On 22 September 1966, the launch issue of the world’s first weekly technology newspaper was published – today Computer Weekly is the UK’s oldest business IT title. What’s changed the most for you since then? Here, Vint Cerf, one of the “fathers of the internet”, reflects on a career that started not long before Computer Weekly did.
In a field as dynamic as computing, the longevity of Computer Weekly is remarkable. It is an indicator of its relevance to subscribers and its ability to identify and document events and developments in the field. And what developments there have been in the course of 60 years.
My first job out of school was at IBM in Los Angeles. In 1965, I was a system engineer responsible for caring for the Quiktran time-sharing system that ran on an IBM 7044 mainframe computer.
The IBM 360 system had been released just two years before, in 1964. The remarkable thing about that design is that the same architecture spanned from the small 360/30 to the 360/91. About this same time, research on what was then called “artificial intelligence” was underway with the support of the US Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (Darpa). Not long thereafter, the Arpanet project began which eventually led to today’s internet.
Computer Weekly has chronicled the history of modern computing over those past 60 years. Re-reading those issues is like reliving the ups and downs of the industry – the tensions, competition, incredible accomplishments and excitement for the future.
Surprises and hot topics
Not all the enthusiasms panned out and many took us by surprise. The arrival of the World Wide Web in late 1991 ignited the internet with web pages from ordinary citizens – I called them “internauts”. So much information was shared on the Web that search engines like Archie, Alta Vista, WAIS, Yahoo!, Google and others became essential tools.
The smartphone’s arrival in the form of the Apple iPhone represented a major shift in the use of the internet. Photos, videos, text messages and literally millions of applications transformed the computational landscape. The internet was accessible wherever you could get a mobile signal.
Then came social media, with origins in the early World Wide Web and even the Arpanet with its mailing lists and affinity groups. After that came blockchains and cryptocurrency which are still with us today. While cryptocurrencies fuel speculation, blockchains are becoming useful documentation tools for tracking transactions.
“Computer Weekly has chronicled the history of modern computing over those past 60 years. Re-reading those issues is like reliving the ups and downs of the industry – the tensions, competition, incredible accomplishments and excitement for the future”
Vint Cerf, internet pioneer
Today’s hot topics are artificial intelligence (AI), quantum computing and quantum networking. While quantum computing and networking are still developing, they may have profound impact on solving problems that are beyond the scope of even today’s supercomputers. Quantum networking will increase the capacity for quantum computing by entangling multiple quantum computers together.
In the last few years, AI has broken new ground in healthcare, diagnosis, drug design and discovery. Large language models (LLMs) are producing poetry and programs and everything in between. Google has announced that 75% of the software it generates is now developed with the aid of LLMs.
Agents are the latest development in AI. The agentic web will have a transformative effect on almost all human activity over time. Agents will permeate all aspects of public and commercial services, academics, research, manufacturing and product and service delivery.
Missions to Mars
The evolution shows no signs of stopping. One next big thing is the commercialisation of space with new companies and new missions planned, including a moonbase with continued habitation by astronauts and missions to Mars.
A Solar System Internet is planned to support digital communication among spacecraft, sensor systems and astronauts. There is little doubt that computing will follow. Already several companies are planning orbital datacentres and perhaps some on the moon.
Computer Weekly has been there with us, in every step of this rapidly evolving digital ecosystem and I expect it will be there in 2066 to celebrate its 100th anniversary.
Vint Cerf co-developed the TCP/IP protocol that led to the creation of the internet.
