1
00:00:04,200 --> 00:00:07,240
Speaker 1: Get in text with technology with tech Stuff from how

2
00:00:07,280 --> 00:00:14,080
Speaker 1: stuff works dot com. Hey there, and welcome to text Stuff.

3
00:00:14,120 --> 00:00:17,920
Speaker 1: I'm your host Jonathan Strickland, senior writer for how stuff

4
00:00:17,960 --> 00:00:21,480
Speaker 1: works dot com. And today's episode comes to us courtesy

5
00:00:21,600 --> 00:00:26,759
Speaker 1: of a little listener mail. And you guys have been

6
00:00:27,080 --> 00:00:30,320
Speaker 1: crushing it, sending tons of suggestions my way, and I

7
00:00:30,360 --> 00:00:32,680
Speaker 1: just want to say I really appreciate it. So remember,

8
00:00:33,000 --> 00:00:35,360
Speaker 1: if you have a suggestion for a topic I should cover,

9
00:00:35,640 --> 00:00:38,559
Speaker 1: send me the message. The emails tech Stuff at how

10
00:00:38,680 --> 00:00:42,159
Speaker 1: stuff works dot com. But this week's listener mail episode

11
00:00:42,200 --> 00:00:45,760
Speaker 1: comes to us from Ryan, who says, please do an

12
00:00:45,800 --> 00:00:49,280
Speaker 1: episode about the Gopher protocol, such a different approach to

13
00:00:49,400 --> 00:00:52,959
Speaker 1: utilizing the Internet that no one knows today. And so

14
00:00:53,560 --> 00:00:56,600
Speaker 1: today we're gonna walk back in Internet history and learn

15
00:00:56,720 --> 00:01:00,160
Speaker 1: all about the Gopher protocol. But first it kind of

16
00:01:00,640 --> 00:01:04,760
Speaker 1: benefits us to remember what exactly the Internet is. And

17
00:01:05,040 --> 00:01:08,399
Speaker 1: trust me, this is important in the grand scheme of things.

18
00:01:08,440 --> 00:01:11,240
Speaker 1: But I'll be nice and high level and brief about it.

19
00:01:11,280 --> 00:01:13,520
Speaker 1: So when you get down to it, the Internet is

20
00:01:13,600 --> 00:01:16,119
Speaker 1: essentially just a bunch of computing devices that are all

21
00:01:16,120 --> 00:01:18,760
Speaker 1: connected to each other, and that's it. Really. There's a

22
00:01:18,760 --> 00:01:21,160
Speaker 1: lot of infrastructure there that allows this to happen. But

23
00:01:21,319 --> 00:01:24,120
Speaker 1: ultimately it's a bunch of computers that are talking to

24
00:01:24,160 --> 00:01:27,240
Speaker 1: each other. It's a network of networks using various types

25
00:01:27,240 --> 00:01:31,720
Speaker 1: of connections and protocols to send and receive communications. But

26
00:01:32,040 --> 00:01:34,800
Speaker 1: when you just break it down to its simplest of terms,

27
00:01:35,080 --> 00:01:39,120
Speaker 1: you're really talking about a bunch of interconnected machines. Now,

28
00:01:39,200 --> 00:01:44,680
Speaker 1: broadly speaking, we can classify most of these machines as

29
00:01:44,720 --> 00:01:48,960
Speaker 1: either servers or clients. Now there are other machines as well,

30
00:01:49,280 --> 00:01:52,720
Speaker 1: like routers and switches and stuff, but I'm mostly talking

31
00:01:52,760 --> 00:01:55,560
Speaker 1: about the devices that are directly communicating with each other

32
00:01:55,720 --> 00:01:59,920
Speaker 1: rather than the ones that facilitate that communication. So as

33
00:02:00,000 --> 00:02:02,640
Speaker 1: a server, well, it does exactly what it sounds like.

34
00:02:02,680 --> 00:02:08,560
Speaker 1: It does. It serves information. Clients request information. So your

35
00:02:08,600 --> 00:02:11,480
Speaker 1: smartphone or your computer or your tablet that you use

36
00:02:11,560 --> 00:02:14,560
Speaker 1: to serve the Internet or read email or whatever it

37
00:02:14,639 --> 00:02:17,880
Speaker 1: is you do online, that is a client. The servers

38
00:02:17,919 --> 00:02:21,320
Speaker 1: are the machines that contain all the information you're looking

39
00:02:21,360 --> 00:02:24,880
Speaker 1: at and serve it up to you. And the Internet

40
00:02:25,120 --> 00:02:28,079
Speaker 1: is older than the World Wide Web. A lot of people,

41
00:02:28,560 --> 00:02:31,880
Speaker 1: probably not as many today as we're around. For like

42
00:02:31,919 --> 00:02:34,520
Speaker 1: the late nineties, but a lot of people would equate

43
00:02:34,560 --> 00:02:37,040
Speaker 1: the World Wide Web with the Internet, like the two

44
00:02:37,080 --> 00:02:39,880
Speaker 1: are synonymous, and that's not really true. The Web is

45
00:02:39,880 --> 00:02:42,560
Speaker 1: really just a layer on top of the Internet. It's

46
00:02:42,680 --> 00:02:45,160
Speaker 1: it's an interface that makes it easy to access and

47
00:02:45,240 --> 00:02:49,680
Speaker 1: interact with information. But it's just one part of the Internet.

48
00:02:49,720 --> 00:02:52,320
Speaker 1: And before it came along, people were facing a bit

49
00:02:52,360 --> 00:02:58,000
Speaker 1: of a challenge. So imagine you've got this network of networks.

50
00:02:58,160 --> 00:03:03,760
Speaker 1: Information is on thousands of servers around the world. You

51
00:03:04,400 --> 00:03:07,840
Speaker 1: want to get access to some specific information, like a

52
00:03:07,960 --> 00:03:12,000
Speaker 1: very particular file. There's one file that you want to get,

53
00:03:12,040 --> 00:03:16,040
Speaker 1: But how do you track down that file? How do

54
00:03:16,080 --> 00:03:20,120
Speaker 1: you know which computer out there in this vast network

55
00:03:20,160 --> 00:03:23,000
Speaker 1: of networks, How do you know which one actually holds

56
00:03:23,040 --> 00:03:27,040
Speaker 1: the file you want. You can't just scream out, hey,

57
00:03:27,040 --> 00:03:29,520
Speaker 1: I need this one text file. You've got to know

58
00:03:29,600 --> 00:03:32,120
Speaker 1: where it is in order to retrieve it. So the

59
00:03:32,160 --> 00:03:35,480
Speaker 1: way this would work normally is that you'd send a

60
00:03:35,520 --> 00:03:39,559
Speaker 1: message from your computer across the network to the specific

61
00:03:39,680 --> 00:03:44,600
Speaker 1: server in question. So ideally you would know what computer

62
00:03:45,080 --> 00:03:49,080
Speaker 1: hosts your file, and you would use some method of

63
00:03:49,280 --> 00:03:53,000
Speaker 1: connecting to that server. Maybe you're using tell neet, maybe

64
00:03:53,000 --> 00:03:57,120
Speaker 1: you're using FTP file transfer protocol, but you're using something

65
00:03:57,160 --> 00:04:00,280
Speaker 1: to send a message to that server, and in return,

66
00:04:00,360 --> 00:04:03,320
Speaker 1: the server responds to you, and then you request access

67
00:04:03,320 --> 00:04:06,600
Speaker 1: to that file. It's really just that the message you

68
00:04:06,640 --> 00:04:10,120
Speaker 1: send is just a request for information stored on that server.

69
00:04:11,040 --> 00:04:14,960
Speaker 1: And if you have access authorized access to the information.

70
00:04:15,040 --> 00:04:16,919
Speaker 1: In other words, if it's not protected by like a

71
00:04:16,960 --> 00:04:20,239
Speaker 1: password or something that you don't have, the server would

72
00:04:20,240 --> 00:04:24,520
Speaker 1: send that information back across the internet to you. But

73
00:04:24,600 --> 00:04:27,880
Speaker 1: what happens if you don't know which computer holds the

74
00:04:27,920 --> 00:04:31,360
Speaker 1: information you want? How do you get access to it?

75
00:04:32,520 --> 00:04:33,960
Speaker 1: Back in the old days, this would be kind of

76
00:04:33,960 --> 00:04:37,920
Speaker 1: like picking up a telephone to call somebody. Let's say

77
00:04:37,920 --> 00:04:40,640
Speaker 1: you're trying to call me, only you don't have my

78
00:04:40,680 --> 00:04:42,760
Speaker 1: phone number. I never gave it to you. I'm not

79
00:04:42,880 --> 00:04:45,400
Speaker 1: listed anywhere, So how do you call me? There are

80
00:04:45,480 --> 00:04:49,000
Speaker 1: millions of phone numbers out there. If you knew my

81
00:04:49,040 --> 00:04:51,039
Speaker 1: phone number, everything would be just fine because you could

82
00:04:51,080 --> 00:04:53,240
Speaker 1: just dial it directly. But since you don't know my

83
00:04:53,400 --> 00:04:56,640
Speaker 1: number and there's no directory to consult, you're faced with

84
00:04:56,680 --> 00:04:58,880
Speaker 1: a nearly impossible task. What do you do? Just start

85
00:04:58,960 --> 00:05:02,360
Speaker 1: randomly hitting button until the right person picks up. Well,

86
00:05:02,360 --> 00:05:06,120
Speaker 1: that was the problem facing the Internet. It arose because

87
00:05:06,480 --> 00:05:09,160
Speaker 1: the network became more complicated. Just as in the old

88
00:05:09,240 --> 00:05:13,040
Speaker 1: days you might have very few telephones in a single town.

89
00:05:13,480 --> 00:05:16,039
Speaker 1: Like I'm talking the real old days. When telephones first

90
00:05:16,040 --> 00:05:18,680
Speaker 1: became popular, you didn't need to worry about phone numbers.

91
00:05:18,720 --> 00:05:21,680
Speaker 1: Maybe three people in town had a phone. These days

92
00:05:22,000 --> 00:05:24,440
Speaker 1: you gotta worry about it because millions of people iPhones. Well,

93
00:05:24,480 --> 00:05:27,400
Speaker 1: same thing was true with the network of networks. As

94
00:05:27,440 --> 00:05:30,680
Speaker 1: more computers came online, as more systems joined the Internet,

95
00:05:31,279 --> 00:05:34,560
Speaker 1: it became more difficult to track very specific stuff down.

96
00:05:35,839 --> 00:05:40,040
Speaker 1: So before the Internet, there was a sort of a precursor,

97
00:05:40,360 --> 00:05:45,000
Speaker 1: not really the Internet. Before there was an Internet, but

98
00:05:45,240 --> 00:05:49,200
Speaker 1: it was a system of networked computers called ARPA Net

99
00:05:50,040 --> 00:05:52,880
Speaker 1: now the ARPA Net. That was a project from the

100
00:05:52,920 --> 00:05:57,200
Speaker 1: Department of Defense in the United States, and it was

101
00:05:57,279 --> 00:06:00,800
Speaker 1: something that that required a bunch of computers scientists to

102
00:06:00,880 --> 00:06:06,040
Speaker 1: sit down and work out protocols. Uh. It was essentially

103
00:06:06,080 --> 00:06:10,000
Speaker 1: a big, but relatively simple network of computers. Now I

104
00:06:10,160 --> 00:06:13,480
Speaker 1: say simple because if you look at the Internet by

105
00:06:13,520 --> 00:06:17,560
Speaker 1: comparison as a network of networks, it is far more

106
00:06:17,680 --> 00:06:21,840
Speaker 1: complex than what Urbanet was. But I am not casting

107
00:06:21,839 --> 00:06:26,960
Speaker 1: aspersions on our bonnet. It was still incredibly sophisticated, particularly

108
00:06:27,080 --> 00:06:31,960
Speaker 1: for its time. It allowed people working on different computers

109
00:06:32,000 --> 00:06:36,120
Speaker 1: that used different operating systems, different languages, the ability to

110
00:06:36,160 --> 00:06:41,400
Speaker 1: communicate with each other. And that's phenomenal because usually you

111
00:06:41,400 --> 00:06:43,240
Speaker 1: know this, these are like computers that if you were

112
00:06:43,240 --> 00:06:45,359
Speaker 1: to connect directly to one another, they would not be

113
00:06:45,400 --> 00:06:48,640
Speaker 1: able to communicate with each other. They were fundamentally different.

