-To: kwe@buit13.bu.edu (Kent England)
Followup-To: comp.protocols.tcp-ip
Organization: Boston U. Information Technology
Lines: 64

In article <575@wet.UUCP> eps@CS.SFSU.EDU (Eric P. Scott) writes:
>Public data networks (Telenet, Tymnet, etc.) are ideally
>suited for these services, "expand with demand," and tend to be
>pretty much universally accessible.

	No, internetworks are universally accessible.  An aggregate of
networks that is not internetworked is not universally accessible.
>
>What you are proposing is not only parasitic, but insulting to
>those of us who crafted this unique resource.

	I imagine the questioner was thinking of the NSF sponsored
Internet.  He could be thinking of the wider FRICC sponsored Internet.
You are thinking of some other internetwork, possibly some predecessor
of the current Internet.

>  There are
>some things that can only be done on the Internet.  You don't
>need Internet's capabilities.  You're looking for a common
>carrier.  We need what little bandwidth we have.  Internet can't
>be all things to all people.
>

	You miss a more critical point of building an internetwork
than the advanced functionality of some protocol.  More critical than
the specific functionality of one of many protocols that may run on
one internetwork and not on another is the fact that an internetwork
is universal.

	The NSF Internet, or the wider FRICC Internet, or the future
National Research and Education Network will be judged as successful
chiefly by how universal and ubiquitous it/they become.

	It is more important to be ubiquitous than to be
state-of-the-art on an operational research and educational
internetwork, compared to a *network* research internet.  Services
such as access to Dialog or whatever are important goals of the
operational internetworks and are not insulting to those who are
building these internets.

	The research and education "Internet" must become all things
to all people to become what the builders, and those who pay for it,
envision.  And if we could buy it commercially, or even envision a day
when we could buy it commercially, then we would.  We are certainly
paying commercial rates (at least in some parts of the Internet) to
get Internet service, and it is well worth it.

	The network research community needs and is getting a new
research internet.  Those who use internets to conduct the business of
research and education accidentally co-opted it from the network
researchers.  Sorry about that, fellas.  But let us not confuse what
the Internet today really is with what it once was.

	The old network-research internet was a grand and glorious
thing.  Perhaps grander and more glorious to those who built her than
the Internet today seems.  But the old-boys should be glad their
little child grew up, moved to the big city and became famous.  Still,
it is hard to see children grow up and harder still to let them become
independent and other than what we envisioned they would be.

	Kent England, Boston University and NEARnet

	[Disclaimer: I do not represent an official position of either
Boston University or NEARnet in this matter.]