The internet's first message
"LO" — then the machine crashed
See it on the timeline →In depth
ARPANET was funded by the US defence research agency and built on packet switching — Baran and Davies's idea of splitting data into fragments that each find their own route. TCP/IP in 1974, developed by Cerf and Kahn, made it possible to join different networks together, which is what "internet" literally means. The architecture is deliberately decentralised and "dumb in the middle", so new services could appear without anyone's permission — probably the main reason the network grew as it did.
For children
Two computers in California were connected for the first time. The first message was supposed to be "LOGIN", but the system crashed after two letters: "LO". From that small beginning grew the internet.
Connects to
Part of Terra Saga — the story of Earth on a timeline. terrasaga.org