114
00:06:48,960 --> 00:06:51,760
Speaker 1: So the designers of the Urbanet had to figure out

115
00:06:51,839 --> 00:06:55,000
Speaker 1: a set of rules that all these different types of

116
00:06:55,000 --> 00:06:59,280
Speaker 1: computers could follow in order to exchange information with one another.

117
00:07:00,120 --> 00:07:02,880
Speaker 1: So that that required a lot of work to create

118
00:07:02,920 --> 00:07:05,960
Speaker 1: these protocols or sets of rules to facilitate communication. And

119
00:07:06,000 --> 00:07:09,159
Speaker 1: I've talked about ARBONETT before. If you want to hear

120
00:07:09,240 --> 00:07:11,400
Speaker 1: a lot more about it, you can track down the

121
00:07:11,440 --> 00:07:15,040
Speaker 1: classic episode. It originally published in two thousand and twelve.

122
00:07:15,560 --> 00:07:19,480
Speaker 1: It was titled Happy Fathers of the Internet Day and

123
00:07:19,480 --> 00:07:22,600
Speaker 1: then it Chris Pallette and I talked a lot about

124
00:07:22,680 --> 00:07:27,120
Speaker 1: the people who designed the various protocols that allow Internet

125
00:07:27,120 --> 00:07:31,720
Speaker 1: communication to happen. Well. Anyway, two of the protocols in

126
00:07:31,800 --> 00:07:36,120
Speaker 1: question during the days of Arbonet were the Transmission Control

127
00:07:36,200 --> 00:07:41,600
Speaker 1: Protocol or TCP developed in ninety and the Internet Protocol

128
00:07:41,800 --> 00:07:45,520
Speaker 1: or i P, in ninety eight. These are almost always

129
00:07:45,560 --> 00:07:48,520
Speaker 1: grouped together whenever anyone talks about Internet protocols, they'll say

130
00:07:48,560 --> 00:07:52,080
Speaker 1: t C P i P, But they're technically two different

131
00:07:52,080 --> 00:07:57,520
Speaker 1: sets of rules that together uh end up guiding the

132
00:07:57,560 --> 00:08:01,000
Speaker 1: computers on how to communicate across this network of networks.

133
00:08:01,040 --> 00:08:04,160
Speaker 1: These are the rules that gave Arponette that ability to

134
00:08:04,320 --> 00:08:09,680
Speaker 1: create global communication across various different computers. The two protocols

135
00:08:09,680 --> 00:08:14,800
Speaker 1: were officially adopted by Arpanett in Night three, So while

136
00:08:14,800 --> 00:08:18,320
Speaker 1: they were developed in the seventies, it wasn't officially adopted

137
00:08:18,720 --> 00:08:21,840
Speaker 1: until Night three. Now, they were being used before that,

138
00:08:22,120 --> 00:08:26,720
Speaker 1: but you know, Arpanet was a government thing, and just

139
00:08:27,320 --> 00:08:32,360
Speaker 1: like you would suspect it moves super fast because it's government. Well,

140
00:08:32,400 --> 00:08:36,920
Speaker 1: the following year a lot of things happen. We got

141
00:08:36,960 --> 00:08:41,839
Speaker 1: that really killer Apple Mac commercial that was like the

142
00:08:42,000 --> 00:08:45,439
Speaker 1: Orwellian nineteen eighty four that was phenomenal. But also Sun

143
00:08:45,559 --> 00:08:51,320
Speaker 1: micro Systems unveiled a system called the Network Filing System

144
00:08:51,520 --> 00:08:55,559
Speaker 1: or NFS that was sort of like a file directory

145
00:08:55,679 --> 00:08:59,480
Speaker 1: and storage system for networked computers running on a heterogeneous

146
00:09:00,280 --> 00:09:03,760
Speaker 1: Unix environment. So you had to have a bunch of

147
00:09:03,760 --> 00:09:08,760
Speaker 1: computers running the same Unix implementation essentially, or same version

148
00:09:08,800 --> 00:09:11,360
Speaker 1: I guess I should say not implementation, but the same

149
00:09:11,520 --> 00:09:14,839
Speaker 1: version of Unix across all these different machines. And it

150
00:09:14,920 --> 00:09:18,000
Speaker 1: was kind of like your basic file management system you'd

151
00:09:18,000 --> 00:09:20,680
Speaker 1: have on a personal computer. So if you've ever used

152
00:09:20,679 --> 00:09:24,640
Speaker 1: a computer that had a variation of this, like Windows

153
00:09:24,679 --> 00:09:29,320
Speaker 1: file Explorer is a good example. You typically have a

154
00:09:29,400 --> 00:09:33,040
Speaker 1: hierarchy of files. You'll have like a top level selection

155
00:09:33,080 --> 00:09:35,360
Speaker 1: of files. If you go into one of those, you

156
00:09:35,440 --> 00:09:40,040
Speaker 1: might see folders, like subfolders underneath that main heading. Go

157
00:09:40,080 --> 00:09:42,840
Speaker 1: into that one, you'll see more subfolders, maybe some files,

158
00:09:42,880 --> 00:09:45,560
Speaker 1: that kind of stuff. Well, it was essentially that, but

159
00:09:45,840 --> 00:09:48,400
Speaker 1: for an entire network of computers. So you can share

160
00:09:48,440 --> 00:09:53,400
Speaker 1: information between different computers on the system by saving files

161
00:09:53,480 --> 00:09:57,320
Speaker 1: to this network drive, something that's very familiar to most

162
00:09:57,320 --> 00:10:01,080
Speaker 1: of us today, but back then was really new. And

163
00:10:01,160 --> 00:10:05,479
Speaker 1: then obviously you could retrieve files from the appropriate directory

164
00:10:05,480 --> 00:10:10,280
Speaker 1: on that same system. Also, in a team over at

165
00:10:10,280 --> 00:10:15,080
Speaker 1: Carnegie Melon University released the Andrew File System or a

166
00:10:15,360 --> 00:10:18,480
Speaker 1: f S now. Originally, the a f S provided Carnegie

167
00:10:18,520 --> 00:10:23,000
Speaker 1: Melon students a campus wide file directory system and later on,

168
00:10:23,200 --> 00:10:26,600
Speaker 1: a company called trans Arc sort of spun off and

169
00:10:26,760 --> 00:10:30,760
Speaker 1: turned this into a commercial product. Now, these file systems

170
00:10:30,760 --> 00:10:35,079
Speaker 1: allowed users to access files on other computers, but they

171
00:10:35,160 --> 00:10:39,200
Speaker 1: also came with a really steep learning curve. If you

172
00:10:39,240 --> 00:10:44,199
Speaker 1: weren't particularly computer savvy, it was really challenging to navigate

173
00:10:44,200 --> 00:10:47,000
Speaker 1: through these file directories. It would be kind of like

174
00:10:47,240 --> 00:10:50,760
Speaker 1: taking someone to a computer and it has all line commands,

175
00:10:51,040 --> 00:10:53,520
Speaker 1: and the person had never really worked with a line

176
00:10:53,559 --> 00:10:57,160
Speaker 1: command interface. They only worked with graphics by line command.

177
00:10:57,200 --> 00:11:00,240
Speaker 1: I mean, you have to type in the command and

178
00:11:00,320 --> 00:11:04,000
Speaker 1: file names you want in order to access stuff. Well,

179
00:11:04,160 --> 00:11:06,120
Speaker 1: if that's what you've been doing the whole time, it's

180
00:11:06,120 --> 00:11:08,240
Speaker 1: not so bad. You start to pick up on it.

181
00:11:08,280 --> 00:11:11,160
Speaker 1: Even as new systems are brought on, you can kind

182
00:11:11,160 --> 00:11:14,120
Speaker 1: of adapt to it pretty quickly because you already have

183
00:11:14,160 --> 00:11:17,400
Speaker 1: that basic level of knowledge. But for someone brand new

184
00:11:17,440 --> 00:11:20,720
Speaker 1: to computers, it was really intimidating. It felt like you

185
00:11:20,800 --> 00:11:25,160
Speaker 1: needed to have a lexicon of different commands at your

186
00:11:25,160 --> 00:11:27,240
Speaker 1: disposal all the time, and a lot of people would

187
00:11:27,280 --> 00:11:29,600
Speaker 1: have to use cheat sheets and take a look at

188
00:11:29,640 --> 00:11:32,160
Speaker 1: those constantly so that they can figure out just how

189
00:11:32,200 --> 00:11:37,200
Speaker 1: to navigate a computer. It wasn't very user friendly, and

190
00:11:37,240 --> 00:11:39,640
Speaker 1: it was really hard to find what you were looking

191
00:11:39,679 --> 00:11:42,440
Speaker 1: for if you didn't already know where to start from

192
00:11:42,440 --> 00:11:45,280
Speaker 1: the beginning. The trick with filing systems is that you

193
00:11:45,280 --> 00:11:49,360
Speaker 1: have to understand the organizational strategy. So not only do

194
00:11:49,400 --> 00:11:53,200
Speaker 1: you have to understand the language to navigate the system,

195
00:11:53,280 --> 00:11:55,800
Speaker 1: you also have to understand the person who set it

196
00:11:55,880 --> 00:11:58,640
Speaker 1: up in the first place. So there's there's a bit

197
00:11:58,679 --> 00:12:01,640
Speaker 1: of machine savvy you have to have, but there's also

198
00:12:01,960 --> 00:12:04,000
Speaker 1: how well do I know the person who set up

199
00:12:04,000 --> 00:12:06,680
Speaker 1: this filing system, and how does that person's brain work,

200
00:12:07,000 --> 00:12:09,760
Speaker 1: Because maybe they'll set things up in a different way

201
00:12:10,280 --> 00:12:12,480
Speaker 1: then I would set it up, and if I were

202
00:12:12,559 --> 00:12:14,960
Speaker 1: to try and navigate using my common sense, I might

203
00:12:15,000 --> 00:12:18,040
Speaker 1: find it frustrating. So here's an example of what I mean.

204
00:12:18,960 --> 00:12:21,079
Speaker 1: Back in the day, I used to organize all of

205
00:12:21,120 --> 00:12:25,440
Speaker 1: my DVDs by genre and then by alphabetical order by title.

206
00:12:26,080 --> 00:12:29,240
Speaker 1: So at all my action films in one place, I

207
00:12:29,280 --> 00:12:31,840
Speaker 1: had all my horror movies in another place, all my

208
00:12:31,920 --> 00:12:34,480
Speaker 1: Tim Curry movies were together, all that kind of thing.

209
00:12:34,600 --> 00:12:38,199
Speaker 1: You know, Tim Curry is a genre unto himself National treasure.

