Where wizards stay up late

This book is about the creation of the Internet, or better yet the ARPAnet (1969 - 1990) that spawned it.

Everything is here: the people and reasons for its creation, beginnings of underlying technologies like packet switching, distributed networks an so on, early fights over standards and finally its proliferation and metamorphosis from ARPAnet to the Internet. Of course there were little detours into the culture of openness and early flame wars as well. It is both reassuring and disturbing that flaming has been with us since the 70s.

When it came to explaining the technology and engineering I believe that the author managed to hit the right balance of writing it in general terms without watering it too much down. Now, I see many people struggling with keeping track of people. Sure, the book may seem like a never ending list of names, but ARPAnet was an endeavor that lasted for 21 years and had hundreds of contributors, so there is no other way. Luckily this book has an index and now we have the internet as well to help us out.

All that said, if you are interested in the history of the Internet this book is a great place to start.