Chapter 2 - 1 (слова "песни" присутствуют) | Текст песни

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On 7 January 1958, President Eisenhower announced a new organization called ARPA that would control all of the government's high-technology work. Soon ARPA was spending millions of dollars on research into new science and technology. In lonely laboratories deep in the deserts and mountains of the USA, brilliant men and women explored extraordinary new ideas. Scientists built bombs that could spread terrible diseases. Engineers made plans for wars in space. Psychologists tried to train people to communicate through the power of thought alone. ARPA's earliest projects were aimed at winning the 'space race' that Sputnik had started. But these projects were soon placed under the control of a new organization, NASA. NASA captured America's imagination all through the 1960s, especially after President Kennedy announced his plan to land a man on the moon. While NASA filled the news, ARPA was working quietly in an area that would eventually prove far more important than space travel: computing.
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In 1966, the man in charge of ARPA's computer projects was Bob Taylor. He began his career as a scientist working on brain research. But he was also interested in computing, even before computer science existed as a separate area of study. Computers were still a very new technology at this time. They were less common than Rolls-Royce cars - and more expensive. In the 1960s, a computer with the power of the machines that sit on desks today cost millions of dollars and was the size of an apartment. Most of these machines were owned by universities, the government or large companies. They were mainly used for mathematics. But even at this time, Bob Taylor realized that computers were not just machines that could calculate. They were machines that could communicate as well. ARPA was paying for computer projects at universities all over the USA. But Bob Taylor was not happy with the results. He went to see his boss, Charlie Herzfeld: 'Charlie, we've got a problem,' he said. 'What's that?' Herzfeld asked. 'We're throwing money away,' said Taylor. 'We're paying different people all over the USA to do exactly the same work.' 'What's wrong with them?' shouted Herzfeld, who had a strong Austrian accent and frightened many of the people who worked for him. 'Haven't they heard of the telephone? Don't they go to conferences? We pay for them to go to conferences. Why don't they just tell each other what they're doing?' 'No, Charlie, that's not the problem,' explained Taylor. 'Of course our people talk to each other. The trouble is that their computers don't.' 'Their computers don't talk? What do you mean?' asked Herzfeld. 'Well, look at my office. I've got connections there to all of our biggest computers. But if I want to communicate with the people at Santa Monica, I have to sit down at one machine. And if I want to talk to the computer at Berkeley, I have to get up from that machine and go over and sit at another one, using a completely different computer language. It's the same for all the other computers.' 'So what's the answer, then?' asked Herzfeld. 'I want to build a network of computers. I'd like to connect four of our biggest computers together. Then the scientists can share their research and we won't be paying for the same jobs again and again.' Herzfeld looked at Taylor for a moment. 'Isn't that going to be difficult?' he asked. 'Oh, no,' said Taylor, sounding more confident than he felt. 'We already know how to do it.' Herzfeld thought for a moment. 'Great idea, Bob,' he said. 'Start working on it. I'll give you a million dollars right now. Go.' Taylor left Herzfeld's office and went back to his own room. 'A million dollars!' he said to himself. 'And that only took twenty minutes! Why didn't I ask for more?'

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