210
00:12:38,520 --> 00:12:41,560
Speaker 1: But if you didn't know that, I did that and

211
00:12:41,600 --> 00:12:44,960
Speaker 1: you didn't know where one section began or ended, you

212
00:12:44,960 --> 00:12:48,320
Speaker 1: could have trouble finding a specific title. Maybe you would

213
00:12:48,320 --> 00:12:50,200
Speaker 1: have had a totally different approach. Maybe you would have

214
00:12:50,280 --> 00:12:53,840
Speaker 1: organized everything alphabetically from the start, so it didn't matter

215
00:12:53,840 --> 00:12:56,600
Speaker 1: what genres and you would know, all right, well, the

216
00:12:56,640 --> 00:12:58,400
Speaker 1: title I'm looking for it starts with a D, so

217
00:12:58,440 --> 00:12:59,600
Speaker 1: I need to find the D S and it's going

218
00:12:59,640 --> 00:13:02,319
Speaker 1: to be there. Or maybe you would even have a

219
00:13:02,760 --> 00:13:07,800
Speaker 1: more crazy organizational strategy, maybe you would organize everything chronologically

220
00:13:07,920 --> 00:13:11,920
Speaker 1: by release date, which would confound everyone but the geekiest

221
00:13:11,960 --> 00:13:15,520
Speaker 1: of film buffs. The point is that these file systems

222
00:13:15,720 --> 00:13:18,640
Speaker 1: back in the day, with these network drives, they weren't

223
00:13:18,640 --> 00:13:21,880
Speaker 1: always intuitive. Even if you weren't immediately put off by

224
00:13:21,880 --> 00:13:24,480
Speaker 1: the interface, you might still not be able to find

225
00:13:24,520 --> 00:13:29,079
Speaker 1: what you're looking for. Now. Later still came alan em

226
00:13:29,120 --> 00:13:34,040
Speaker 1: Taj's Archie tool, and he was a University of Montreal

227
00:13:34,640 --> 00:13:37,720
Speaker 1: employee student. You know, he had gone from one to

228
00:13:37,760 --> 00:13:40,319
Speaker 1: the other really when he when he invented this tool

229
00:13:40,440 --> 00:13:43,040
Speaker 1: to search for files on the Internet that would be

230
00:13:43,120 --> 00:13:47,840
Speaker 1: transferred via f t P file transfer protocol. So instead

231
00:13:47,880 --> 00:13:50,320
Speaker 1: of requiring the user to know a direct path, you

232
00:13:50,440 --> 00:13:53,559
Speaker 1: just had to know the name of the file, how

233
00:13:53,840 --> 00:13:57,880
Speaker 1: was the file named? Now, that still isn't ideal, because

234
00:13:57,880 --> 00:14:01,720
Speaker 1: I'm sure you've encountered files that had weird or nonintuitive

235
00:14:01,800 --> 00:14:03,880
Speaker 1: names that may have had nothing to do with what

236
00:14:03,920 --> 00:14:07,679
Speaker 1: the file actually was about. So you had to know

237
00:14:07,920 --> 00:14:10,640
Speaker 1: precisely how the file was named or else it really

238
00:14:10,679 --> 00:14:12,520
Speaker 1: didn't do you any good. But at least it didn't

239
00:14:12,559 --> 00:14:16,120
Speaker 1: require you to also know the full path name of

240
00:14:16,240 --> 00:14:19,440
Speaker 1: where a file was, and it allowed you to actually

241
00:14:19,480 --> 00:14:23,680
Speaker 1: do a search across the internet. Now, once the Web

242
00:14:23,760 --> 00:14:26,000
Speaker 1: came along, and I'll talk a lot more about the

243
00:14:26,000 --> 00:14:29,400
Speaker 1: World Wide Web later on in this episode, and once

244
00:14:29,400 --> 00:14:34,680
Speaker 1: programmers began building search engines, this probably became less difficult. Right.

245
00:14:35,000 --> 00:14:37,760
Speaker 1: Search engines started to make things much easier for people.

246
00:14:38,080 --> 00:14:40,880
Speaker 1: The Web made navigation more intuitive. It made it more

247
00:14:40,880 --> 00:14:44,000
Speaker 1: accessible to people who weren't experienced with computers or had

248
00:14:44,040 --> 00:14:47,840
Speaker 1: inside knowledge of directory organization. But in those in between

249
00:14:47,880 --> 00:14:52,800
Speaker 1: times before the web, but after the Internet came online,

250
00:14:53,800 --> 00:14:59,920
Speaker 1: that's when Gopher emerged. Now, there were several developers behind

251
00:15:00,080 --> 00:15:03,400
Speaker 1: go for really six people in total, and one of

252
00:15:03,440 --> 00:15:06,400
Speaker 1: the more important ones I shouldn't even say it that way,

253
00:15:06,640 --> 00:15:08,720
Speaker 1: one of the leads I should say, because all six

254
00:15:08,760 --> 00:15:12,200
Speaker 1: were important. Uh. One of the leads was Mark McHale,

255
00:15:12,520 --> 00:15:15,640
Speaker 1: and Michael attended the University of Minnesota. Actually they were

256
00:15:15,640 --> 00:15:18,520
Speaker 1: all part of the University of Minnesota, but he had

257
00:15:18,520 --> 00:15:21,360
Speaker 1: attended as a student, earning a bachelor's degree in chemistry

258
00:15:21,480 --> 00:15:24,640
Speaker 1: in nineteen seventy nine. But while he earned his degree

259
00:15:24,640 --> 00:15:26,760
Speaker 1: in chemistry, he would actually go on to join the

260
00:15:26,840 --> 00:15:31,160
Speaker 1: campus micro computer Center as a programmer, and by the

261
00:15:31,240 --> 00:15:34,120
Speaker 1: late nineteen eighties he was leading a team of programmers

262
00:15:34,200 --> 00:15:37,640
Speaker 1: and together they built an email client called pop mail,

263
00:15:38,320 --> 00:15:41,200
Speaker 1: first for the Macintosh computer and then later on for

264
00:15:41,280 --> 00:15:46,120
Speaker 1: the PC platform. The POP in pop mail stands for

265
00:15:46,240 --> 00:15:50,360
Speaker 1: post Office Protocol. So the way it worked was that

266
00:15:50,400 --> 00:15:52,120
Speaker 1: you had a server that would kind of act like

267
00:15:52,160 --> 00:15:56,600
Speaker 1: a virtual post office. You would whenever you were checking

268
00:15:56,680 --> 00:15:59,920
Speaker 1: email or sending email, it would involve a virtual visit

269
00:16:00,160 --> 00:16:03,320
Speaker 1: to this post office. You could drop off and receive

270
00:16:03,400 --> 00:16:05,880
Speaker 1: mail there. So if you want to send a message

271
00:16:05,880 --> 00:16:10,480
Speaker 1: through your popmail client, the client, as in your computer

272
00:16:10,600 --> 00:16:14,040
Speaker 1: the workstation you are using, would relay the message through

273
00:16:14,120 --> 00:16:17,880
Speaker 1: the post office server, which would then direct the message

274
00:16:17,920 --> 00:16:23,000
Speaker 1: onto your destination. When retreating messages, you would actually be

275
00:16:23,560 --> 00:16:28,560
Speaker 1: going to this popmail server to pull the emails off

276
00:16:28,600 --> 00:16:31,400
Speaker 1: of it in order to read them. So they were

277
00:16:31,440 --> 00:16:33,280
Speaker 1: the ones who developed this, and it was a very

278
00:16:33,320 --> 00:16:37,920
Speaker 1: popular type of way of getting hold of email. The

279
00:16:38,040 --> 00:16:41,800
Speaker 1: next big project that this team tackled was creating an

280
00:16:41,840 --> 00:16:46,800
Speaker 1: interface for navigating the university's local network. So the question was,

281
00:16:46,840 --> 00:16:50,600
Speaker 1: how can we find whatever we're looking for? How do

282
00:16:50,640 --> 00:16:53,800
Speaker 1: we organize all this information we have in a way

283
00:16:53,800 --> 00:16:57,160
Speaker 1: that makes sense because they could see that the Internet

284
00:16:57,240 --> 00:17:01,000
Speaker 1: was creating this incredible opportunity to share information, but it

285
00:17:01,080 --> 00:17:05,120
Speaker 1: was getting increasingly difficult to find stuff and to organize

286
00:17:05,119 --> 00:17:08,920
Speaker 1: stuff properly because there were more and more computers coming

287
00:17:09,000 --> 00:17:12,840
Speaker 1: onto the system and it just made things even more complicated.

288
00:17:13,800 --> 00:17:19,560
Speaker 1: So together Mikhail, Bob Alberti, far Aud, Ankle, Saria, Paul Linda,

289
00:17:19,600 --> 00:17:23,400
Speaker 1: and Daniel Torry began to work to develop a solution,

290
00:17:23,520 --> 00:17:27,240
Speaker 1: and as it turned out, their solution had applications far

291
00:17:27,440 --> 00:17:30,680
Speaker 1: beyond the campus they worked on. In fact, it would

292
00:17:30,680 --> 00:17:34,960
Speaker 1: turn out their solution had applications outside of the campus

293
00:17:34,960 --> 00:17:38,760
Speaker 1: they worked on before it actually was implemented by the

294
00:17:38,800 --> 00:17:42,880
Speaker 1: campus itself. It would work across the Internet in general.

295
00:17:43,600 --> 00:17:46,280
Speaker 1: Now I'm gonna jump into what they did in just

296
00:17:46,520 --> 00:17:49,399
Speaker 1: a second. But before I do that, let's take a

297
00:17:49,480 --> 00:18:00,320
Speaker 1: quick break to thank our sponsor. So the team got

298
00:18:00,359 --> 00:18:04,240
Speaker 1: to work in They knew that they wanted a system

299
00:18:04,359 --> 00:18:08,000
Speaker 1: that could organize information in an intuitive way, giving users

300
00:18:08,040 --> 00:18:12,400
Speaker 1: an opportunity to navigate the information they needed quickly. They

301
00:18:12,400 --> 00:18:15,280
Speaker 1: wanted it to be a client server system. This was

302
00:18:15,520 --> 00:18:19,880
Speaker 1: really important to them. What they perhaps the biggest decision

303
00:18:19,880 --> 00:18:23,280
Speaker 1: they made, the most important one to them, was to

304
00:18:23,560 --> 00:18:30,119
Speaker 1: not go a centralized mainframe organizational strategy. They wanted to

305
00:18:30,119 --> 00:18:33,240
Speaker 1: get away from mainframe computers. They saw that the future

306
00:18:33,800 --> 00:18:37,640
Speaker 1: was in desktops. But desktop machines, especially in ninety one,

307
00:18:38,359 --> 00:18:45,600
Speaker 1: were slow, they had relatively limited capabilities, so whatever system

308
00:18:45,600 --> 00:18:52,400
Speaker 1: they created had to be optimized for these less powerful machines.

309
00:18:53,440 --> 00:18:56,320
Speaker 1: They also wanted to make this system scalable, with options

310
00:18:56,320 --> 00:19:00,479
Speaker 1: to have various departments register servers with a top level servers.

