Al Gore is a former
US Senator who served as the
Vice President of the United States from 1993 to 2001, and is co-winner of the
2007 Nobel Peace Prize. In the 1980s and 1990s, he promoted legislation that funded an expansion of the
ARPANET, allowing greater public access, and helping to develop the
Internet.
Gore had been involved with computers since the 1970s, first as a Congressman and later as Senator and Vice President, where he was a "genuine nerd, with a geek reputation running back to his days as a futurist
Atari Democrat in the House. Before computers were comprehensible [...] Gore struggled to explain artificial intelligence and fiber-optic networks to sleepy colleagues."
[1] According to Campbell-Kelly and Aspray (
Computer: A History of the Information Machine), up until the early 1990s public usage of the Internet was limited and the "problem of giving ordinary Americans network access had excited Senator
Al Gore since the late 1970s."
[2]
Of Gore's involvement in the then-developing Internet while in Congress, Internet pioneers
Vint Cerf and
Bob Kahn have also noted that,
As far back as the 1970s Congressman Gore promoted the idea of high-speed telecommunications as an engine for both economic growth and the improvement of our educational system. He was the first elected official to grasp the potential of computer communications to have a broader impact than just improving the conduct of science and scholarship [...] the Internet, as we know it today, was not deployed until 1993. When the Internet was still in the early stages of its deployment, Congressman Gore provided intellectual leadership by helping create the vision of the potential benefits of high speed computing and communication. As an example, he sponsored hearings on how advanced technologies might be put to use in areas like coordinating the response of government agencies to natural disasters and other crises.
[3]
24 Jun 1986: Albert Gore introduced S 2594 Supercomputer Network Study Act of 1986
[4]
As a Senator, Gore began to craft the
High Performance Computing and Communication Act of 1991 (commonly referred to as "The
Gore Bill"
[5]) after hearing the 1988 report
Toward a National Research Network[6] submitted to Congress by a group chaired by
UCLA professor of computer science,
Leonard Kleinrock, one of the central creators of the
ARPANET (the ARPANET, first deployed by Kleinrock and others in 1969, is the predecessor of the Internet).
[7]
Indeed, Kleinrock would later credit both Gore and the
Gore Bill as a critical moment in Internet history:
A second development occurred around this time, namely, then-Senator Al Gore, a strong and knowledgeable proponent of the Internet, promoted legislation that resulted in President George H.W Bush signing the
High Performance Computing and Communication Act of 1991. This Act allocated $600 million for high performance computing and for the creation of the
National Research and Education Network [13–14]. The NREN brought together industry, academia and government in a joint effort to accelerate the development and deployment of gigabit/sec networking.
[8]
The bill was passed on Dec. 9, 1991 and led to the
National Information Infrastructure (NII)
[9] which Gore referred to as the "
information superhighway". President
George H. W. Bush predicted that the bill would help "unlock the secrets of DNA," open up foreign markets to free trade, and a promise of cooperation between government, academia, and industry.
[10]
Prior to its passage, Gore discussed the basics of the bill in an article for the September 1991 issue of
Scientific American entitled
Scientific American presents the September 1991 Single Copy Issue: Communications, Computers, and Networks. His essay, "Infrastructure for the Global Village", commented on the lack of network access described above and argued: "Rather than holding back, the U.S. should lead by building the
information infrastructure, essential if all Americans are to gain access to this transforming technology"
[11] [...] "high speed networks must be built that tie together millions of computers, providing capabilities that we cannot even imagine."
[12]
