Before the apps and algorithms, there was a different internet. Not the garage-born startup myth, but something built in the shadow of the Cold War - a network designed to survive nuclear war that became the foundation of modern life.

For a brief moment, it was public. Funded by taxpayers. Built for research and shared access.

Then came the handoff. Not a conspiracy or collapse, but a quiet transition from public to private. From open system to controlled infrastructure. From sharing information to capturing attention.

A series of choices that felt small at the time and inevitable in retrospect.

This is Part 1 of that story.

This interlude explores the history most people never learned:

• 1957: Sputnik launches. Cold War paranoia births ARPANET—a distributed network designed to survive annihilation.
• 1991: Congress passes the High-Performance Computing Act. The NREN (National Research and Education Network) promises a publicly controlled internet with guardrails: privacy, equity, security.
• 1993: While Congress debates, MCI, IBM, and Merit Network quietly build commercial backbones. Their mantra: build it before there's a law to stop it.
• April 1995: The NSF decommissions its backbone. Overnight, the public web becomes commercial. No conditions. No compensation. The NREN is abandoned mid-construction.

What followed wasn't chaos. It was order...the kind only capital can impose.

This is Part 1 of a 2-part interlude. Standalone listening or part of the "What Radiohead Knew" series.

Part 2 coming soon: The architects of enclosure. The legal frameworks that locked the doors. And how hope became our greatest weakness.

The With Jay Burke Show is a member of the Unfiltered Studios https://www.unfpod.com/ Please be sure to Rate and Review this episode. Subscribe and Share

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