311
00:19:00,520 --> 00:19:03,840
Speaker 1: So in other words, you could have different departments having

312
00:19:03,880 --> 00:19:08,160
Speaker 1: their own networks, but have them linked to the main

313
00:19:08,320 --> 00:19:11,280
Speaker 1: network so that you can navigate throughout all of these

314
00:19:11,320 --> 00:19:13,399
Speaker 1: different systems. And that way, if you're connected to that

315
00:19:13,440 --> 00:19:17,280
Speaker 1: top level server, you could navigate to any lower department

316
00:19:17,320 --> 00:19:20,199
Speaker 1: through a master menu. They also wanted the tool to

317
00:19:20,200 --> 00:19:22,800
Speaker 1: be efficient and lightweight, meaning they didn't want to tax

318
00:19:22,840 --> 00:19:26,760
Speaker 1: those normal PCs and workstations. They didn't want a tool

319
00:19:26,800 --> 00:19:30,880
Speaker 1: that would move into Snail's pace, and that was one

320
00:19:30,920 --> 00:19:34,560
Speaker 1: of the reasons that they really focused on text based

321
00:19:35,600 --> 00:19:39,520
Speaker 1: communications because it's doesn't require a whole lot of data

322
00:19:39,560 --> 00:19:42,520
Speaker 1: to send text, and it meant that it could be

323
00:19:42,800 --> 00:19:47,320
Speaker 1: relatively fast and informative. They also decided that the server

324
00:19:47,840 --> 00:19:51,359
Speaker 1: would not retain states. Now that means that the server

325
00:19:51,440 --> 00:19:53,320
Speaker 1: wouldn't need to keep a record of all the different

326
00:19:53,320 --> 00:19:57,080
Speaker 1: information requests from multiple clients. Once a connection closed, the

327
00:19:57,119 --> 00:20:00,359
Speaker 1: state was white, and it would close the connect after

328
00:20:00,400 --> 00:20:04,040
Speaker 1: every transaction. Essentially, so together they worked on this tool

329
00:20:04,480 --> 00:20:08,359
Speaker 1: and they decided to call it Gopher. The name, by

330
00:20:08,359 --> 00:20:11,320
Speaker 1: the way, serves many purposes. For one, the mascot of

331
00:20:11,359 --> 00:20:14,679
Speaker 1: the University of Minnesota as the Golden Gopher, Minnesota is

332
00:20:15,080 --> 00:20:20,520
Speaker 1: the Gopher state. Also, the idea of a metaphorical Gopher

333
00:20:20,560 --> 00:20:24,119
Speaker 1: appealed to them. Gophers tunnel, and in a way, the

334
00:20:24,160 --> 00:20:30,080
Speaker 1: Gopher protocol kind of tunnels through networks. They also started

335
00:20:30,080 --> 00:20:33,520
Speaker 1: to refer to the networks that we're using Gopher as

336
00:20:33,600 --> 00:20:37,920
Speaker 1: Gopher space. And finally, gophers also the term for someone

337
00:20:37,960 --> 00:20:41,880
Speaker 1: who runs errands and fetches things because the gopher will

338
00:20:42,000 --> 00:20:49,080
Speaker 1: gopher like coffee or you know, uh, you can gopher

339
00:20:49,080 --> 00:20:53,360
Speaker 1: snacks that kind of stuff. The Classic Muppet Show series

340
00:20:53,840 --> 00:20:57,600
Speaker 1: had Scooter who was a gopher. Uh. There were a

341
00:20:57,600 --> 00:21:00,280
Speaker 1: lot of jokes about that, about how Scooter was a

342
00:21:00,320 --> 00:21:05,959
Speaker 1: gopher by job, but he wasn't a gopher by critter,

343
00:21:06,119 --> 00:21:10,879
Speaker 1: like he was not the actual animal gopher. Anyway, here's

344
00:21:10,880 --> 00:21:15,320
Speaker 1: the weird thing. So the team knew they were onto

345
00:21:15,359 --> 00:21:18,720
Speaker 1: something when they designed Gopher, but it didn't get a

346
00:21:18,760 --> 00:21:21,400
Speaker 1: lot of traction right out of the gate despite its utility,

347
00:21:21,440 --> 00:21:25,480
Speaker 1: because the University of Minnesota they just didn't see how

348
00:21:25,520 --> 00:21:28,000
Speaker 1: this would be useful. They didn't see the value in it,

349
00:21:28,480 --> 00:21:31,359
Speaker 1: so they didn't really put any support behind it, and

350
00:21:31,359 --> 00:21:34,199
Speaker 1: they didn't implement it at all. So the team decided

351
00:21:34,240 --> 00:21:37,280
Speaker 1: to sidestep all that red tape, and one of the

352
00:21:37,320 --> 00:21:42,040
Speaker 1: team members uploaded the software to an FTP server and

353
00:21:42,080 --> 00:21:45,320
Speaker 1: then posted a message on an Internet mailing list saying, hey, guys,

354
00:21:45,400 --> 00:21:48,240
Speaker 1: we developed this kind of cool tool. We think it

355
00:21:48,400 --> 00:21:50,800
Speaker 1: is a great way to organize information on networks and

356
00:21:50,840 --> 00:21:54,000
Speaker 1: allow people to find stuff. Give it a try. So

357
00:21:54,080 --> 00:21:57,479
Speaker 1: people began to download it and put use and not

358
00:21:57,600 --> 00:22:01,119
Speaker 1: long after that it started to take off a lot

359
00:22:01,200 --> 00:22:03,960
Speaker 1: of places we're using it, and they decided that it

360
00:22:04,000 --> 00:22:06,560
Speaker 1: made a whole lot of sense, and eventually the University

361
00:22:06,560 --> 00:22:10,679
Speaker 1: of Minnesota administration relented and implemented Gopher as well on

362
00:22:10,760 --> 00:22:14,879
Speaker 1: their campus. Now, let's go ahead and talk about Gopher

363
00:22:14,920 --> 00:22:18,000
Speaker 1: implementations and what it was actually like. So there were

364
00:22:18,200 --> 00:22:21,359
Speaker 1: two main ways you could interact with Gopher. One of

365
00:22:21,359 --> 00:22:25,160
Speaker 1: them was to install software on your computer. And uh,

366
00:22:25,240 --> 00:22:28,720
Speaker 1: this is looking at interacting with Gopher as a user

367
00:22:28,800 --> 00:22:32,159
Speaker 1: as opposed to as an administrator. So you want to

368
00:22:32,240 --> 00:22:34,719
Speaker 1: use Gopher, Well, one thing you could do is install

369
00:22:34,800 --> 00:22:37,679
Speaker 1: software on your computer, and this was a client side

370
00:22:37,800 --> 00:22:41,399
Speaker 1: Gopher application, which really is not that different from a

371
00:22:41,400 --> 00:22:46,679
Speaker 1: web browser like Firefox or Chrome or Safari. It's essentially

372
00:22:46,960 --> 00:22:49,400
Speaker 1: a similar thing. It's a it's a program that runs

373
00:22:49,440 --> 00:22:53,600
Speaker 1: on your computer that acts as the interface for this protocol. Uh.

374
00:22:53,640 --> 00:22:56,280
Speaker 1: Those are all clients side applications, just like the Gopher

375
00:22:56,320 --> 00:22:58,480
Speaker 1: one was. But you didn't have to do that. What

376
00:22:58,600 --> 00:23:02,680
Speaker 1: you could do instead is use a tell net application.

377
00:23:03,560 --> 00:23:06,879
Speaker 1: Telling Net was another old protocol that's still used in

378
00:23:06,960 --> 00:23:11,680
Speaker 1: some places. Uh tell net would allow you to virtually

379
00:23:11,880 --> 00:23:15,919
Speaker 1: log into another terminal, and you just had to have

380
00:23:16,040 --> 00:23:19,320
Speaker 1: the correct address, import number and everything in order to

381
00:23:19,320 --> 00:23:23,119
Speaker 1: tell Net into that that room. So you could use

382
00:23:23,160 --> 00:23:25,760
Speaker 1: tell neet to log onto a remote server and use

383
00:23:25,840 --> 00:23:29,959
Speaker 1: the server side Gopher client to access directories, and in

384
00:23:29,960 --> 00:23:32,360
Speaker 1: that case, all the work is being done by the

385
00:23:32,400 --> 00:23:36,080
Speaker 1: server and you don't have to actually have a client

386
00:23:36,200 --> 00:23:40,119
Speaker 1: based application on your side. The style of the Gopher

387
00:23:40,119 --> 00:23:43,119
Speaker 1: client really dependent upon its implementation. The team wanted to

388
00:23:43,160 --> 00:23:47,040
Speaker 1: make sure that it was it was customizable, but it

389
00:23:47,080 --> 00:23:51,040
Speaker 1: was always simple. It's always text based. It could be

390
00:23:51,080 --> 00:23:55,720
Speaker 1: extremely simple where all you have our text options under

391
00:23:55,760 --> 00:23:59,640
Speaker 1: a menu, or it could have some very primitive kind

392
00:23:59,640 --> 00:24:04,200
Speaker 1: of of graphic user interface elements in it. Graphic user

393
00:24:04,240 --> 00:24:10,720
Speaker 1: interface also known as gooey, but less less um what's

394
00:24:10,800 --> 00:24:15,840
Speaker 1: the right word, less impressive or extensive as what you

395
00:24:15,840 --> 00:24:18,719
Speaker 1: would find in the Worldwide Web later. And there were

396
00:24:18,720 --> 00:24:21,399
Speaker 1: two worlds in the Gopher verse, the world the client

397
00:24:21,600 --> 00:24:25,879
Speaker 1: could see and the world the server worked with. So

398
00:24:25,920 --> 00:24:30,640
Speaker 1: on the server side, every item within a Gopher directory

399
00:24:30,840 --> 00:24:34,080
Speaker 1: would have certain elements to it, and that included a

400
00:24:34,119 --> 00:24:38,520
Speaker 1: client visible name, a selector, which was usually something that

401
00:24:39,440 --> 00:24:44,840
Speaker 1: used the path name that would connect the server for

402
00:24:44,960 --> 00:24:49,040
Speaker 1: location purposes. Then there would be a host name which

403
00:24:49,040 --> 00:24:53,440
Speaker 1: would tell the top level server which computer actually contained

404
00:24:53,480 --> 00:24:57,600
Speaker 1: the file in question, and an IP port number. Ports

405
00:24:57,600 --> 00:24:59,679
Speaker 1: are kind of like telephone lines, so a computer had

406
00:24:59,720 --> 00:25:02,679
Speaker 1: to know which port it should use when contacting other computers.

407
00:25:03,280 --> 00:25:06,359
Speaker 1: Now on the client side, on the user side, only

408
00:25:06,400 --> 00:25:09,400
Speaker 1: those client visible names would show up. Everything else would

409
00:25:09,400 --> 00:25:13,520
Speaker 1: be hidden. And to use an analogy, imagine that you

410
00:25:13,600 --> 00:25:16,520
Speaker 1: go to a party and it's one of those super hip,

411
00:25:16,560 --> 00:25:19,920
Speaker 1: geeky tech parties that I assume happened but I never

412
00:25:19,960 --> 00:25:23,040
Speaker 1: get invited to anyway. Everyone gets a little name tag,

413
00:25:23,200 --> 00:25:26,000
Speaker 1: and the name tag just has the person's name on it.

414
00:25:26,080 --> 00:25:28,399
Speaker 1: That's it. That's the only information about the person that

415
00:25:28,520 --> 00:25:33,760
Speaker 1: is visible to the average attendee. So when you walk

416
00:25:33,800 --> 00:25:36,199
Speaker 1: around the party, you can see each person's name, but

417
00:25:36,320 --> 00:25:40,440
Speaker 1: that's it. But let's say you're a super duper awesome

418
00:25:40,560 --> 00:25:42,840
Speaker 1: v I P at this party, and all the super

419
00:25:42,920 --> 00:25:45,200
Speaker 1: duper awesome v I P s at this particular party

420
00:25:45,240 --> 00:25:47,520
Speaker 1: get a little swag bag that has a pair of

421
00:25:47,560 --> 00:25:50,119
Speaker 1: smart glasses in them, and if you put the smart

422
00:25:50,160 --> 00:25:55,199
Speaker 1: glasses on, you see projected above the name tag of

423
00:25:55,240 --> 00:25:58,000
Speaker 1: each person more information, and it tells you where that

424
00:25:58,080 --> 00:26:01,440
Speaker 1: person lives, what their phone or is, tells you about

425
00:26:01,440 --> 00:26:04,119
Speaker 1: their favorite lunch spots. In other words, you know a

426
00:26:04,119 --> 00:26:06,639
Speaker 1: few different ways you could reach those people if you

427
00:26:06,680 --> 00:26:10,359
Speaker 1: needed to. Well, in the gover verse, that sort of

428
00:26:10,400 --> 00:26:13,960
Speaker 1: same approach was applying, but only two files, not to people,

429
00:26:14,520 --> 00:26:17,040
Speaker 1: so there wasn't anything creepy going on. But Michale and

430
00:26:17,080 --> 00:26:20,040
Speaker 1: his group decided that users didn't need to see all

431
00:26:20,080 --> 00:26:23,000
Speaker 1: the extra information. They don't need to know where a

432
00:26:23,080 --> 00:26:27,040
Speaker 1: file is on a network. They don't care. They don't

433
00:26:27,119 --> 00:26:29,679
Speaker 1: care if the file they want is on computer A

434
00:26:30,119 --> 00:26:33,240
Speaker 1: or computer B. They just want access to that file.

435
00:26:33,640 --> 00:26:37,640
Speaker 1: So they decided that all of that excess information would

436
00:26:37,680 --> 00:26:40,200
Speaker 1: be invisible to the user. It would still be there

437
00:26:40,200 --> 00:26:42,560
Speaker 1: for the servers because the servers would need to know

438
00:26:43,320 --> 00:26:45,960
Speaker 1: where everything was in order to direct users to the

439
00:26:46,040 --> 00:26:49,640
Speaker 1: right location, But to the users themselves, they don't care,

440
00:26:50,119 --> 00:26:53,480
Speaker 1: So get rid of it, and UH ended up being

441
00:26:53,640 --> 00:26:56,960
Speaker 1: a much more elegant system that way. So let's say

442
00:26:57,000 --> 00:27:00,679
Speaker 1: you've blogged into a college campus Gopher server, because the

443
00:27:00,680 --> 00:27:03,480
Speaker 1: tool was originally developed for colleges, So what would you

444
00:27:03,480 --> 00:27:07,080
Speaker 1: actually see if you did this, well, you'd start off

445
00:27:07,080 --> 00:27:09,359
Speaker 1: with a menu of options. It's kind of like a

446
00:27:09,400 --> 00:27:11,960
Speaker 1: table of contents, and that would allow you to explore

447
00:27:12,040 --> 00:27:16,120
Speaker 1: different areas of the Gopher verse more thoroughly. A typical

448
00:27:16,240 --> 00:27:19,200
Speaker 1: top level menu might include and by the way, I'm

449
00:27:19,240 --> 00:27:22,880
Speaker 1: taking this largely from a request for comments that Michale

450
00:27:22,920 --> 00:27:26,800
Speaker 1: and his group created in order to discuss what Gopher is,

451
00:27:26,840 --> 00:27:29,919
Speaker 1: what it was meant for, and how it works. The

452
00:27:29,960 --> 00:27:33,399
Speaker 1: first item might be something like about Internet Gopher, and

453
00:27:33,440 --> 00:27:36,080
Speaker 1: it would literally just be that little phrase, and if

454
00:27:36,119 --> 00:27:39,159
Speaker 1: you selected that one, it would open up something that

455
00:27:39,200 --> 00:27:42,560
Speaker 1: would allow you to learn more about Internet Gopher. It

456
00:27:42,560 --> 00:27:44,480
Speaker 1: would pull the files that could tell you about the

457
00:27:44,600 --> 00:27:47,199
Speaker 1: versions and Gopher in use and how best to navigate it.

458
00:27:47,960 --> 00:27:51,480
Speaker 1: It may even tell you about the site administrator. And

459
00:27:51,600 --> 00:27:54,800
Speaker 1: in fact, in that original request for comments, they suggested

460
00:27:54,840 --> 00:27:59,720
Speaker 1: that every administrator for a Gopher server include his or

461
00:27:59,760 --> 00:28:03,800
Speaker 1: her name, email address, and phone number so that you

462
00:28:03,840 --> 00:28:08,160
Speaker 1: could get in contact with them should something go wrong. Yikes.

463
00:28:09,040 --> 00:28:11,840
Speaker 1: Obviously this was in the days when very few people,

464
00:28:12,440 --> 00:28:16,160
Speaker 1: comparatively speaking, we're using an Internet tool. Because you could

465
00:28:16,200 --> 00:28:20,200
Speaker 1: just imagine how much you know traffic you would get

466
00:28:20,680 --> 00:28:23,640
Speaker 1: from various emails and phone numbers. If you just put

467
00:28:23,680 --> 00:28:26,800
Speaker 1: your actual address out on a major website, that would

468
00:28:26,800 --> 00:28:32,800
Speaker 1: be tough. The next UH element on this Gopher list

469
00:28:32,880 --> 00:28:35,920
Speaker 1: might be something like around the campus, and that could

470
00:28:35,960 --> 00:28:39,480
Speaker 1: include more directories that give you links to files about

471
00:28:39,520 --> 00:28:42,720
Speaker 1: various areas of campus. You might get sub menus of

472
00:28:42,800 --> 00:28:47,280
Speaker 1: different options. For example, at University of Georgia, if I

473
00:28:47,320 --> 00:28:49,840
Speaker 1: saw around the campus on a Gopher site and I

474
00:28:49,880 --> 00:28:52,360
Speaker 1: clicked on that, it might take me to a couple

475
00:28:52,400 --> 00:28:55,400
Speaker 1: of different sub menus, one for North campus and one

476
00:28:55,520 --> 00:28:58,200
Speaker 1: for South campus, because the University of Georgia, at least

477
00:28:58,240 --> 00:29:01,360
Speaker 1: at the time when I was attending it was roughly

478
00:29:01,400 --> 00:29:05,920
Speaker 1: divided into North and South campuses. Another option might say courses,

479
00:29:06,040 --> 00:29:09,280
Speaker 1: schedules and calendars, which would obviously take you to information

480
00:29:09,320 --> 00:29:12,360
Speaker 1: about the classes offered by that college and when they happen,

481
00:29:12,400 --> 00:29:14,440
Speaker 1: as well as a list of campus events throughout the year,

482
00:29:14,800 --> 00:29:16,520
Speaker 1: and so on and so forth. Those are just the

483
00:29:16,600 --> 00:29:19,120
Speaker 1: kind of basic table of content stuff you wuld see,

484
00:29:19,120 --> 00:29:23,320
Speaker 1: and again it's all text based. Typically the options on

485
00:29:23,360 --> 00:29:25,600
Speaker 1: any list, we have indicators to let you know if

486
00:29:25,600 --> 00:29:28,400
Speaker 1: you were looking at the name of a file or

487
00:29:28,480 --> 00:29:31,440
Speaker 1: if you were looking at the name of another directory.

488
00:29:31,520 --> 00:29:35,240
Speaker 1: So again, in an example given from that RFC paper

489
00:29:35,320 --> 00:29:39,120
Speaker 1: that was written back in nineteen, they the group showed

490
00:29:39,160 --> 00:29:42,800
Speaker 1: directories as being followed by an ellipses and files were not.

491
00:29:43,360 --> 00:29:46,920
Speaker 1: So if it said campus schedule with no ellipses, then

492
00:29:46,960 --> 00:29:49,120
Speaker 1: you knew that clicking on that would give you a

493
00:29:49,160 --> 00:29:52,360
Speaker 1: file with the schedule on it if you chose that option.

494
00:29:52,680 --> 00:29:55,160
Speaker 1: But if it if you were looking at a list

495
00:29:55,200 --> 00:29:58,959
Speaker 1: that said college activities dot dot dot, you knew that

496
00:29:59,000 --> 00:30:02,240
Speaker 1: the dot dot dot at ellipses indicated that it was

497
00:30:02,440 --> 00:30:05,400
Speaker 1: a link to another directory. So if you clicked on

498
00:30:05,480 --> 00:30:09,920
Speaker 1: college activities, you would get another menu that would subdivide

499
00:30:10,000 --> 00:30:14,520
Speaker 1: up college activities. Maybe it would be sports, after school activities,

500
00:30:14,880 --> 00:30:20,120
Speaker 1: it might be extracurricular student groups, that kind of thing. Now,

501
00:30:20,160 --> 00:30:25,080
Speaker 1: Gopher's design allows other servers to interact with a top

502
00:30:25,200 --> 00:30:27,440
Speaker 1: level servers, so it didn't have to just be a

503
00:30:27,480 --> 00:30:30,240
Speaker 1: single computer running all of this information. In fact, that

504
00:30:30,320 --> 00:30:32,520
Speaker 1: was beside the point. The The whole purpose of this

505
00:30:32,920 --> 00:30:36,320
Speaker 1: was to allow multiple servers to connect with each other

506
00:30:36,760 --> 00:30:41,000
Speaker 1: and create an an UH overall strategy for navigation to

507
00:30:41,080 --> 00:30:46,080
Speaker 1: allow students or other users to learn more information. So

508
00:30:46,160 --> 00:30:50,360
Speaker 1: you could have say the computer science department server registered

509
00:30:50,520 --> 00:30:53,959
Speaker 1: under a top level option for the entire university, and

510
00:30:54,000 --> 00:30:56,600
Speaker 1: the English department could have its own server, and the

511
00:30:56,640 --> 00:30:58,880
Speaker 1: Math department could have its own server, and so on

512
00:30:58,920 --> 00:31:02,400
Speaker 1: and so on. So each departmental server would further point

513
00:31:02,440 --> 00:31:05,720
Speaker 1: down the chain to specific files relevant to that department.

514
00:31:06,160 --> 00:31:09,560
Speaker 1: And Gopher also included the ability to stack, meaning that

515
00:31:09,600 --> 00:31:12,200
Speaker 1: you could actually retrace your steps, which is kind of

516
00:31:12,200 --> 00:31:15,120
Speaker 1: like hitting the backbar or the back button rather on

517
00:31:15,200 --> 00:31:18,040
Speaker 1: a browser. So if you went down one path and

518
00:31:18,120 --> 00:31:20,360
Speaker 1: then decided, hey, I need to see something else that

519
00:31:20,440 --> 00:31:23,280
Speaker 1: was further back in my browsing, you could back up

520
00:31:23,320 --> 00:31:26,560
Speaker 1: the pathway until you got to that specific fork and

521
00:31:26,600 --> 00:31:29,320
Speaker 1: then take the other fork. And that was actually pretty

522
00:31:29,360 --> 00:31:31,760
Speaker 1: innovative in the early nineties. It wasn't like it was,

523
00:31:32,240 --> 00:31:34,680
Speaker 1: you know, something that they were copying from other people.

524
00:31:36,040 --> 00:31:39,560
Speaker 1: Unlike today's websites. The information on Gopher pages tended to

525
00:31:39,600 --> 00:31:43,120
Speaker 1: remain fairly static, which actually was also a huge help

526
00:31:43,160 --> 00:31:45,560
Speaker 1: for Gopher space. You didn't have to update things quite

527
00:31:45,560 --> 00:31:48,800
Speaker 1: so frequently. Occasionally you might need to update a file,

528
00:31:49,040 --> 00:31:51,120
Speaker 1: or you might need to add a file to a server,

529
00:31:51,640 --> 00:31:54,040
Speaker 1: but that didn't happen at the frequency we see today

530
00:31:54,040 --> 00:31:56,240
Speaker 1: On the web, there weren't a lot of dynamic pages

531
00:31:56,280 --> 00:31:59,080
Speaker 1: out there. It was important for Gopher to be able

532
00:31:59,080 --> 00:32:01,840
Speaker 1: to adapt to change is and evolving conditions, So the

533
00:32:01,880 --> 00:32:05,320
Speaker 1: team designed a system that it would allow them to

534
00:32:05,600 --> 00:32:08,920
Speaker 1: update files and path names in pieces, so that you

535
00:32:08,960 --> 00:32:10,920
Speaker 1: didn't have to do a full update of the whole

536
00:32:10,960 --> 00:32:14,640
Speaker 1: system regularly. You could just focus on whichever sections had

537
00:32:14,720 --> 00:32:17,920
Speaker 1: new information and just update those bits. Everything else could

538
00:32:17,920 --> 00:32:20,880
Speaker 1: remain the same. That sped everything else up, Like if

539
00:32:20,920 --> 00:32:24,000
Speaker 1: you are only making changes to two percent of your network,

540
00:32:24,520 --> 00:32:28,240
Speaker 1: then there's no reason to update all They could save

541
00:32:28,320 --> 00:32:32,280
Speaker 1: time by just updating that two They also made another

542
00:32:32,440 --> 00:32:35,680
Speaker 1: very clever choice. They recommended that all top level servers

543
00:32:36,000 --> 00:32:39,080
Speaker 1: have a clone and that way, if one server were

544
00:32:39,120 --> 00:32:41,760
Speaker 1: to fail for whatever reason, another one could take over

545
00:32:41,800 --> 00:32:45,040
Speaker 1: the job. Also, if you had a really busy network,

546
00:32:45,080 --> 00:32:47,800
Speaker 1: you could have both servers acting at the same time,

547
00:32:47,880 --> 00:32:51,000
Speaker 1: sharing the load. So some users are using server A,

548
00:32:51,200 --> 00:32:53,480
Speaker 1: some users are using server B, but both of them

549
00:32:53,480 --> 00:32:57,680
Speaker 1: are identical. They have complete navigational tools to go through

550
00:32:57,680 --> 00:33:01,120
Speaker 1: the whole network, and so it doesn't really matter which

551
00:33:01,120 --> 00:33:02,920
Speaker 1: one you land on as a user, it's going to

552
00:33:02,960 --> 00:33:05,960
Speaker 1: be the same experience. And since most of the files

553
00:33:05,960 --> 00:33:09,480
Speaker 1: remain static. You didn't really have to worry about the

554
00:33:09,560 --> 00:33:12,520
Speaker 1: two top level servers getting out of sync. They would

555
00:33:12,560 --> 00:33:15,240
Speaker 1: be pretty much ready to go all the time. I mean,

556
00:33:15,280 --> 00:33:17,920
Speaker 1: occasionally you don't have to update at least parts of

557
00:33:17,920 --> 00:33:21,520
Speaker 1: the system. But it was pretty manageable, especially in those

558
00:33:21,560 --> 00:33:26,240
Speaker 1: early days before things got super complicated now. The team

559
00:33:26,280 --> 00:33:29,120
Speaker 1: also suggested that all registered servers in a system have

560
00:33:29,200 --> 00:33:31,840
Speaker 1: an alias that the Gopher A client could use to

561
00:33:31,960 --> 00:33:35,280
Speaker 1: locate those servers, and this way the client would know

562
00:33:35,400 --> 00:33:39,480
Speaker 1: each registered server by its alias, rather than the server's

563
00:33:39,520 --> 00:33:43,440
Speaker 1: primary name, which was more or less unchangeable. Now why

564
00:33:43,480 --> 00:33:45,400
Speaker 1: would you want to have an alias, Well, the reason

565
00:33:46,000 --> 00:33:50,200
Speaker 1: was to improve portability. So if as an administrator you

566
00:33:50,520 --> 00:33:53,360
Speaker 1: decided that you needed to move files from one server

567
00:33:53,520 --> 00:33:56,800
Speaker 1: to another server, that could be a huge headache because

568
00:33:56,920 --> 00:33:59,480
Speaker 1: we mean having to update all these different path names

569
00:33:59,640 --> 00:34:04,320
Speaker 1: so that your top level machine knows where everything is now, right,

570
00:34:04,720 --> 00:34:07,720
Speaker 1: if if you had to say, oh, well, instead of

571
00:34:07,720 --> 00:34:09,440
Speaker 1: being on this machine, it needs to be on this machine.

572
00:34:09,440 --> 00:34:12,160
Speaker 1: I've got to update all these different files and these

573
00:34:12,200 --> 00:34:15,239
Speaker 1: different path names so that people navigating the system will

574
00:34:15,280 --> 00:34:17,760
Speaker 1: get to where they need to go. Using the alias

575
00:34:17,840 --> 00:34:20,120
Speaker 1: was actually a very clever idea to get around this.

576
00:34:20,239 --> 00:34:23,200
Speaker 1: Clients wouldn't require an update or any alteration. They don't

577
00:34:23,200 --> 00:34:25,640
Speaker 1: need to know that computer one, which used to be

578
00:34:25,680 --> 00:34:28,799
Speaker 1: known as Bob, has gone offline and now computer two

579
00:34:28,880 --> 00:34:32,239
Speaker 1: has all of Computer one stuff. Instead, the administrator would

580
00:34:32,280 --> 00:34:35,000
Speaker 1: just name computer to Bob. They would give computer to

581
00:34:35,640 --> 00:34:39,279
Speaker 1: the alias of the old computer one, and then the

582
00:34:39,280 --> 00:34:42,640
Speaker 1: clients would just end up going to computer two because

583
00:34:42,680 --> 00:34:44,959
Speaker 1: they're not looking at one or two. They're just looking

584
00:34:45,000 --> 00:34:47,680
Speaker 1: for Bob. And if computer two is Bob, now that's

585
00:34:47,680 --> 00:34:50,799
Speaker 1: where they go. It was an elegant solution, particularly once

586
00:34:50,840 --> 00:34:54,880
Speaker 1: network's got really complex. Now, the brilliant thing behind Gopher

587
00:34:55,040 --> 00:34:57,160
Speaker 1: is that the end user didn't need to know any

588
00:34:57,239 --> 00:35:00,680
Speaker 1: of this. That didn't matter to them. They they just

589
00:35:00,760 --> 00:35:04,319
Speaker 1: needed to have a simple interface to interact with. They

590
00:35:04,440 --> 00:35:06,560
Speaker 1: needed to be able to see the choices they wanted

591
00:35:06,719 --> 00:35:09,520
Speaker 1: to make a choice and follow that pathway, and it

592
00:35:09,560 --> 00:35:11,480
Speaker 1: was very similar to kind of a choose your own

593
00:35:11,520 --> 00:35:14,920
Speaker 1: adventure book. As long as the directories were clear and

594
00:35:15,239 --> 00:35:18,040
Speaker 1: organization of the information made sense, it was easy to use.

595
00:35:18,560 --> 00:35:22,920
Speaker 1: And then there was the killer app, the ability to search.

596
00:35:24,000 --> 00:35:26,799
Speaker 1: So so to search on Gopher you had to set

597
00:35:26,880 --> 00:35:30,960
Speaker 1: up an actual go Gopher search server. It would be

598
00:35:31,160 --> 00:35:34,960
Speaker 1: its own purpose was to to essentially have all the

599
00:35:35,040 --> 00:35:39,160
Speaker 1: different files that are connected to that particular Gopher space

600
00:35:39,840 --> 00:35:44,000
Speaker 1: UH indexed, and these servers could perform full text searches

601
00:35:44,080 --> 00:35:47,080
Speaker 1: in all the files on all the registered servers in

602
00:35:47,200 --> 00:35:52,360
Speaker 1: that Gopher space. So, by default, search queries assumed that

603
00:35:52,480 --> 00:35:55,760
Speaker 1: if you were to type in multiple words, the spaces

604
00:35:55,800 --> 00:36:00,160
Speaker 1: between those words were an and in boolean logic. In

605
00:36:00,200 --> 00:36:04,120
Speaker 1: other words, if you typed in Spanish dance in the

606
00:36:04,200 --> 00:36:08,400
Speaker 1: query field, so you just have Spanish space dance, the

607
00:36:08,440 --> 00:36:11,439
Speaker 1: search would actually assume what you are saying is give

608
00:36:11,520 --> 00:36:15,239
Speaker 1: me all the files that have both the words Spanish

609
00:36:15,520 --> 00:36:19,880
Speaker 1: and dance in them. Files that didn't meet that criteria

610
00:36:19,920 --> 00:36:22,319
Speaker 1: would not be returned. So if there was a file

611
00:36:22,360 --> 00:36:24,239
Speaker 1: that had the word Spanish in it, but dance never

612
00:36:24,320 --> 00:36:26,719
Speaker 1: appeared in that file, you wouldn't get it. Same thing

613
00:36:26,760 --> 00:36:29,239
Speaker 1: if it were dance but Spanish was never there, you

614
00:36:29,239 --> 00:36:32,720
Speaker 1: wouldn't get it. Now, this structure only worked with servers

615
00:36:32,760 --> 00:36:35,920
Speaker 1: that were registered to the same system, So these Gopher

616
00:36:35,960 --> 00:36:39,319
Speaker 1: spaces were kind of like islands in the ocean. You

617
00:36:39,320 --> 00:36:43,360
Speaker 1: could connect Gopher spaces together. You could end up registering

618
00:36:43,360 --> 00:36:46,120
Speaker 1: the servers of different Gopher spaces so that they made

619
00:36:46,200 --> 00:36:50,120
Speaker 1: larger networks, and that would allow users to navigate from

620
00:36:50,160 --> 00:36:53,279
Speaker 1: one system of servers to another. But that wasn't necessarily

621
00:36:53,280 --> 00:36:55,720
Speaker 1: the aim of Gopher. So if I did a search

622
00:36:55,800 --> 00:36:59,520
Speaker 1: on a Gopher space for a specific term, like again

623
00:36:59,560 --> 00:37:01,960
Speaker 1: at you g A, if you g A was its

624
00:37:02,040 --> 00:37:07,520
Speaker 1: own contained system, its own network of servers throughout the campus,

625
00:37:07,520 --> 00:37:11,560
Speaker 1: but none of those had connections to other campuses. I'm

626
00:37:11,560 --> 00:37:14,360
Speaker 1: not gonna find files that are stored at the University

627
00:37:14,360 --> 00:37:19,040
Speaker 1: of Minnesota because the two systems are distinct. I'll only

628
00:37:19,080 --> 00:37:21,960
Speaker 1: find files that are on u g A system. So

629
00:37:22,239 --> 00:37:24,000
Speaker 1: it was a little different from the World Wide Web.

630
00:37:24,040 --> 00:37:29,000
Speaker 1: It had these uh again, these kind of islands of information. Well,

631
00:37:29,040 --> 00:37:32,439
Speaker 1: I've got some more to talk about, including the rise

632
00:37:32,480 --> 00:37:34,960
Speaker 1: and fall of Gopher itself, but before I get into

633
00:37:35,000 --> 00:37:38,560
Speaker 1: that section, let's take another quick break to thank our sponsor.

634
00:37:47,239 --> 00:37:50,440
Speaker 1: All Right, we're talking about the nineteen nineties. Now, the

635
00:37:50,440 --> 00:37:55,759
Speaker 1: Internet was still pretty darn young back then, Especially an

636
00:37:55,800 --> 00:37:59,720
Speaker 1: Internet that was accessible to people beyond the computer science

637
00:37:59,760 --> 00:38:02,480
Speaker 1: field old, and no one was really sure what it

638
00:38:02,480 --> 00:38:07,560
Speaker 1: would evolve into. In those early nineties, in the Internet

639
00:38:07,600 --> 00:38:10,680
Speaker 1: engineering Task Force or i E. T F held a

640
00:38:10,719 --> 00:38:14,480
Speaker 1: meeting in San Diego and they invited Michael and also

641
00:38:14,600 --> 00:38:17,960
Speaker 1: Ankle Saria to come out and to speak to the

642
00:38:18,040 --> 00:38:20,320
Speaker 1: group as a whole about the work they were doing

643
00:38:20,680 --> 00:38:24,680
Speaker 1: with Gopher now. The meeting included a whole bunch of

644
00:38:24,719 --> 00:38:28,920
Speaker 1: different important figures in Internet history, including Tim burners Lee,

645
00:38:28,960 --> 00:38:31,279
Speaker 1: who is the guy who pioneered the Worldwide Web. He

646
00:38:31,360 --> 00:38:34,080
Speaker 1: built the first web page at CERN, that's the same

647
00:38:34,160 --> 00:38:38,000
Speaker 1: organization that runs the Large Hadron Collider. So Burner's Lee

648
00:38:38,120 --> 00:38:40,840
Speaker 1: was there to talk about his approach to Internet navigation

649
00:38:41,160 --> 00:38:44,960
Speaker 1: using what he called the web and hypertext, which I'm

650
00:38:45,000 --> 00:38:48,480
Speaker 1: sure you're familiar with because that's what everybody uses today.

651
00:38:48,560 --> 00:38:51,120
Speaker 1: He also was very interested in trying to find a

652
00:38:51,120 --> 00:38:55,440
Speaker 1: way for the Web and Gopher to work together. Um,

653
00:38:55,480 --> 00:38:57,880
Speaker 1: the folks over at Gopher they were looking at burners

654
00:38:57,960 --> 00:39:00,800
Speaker 1: lee approach to navigation and they said, well, this doesn't

655
00:39:00,800 --> 00:39:04,600
Speaker 1: make any sense using hypertext of different words too to

656
00:39:04,800 --> 00:39:09,480
Speaker 1: leap to connected but distinct ideas. That's that makes an

657
00:39:09,560 --> 00:39:12,319
Speaker 1: organization impossible. It's like the opposite of what we're doing.

658
00:39:12,360 --> 00:39:16,440
Speaker 1: We're trying to create hierarchies of information and the Web

659
00:39:16,560 --> 00:39:19,200
Speaker 1: is is a web. It's all this interconnectivity. So they

660
00:39:19,239 --> 00:39:21,480
Speaker 1: never really got to work things out with burners Lee,

661
00:39:21,760 --> 00:39:25,320
Speaker 1: something that they said in retrospect perhaps was a mistake,

662
00:39:25,760 --> 00:39:27,920
Speaker 1: but they didn't know that at the time. No one

663
00:39:28,040 --> 00:39:30,560
Speaker 1: was sure at the time whose approach was going to

664
00:39:30,600 --> 00:39:36,799
Speaker 1: work out best. So uh, it wasn't as a weird experience,

665
00:39:36,880 --> 00:39:39,640
Speaker 1: right And besides, the web programmers learned about other means

666
00:39:39,680 --> 00:39:42,640
Speaker 1: of accessing and navigating the Internet. There were other ones

667
00:39:42,680 --> 00:39:46,239
Speaker 1: like a Prospero and waste or w A I s

668
00:39:46,800 --> 00:39:50,959
Speaker 1: so be. Clifford Neumann was the pioneer behind Prospero, which

669
00:39:51,080 --> 00:39:54,319
Speaker 1: was meant to create personalized directories of the Internet in

670
00:39:54,400 --> 00:39:57,759
Speaker 1: response to user queries so they could organize information and

671
00:39:57,800 --> 00:40:01,280
Speaker 1: allow users to search grouping resources together so that users

672
00:40:01,280 --> 00:40:03,799
Speaker 1: didn't have to go down several different individual paths and

673
00:40:03,840 --> 00:40:07,200
Speaker 1: just hope for the best. Ways stood for Wide Area

674
00:40:07,360 --> 00:40:11,960
Speaker 1: Information Server. It was a text searching system that could

675
00:40:12,000 --> 00:40:15,239
Speaker 1: look for specific strings of text on files on the server,

676
00:40:15,600 --> 00:40:19,000
Speaker 1: retrieving any hits that it might find. And so it

677
00:40:19,120 --> 00:40:23,239
Speaker 1: was also very different from the Gopher approach or the

678
00:40:23,280 --> 00:40:27,200
Speaker 1: Prospero approach. It was a pretty basic strategy to search

679
00:40:27,200 --> 00:40:32,360
Speaker 1: and retrieval. So at this gathering, Michael discovered that people

680
00:40:32,440 --> 00:40:35,480
Speaker 1: already knew a lot about Gopher. He thought he was

681
00:40:35,520 --> 00:40:37,719
Speaker 1: going out there to tell people about a system that

682
00:40:37,719 --> 00:40:39,600
Speaker 1: he had developed and kind of launched the year before,

683
00:40:39,640 --> 00:40:42,319
Speaker 1: but everyone there seemed to really be familiar with it.

684
00:40:43,000 --> 00:40:44,960
Speaker 1: A lot of them were running their own Gopher servers.

685
00:40:45,840 --> 00:40:48,160
Speaker 1: They were very curious to hear more about the team

686
00:40:48,200 --> 00:40:51,839
Speaker 1: behind Gopher. The software had spread rapidly because of its

687
00:40:51,840 --> 00:40:59,400
Speaker 1: easy implementation and interface, and adoption was incredible. By Gophers,

688
00:40:59,520 --> 00:41:05,480
Speaker 1: traffic growth rate hit nine hundred nine seven percent. Now

689
00:41:05,560 --> 00:41:09,080
Speaker 1: that definitely sounds astronomical, but keep in mind percentages are tricksy.

690
00:41:10,000 --> 00:41:12,640
Speaker 1: For example, if I sold one newspaper in a week,

691
00:41:13,160 --> 00:41:16,359
Speaker 1: and then the following week I sold ten newspapers, I'd

692
00:41:16,400 --> 00:41:22,480
Speaker 1: have a growth sales rate of nine. So while growth

693
00:41:22,560 --> 00:41:27,319
Speaker 1: is spectacular, we're not talking about enormous numbers. By April,

694
00:41:28,239 --> 00:41:30,359
Speaker 1: the number of Gopher servers, or at least the ones

695
00:41:30,480 --> 00:41:33,600
Speaker 1: that the team was aware of, had hit just under

696
00:41:33,719 --> 00:41:37,879
Speaker 1: seven thousand servers. But Goverer did have a big head

697
00:41:37,920 --> 00:41:40,560
Speaker 1: start on the web. It took the web a bit

698
00:41:40,640 --> 00:41:43,880
Speaker 1: longer to catch on because you had to have the

699
00:41:43,920 --> 00:41:47,680
Speaker 1: development of the clients that people could use to browse

700
00:41:47,680 --> 00:41:49,400
Speaker 1: the web, and you know, you have to have the

701
00:41:49,400 --> 00:41:53,200
Speaker 1: development of the actual software people were using to create

702
00:41:53,960 --> 00:41:58,040
Speaker 1: web servers. Gover was popular enough for the team to

703
00:41:58,040 --> 00:42:01,719
Speaker 1: start to hold conferences of their own Gopher cons They

704
00:42:01,760 --> 00:42:05,040
Speaker 1: even created t shirts and merchandise with the Gopher logo

705
00:42:05,120 --> 00:42:07,680
Speaker 1: on it. Colleges and companies were adopting it. Even the

706
00:42:07,680 --> 00:42:10,840
Speaker 1: White House launched a Gopher site back in those days.

707
00:42:11,680 --> 00:42:14,600
Speaker 1: But hot on the heels of Gopher was the Worldwide

708
00:42:14,600 --> 00:42:17,719
Speaker 1: Web concept, which had its own compelling methods of navigating

709
00:42:17,719 --> 00:42:22,040
Speaker 1: and present presenting information. Even though it seemed nonintuitive to

710
00:42:22,080 --> 00:42:24,680
Speaker 1: the Gopher group, it turned out that people really like it.

711
00:42:24,840 --> 00:42:26,960
Speaker 1: Anyone who spent a lot of time on a site

712
00:42:27,000 --> 00:42:30,720
Speaker 1: like Wikipedia dancing from one topic to another, just diving

713
00:42:30,760 --> 00:42:36,239
Speaker 1: down those rabbit holes, they know what I'm talking about. Someone, ironically,

714
00:42:36,239 --> 00:42:38,440
Speaker 1: I would say Tim burners Lee actually was able to

715
00:42:38,480 --> 00:42:42,520
Speaker 1: spread the word about the Worldwide Web using a Gopher site.

716
00:42:42,880 --> 00:42:44,759
Speaker 1: That's how people were able to get the files they

717
00:42:44,760 --> 00:42:48,319
Speaker 1: needed to create web servers and web clients, as well

718
00:42:48,320 --> 00:42:51,200
Speaker 1: as find more information about the web itself. And the

719
00:42:51,200 --> 00:42:53,480
Speaker 1: Gopher team was running into problems with the University of

720
00:42:53,480 --> 00:42:58,200
Speaker 1: Minnesota as well. The administration was always something of a

721
00:42:58,239 --> 00:43:02,520
Speaker 1: reluctant partner with this group. At first, the college had

722
00:43:02,560 --> 00:43:05,319
Speaker 1: been a roadblock. You remember I mentioned they refused to

723
00:43:05,360 --> 00:43:08,480
Speaker 1: implement Gopher in those early days. They only did it

724
00:43:08,600 --> 00:43:11,799
Speaker 1: after it had already been implemented at other college campuses.

725
00:43:12,360 --> 00:43:14,759
Speaker 1: Members of the Gopher development team, we're looking at the

726
00:43:14,760 --> 00:43:18,280
Speaker 1: possibility of creating a private entity, like a spinoff company,

727
00:43:18,360 --> 00:43:21,480
Speaker 1: to create Gopher as a commercial product. But back in

728
00:43:21,520 --> 00:43:23,960
Speaker 1: those days, the Internet was still largely the domain of

729
00:43:24,120 --> 00:43:27,560
Speaker 1: universities and government offices. In fact, a lot of people

730
00:43:27,640 --> 00:43:30,719
Speaker 1: looked at the possibility of private enterprise getting involved with

731
00:43:30,719 --> 00:43:33,520
Speaker 1: the Internet as something they did not want. A lot

732
00:43:33,600 --> 00:43:37,040
Speaker 1: of people kind of compared it to public broadcasting. They said,

733
00:43:37,560 --> 00:43:41,320
Speaker 1: the Internet should remain like PBS and all these companies.

734
00:43:41,320 --> 00:43:44,160
Speaker 1: That's like ads supported TV. We don't want that here.

735
00:43:44,600 --> 00:43:47,160
Speaker 1: So there was a lot of resistance even among the

736
00:43:47,160 --> 00:43:50,160
Speaker 1: group themselves. Not everybody was in agreement that they should

737
00:43:50,160 --> 00:43:53,799
Speaker 1: go the privatized route. And remember the dot com era

738
00:43:53,880 --> 00:43:56,680
Speaker 1: had not yet begun at this point. Then, the University

739
00:43:56,680 --> 00:44:01,120
Speaker 1: of Minnesota instituted a licensing policy for Gopher. They said

740
00:44:01,120 --> 00:44:04,880
Speaker 1: that any organization out there that was operating for profit

741
00:44:05,360 --> 00:44:08,080
Speaker 1: would need to pay a license fee to the University

742
00:44:08,080 --> 00:44:12,680
Speaker 1: of Minnesota in order to use Gopher, and the cost

743
00:44:12,840 --> 00:44:15,880
Speaker 1: of this license fee was sliding. It depended upon the

744
00:44:15,960 --> 00:44:20,440
Speaker 1: size and type of business in question, and the university

745
00:44:20,480 --> 00:44:22,440
Speaker 1: was looking to keep all that money for themselves. Really

746
00:44:22,719 --> 00:44:25,319
Speaker 1: I Meanwhile, the development team found that the university still

747
00:44:25,320 --> 00:44:28,200
Speaker 1: wanted them to do their regular desk jobs as programmers

748
00:44:28,200 --> 00:44:31,840
Speaker 1: for the University of Minnesota, so they were supposed to

749
00:44:31,880 --> 00:44:35,480
Speaker 1: both develop Gopher and work on their normal jobs, and

750
00:44:35,520 --> 00:44:38,279
Speaker 1: they weren't really given any more resources to do this.

751
00:44:38,320 --> 00:44:40,879
Speaker 1: It was still just the six of them, so their

752
00:44:40,920 --> 00:44:45,400
Speaker 1: morale began to decline. And then they had the university

753
00:44:45,480 --> 00:44:48,319
Speaker 1: expecting them to do these two jobs at once, as

754
00:44:48,360 --> 00:44:51,600
Speaker 1: well as having an entire population of users out there

755
00:44:51,920 --> 00:44:55,040
Speaker 1: who are angry about this licensing policy that the university

756
00:44:55,080 --> 00:44:57,160
Speaker 1: has had put in place, and and the team was

757
00:44:57,239 --> 00:45:00,000
Speaker 1: kind of caught in the middle. And at one point

758
00:45:00,000 --> 00:45:04,600
Speaker 1: the university even considered outsourcing Gopher to other programmers, essentially

759
00:45:04,600 --> 00:45:07,919
Speaker 1: taking it away from the team that created it and

760
00:45:07,960 --> 00:45:11,560
Speaker 1: giving it to someone else. Meanwhile, the web was just

761
00:45:11,719 --> 00:45:16,520
Speaker 1: getting started. Remember that I said Gopher grew by back

762
00:45:16,520 --> 00:45:22,160
Speaker 1: in well. The web also grew that year by three

763
00:45:22,239 --> 00:45:27,759
Speaker 1: hundred forty one thousand, six hundred thirty four percent. It

764
00:45:27,840 --> 00:45:31,719
Speaker 1: was also the first year of the commercial web browser, Mosaic.

765
00:45:32,160 --> 00:45:35,840
Speaker 1: Mosaic proved that you could go commercial on the Internet.

766
00:45:35,880 --> 00:45:40,000
Speaker 1: So while the Gopher group was reluctant the website, things

767
00:45:40,000 --> 00:45:42,879
Speaker 1: were going in a very different direction, and the web

768
00:45:42,960 --> 00:45:46,160
Speaker 1: was incorporating stuff that Gopher couldn't really support, like images

769
00:45:46,160 --> 00:45:49,319
Speaker 1: on web pages. Not first, an image on a web

770
00:45:49,320 --> 00:45:52,480
Speaker 1: page was not a huge asset because it took forever

771
00:45:52,760 --> 00:45:55,880
Speaker 1: to render a picture on a screen, and it caused

772
00:45:55,960 --> 00:45:59,960
Speaker 1: some people to say that WWW actually stood for world

773
00:46:00,000 --> 00:46:03,359
Speaker 1: Old Wide Weight. But modem speeds were on the rise

774
00:46:03,400 --> 00:46:06,200
Speaker 1: as well, and that helped reduce some of that loading time,

775
00:46:07,080 --> 00:46:10,320
Speaker 1: and some of the Gopher team rather sardonic Lee said,

776
00:46:10,880 --> 00:46:13,600
Speaker 1: we knew the game was up when we realized that

777
00:46:13,640 --> 00:46:17,480
Speaker 1: people could get naked photos on their computer screens using

778
00:46:17,480 --> 00:46:19,759
Speaker 1: the Worldwide Web, something that you could not be done

779
00:46:19,800 --> 00:46:22,840
Speaker 1: with Gopher, and they were being pretty serious about it

780
00:46:22,920 --> 00:46:27,880
Speaker 1: at the time. By the spring of Web traffic exceeded

781
00:46:28,080 --> 00:46:32,160
Speaker 1: Gopher traffic, so even though Gopher had a headstart, Web

782
00:46:32,160 --> 00:46:36,520
Speaker 1: had caught up and passed Gopher traffic. Companies were discovering

783
00:46:36,600 --> 00:46:40,320
Speaker 1: that there were some possibilities on the web, though really

784
00:46:40,400 --> 00:46:42,840
Speaker 1: web commerce was still a couple of years away from

785
00:46:42,880 --> 00:46:47,080
Speaker 1: really taking off, but it offered opportunities beyond just sharing information,

786
00:46:47,080 --> 00:46:50,200
Speaker 1: which was really the only thing Gopher was good for.

787
00:46:50,280 --> 00:46:53,919
Speaker 1: It was really sharing information and distributing files. It wasn't

788
00:46:54,320 --> 00:46:57,080
Speaker 1: meant to do really more than that. So the web

789
00:46:57,120 --> 00:47:00,239
Speaker 1: had versatility on its side as well. And one of

790
00:47:00,280 --> 00:47:03,279
Speaker 1: the big things that helped drive the knife home and

791
00:47:03,320 --> 00:47:06,920
Speaker 1: Gopher had nothing to do with how people use the Internet.

792
00:47:07,440 --> 00:47:10,759
Speaker 1: It had to do with a scandal unrelated to anyone

793
00:47:10,960 --> 00:47:15,640
Speaker 1: on the Gopher team. Dr John Nigerian, a transplant surgeon

794
00:47:15,680 --> 00:47:20,280
Speaker 1: at the University of Minnesota, was accused of fraud, tax evasion,

795
00:47:20,320 --> 00:47:24,720
Speaker 1: and embezzlement. The charges led the National Institutes of Health,

796
00:47:24,800 --> 00:47:27,680
Speaker 1: which is a federal government office here in the United States,

797
00:47:27,680 --> 00:47:30,759
Speaker 1: to withdraw funding to the university, and that was a

798
00:47:30,800 --> 00:47:34,279
Speaker 1: serious blow to the school, so they went to emergency

799
00:47:34,360 --> 00:47:38,160
Speaker 1: mode to try and fix the situation. They as part

800
00:47:38,160 --> 00:47:41,439
Speaker 1: of that, asked the Gopher team to create a new

801
00:47:41,520 --> 00:47:45,800
Speaker 1: system to track accounts and file paperwork because a large

802
00:47:45,840 --> 00:47:50,400
Speaker 1: part of this accusation really dealt with the way paperwork

803
00:47:50,520 --> 00:47:54,799
Speaker 1: was failing to be filed on time. So the team

804
00:47:54,840 --> 00:47:58,640
Speaker 1: eventually developed a web based transaction program, which is also

805
00:47:58,719 --> 00:48:00,359
Speaker 1: kind of ironic when you think about that was a

806
00:48:00,360 --> 00:48:03,720
Speaker 1: web based approach. It was the world's first web based

807
00:48:03,760 --> 00:48:06,719
Speaker 1: transaction program. But it also meant that while they were

808
00:48:06,800 --> 00:48:10,440
Speaker 1: developing this, they could not continue working on Gopher because

809
00:48:10,440 --> 00:48:12,640
Speaker 1: they just didn't have the time to do it. So

810
00:48:12,760 --> 00:48:16,840
Speaker 1: by the time they finished the web based application, Gopher

811
00:48:16,920 --> 00:48:20,120
Speaker 1: was dead in the water, or I guess dead under

812
00:48:20,160 --> 00:48:22,759
Speaker 1: the ground, I suppose, if we want to stick with

813
00:48:22,800 --> 00:48:26,239
Speaker 1: the metaphor anyway, it's it's not really dead dead. It's

814
00:48:26,280 --> 00:48:29,600
Speaker 1: not entirely gone. There are still Gopher servers out there

815
00:48:30,160 --> 00:48:33,880
Speaker 1: if you know where to look. But as an evolving entity,

816
00:48:33,960 --> 00:48:37,920
Speaker 1: Gopher was essentially a thing of the past and at

817
00:48:37,960 --> 00:48:41,439
Speaker 1: some point, and no one's really sure, when someone took

818
00:48:41,520 --> 00:48:46,239
Speaker 1: the original Gophers server known as Mother Gopher offline. The

819
00:48:46,320 --> 00:48:49,200
Speaker 1: University of Minnesota supported it for several years after Gopher

820
00:48:49,239 --> 00:48:51,520
Speaker 1: had clearly lost the race to the web, but that

821
00:48:51,520 --> 00:48:54,640
Speaker 1: as no longer the case. As for Michael, he would

822
00:48:54,640 --> 00:48:57,960
Speaker 1: go on to join Duke University, where he still works today,

823
00:48:58,360 --> 00:49:00,120
Speaker 1: and other members of the team have gone on to

824
00:49:00,120 --> 00:49:02,560
Speaker 1: do other things. Some of them retired, some of them

825
00:49:02,600 --> 00:49:04,800
Speaker 1: while I was working for Google. One of them stayed

826
00:49:04,840 --> 00:49:09,160
Speaker 1: with the University of Minnesota, oh And Dr Nigerian, who

827
00:49:09,239 --> 00:49:13,399
Speaker 1: was accused of those crimes, was ultimately exonerated of those

828
00:49:13,400 --> 00:49:17,120
Speaker 1: accusations of fraud and embezzlement. The jury returned with a

829
00:49:17,239 --> 00:49:20,600
Speaker 1: verdict of not guilty. But by then the damage was

830
00:49:20,640 --> 00:49:23,200
Speaker 1: done in more ways than one Gopher it faded away

831
00:49:23,280 --> 00:49:26,120
Speaker 1: due to lack of support, and the university found itself

832
00:49:26,160 --> 00:49:29,360
Speaker 1: struggling to regain the trust of the n i H.

833
00:49:29,640 --> 00:49:34,120
Speaker 1: So that's the tragic story of the Gopher protocol, and

834
00:49:34,160 --> 00:49:36,799
Speaker 1: that's why we serve the web rather than burrow through

835
00:49:36,840 --> 00:49:39,759
Speaker 1: the Internet. I hope you guys enjoyed that look back

836
00:49:39,800 --> 00:49:42,359
Speaker 1: into the history of the Internet. If you have suggestions

837
00:49:42,360 --> 00:49:45,759
Speaker 1: for topics I should cover in future episodes, let me know.

838
00:49:46,000 --> 00:49:49,120
Speaker 1: Send me an email. My address is tech Stuff at

839
00:49:49,200 --> 00:49:51,719
Speaker 1: how stuff Works dot com, or you can drop me

840
00:49:51,760 --> 00:49:54,799
Speaker 1: a line on Facebook or Twitter. The show's handle at

841
00:49:54,800 --> 00:49:58,480
Speaker 1: both of those is tech Stuff hs W. And if

842
00:49:58,480 --> 00:50:01,680
Speaker 1: you want to watch me record a show live, and

843
00:50:01,760 --> 00:50:04,399
Speaker 1: that includes all the times I make mistakes, and go

844
00:50:04,520 --> 00:50:07,879
Speaker 1: back and do it again. You can follow me on

845
00:50:07,920 --> 00:50:13,080
Speaker 1: twitch dot tv. We're tech stuff. They're surprisingly enough, and

846
00:50:13,160 --> 00:50:17,200
Speaker 1: we will be streaming on Wednesdays and Fridays unless something

847
00:50:17,280 --> 00:50:21,359
Speaker 1: changes between now and then, which could happen. But that's

848
00:50:21,360 --> 00:50:24,120
Speaker 1: all for now, and I'll talk to you again and

849
00:50:24,280 --> 00:50:32,400
Speaker 1: really soon. For more on this and thousands of other topics,

850
00:50:32,640 --> 00:50:43,720
Speaker 1: is a stock works dot com