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     The OHI Project – 50 Years of the Internet


Introduction

To celebrate the first 50 years of the Internet, CyberLabs has launched the Oral History of the Internet (OHI), recording and preserving the personal narratives of global Internet Pioneers’ extraordinary contribution to the internet development. By 2019, OHI should have interviewed 500 Internet Pioneers around the world. A 50-episode TV series, documentaries and books will be produced based on the video interviews. The OHI, which started first in China in 2007, has interviewed nearly 200 Internet Pioneers who mostly come from Asia, Europe and the United States. The OHI will also go to interview those from Africa, Mid-East and Oceania.

The mission of OHI: Recording the first 50 years of the internet so to embrace its next 50 years.

The OHI will thus build a virtual monument that is committed to documenting personal narratives from the Internet Pioneers who have made extraordinary contributions to the development of the internet around the world. OHI was launched by CyberLabs, a think tank devoted to recording and preserving the internet history, which has started the project first in China since 2007. As the internet is facilitating unprecedented, multi-faceted interactions around the world, OHI goes global by video recording oral testimonies from the worldwide Internet Pioneers about their extraordinary contributions to the development of the internet in their own countries or fields.

The Process

The Internet Pioneers were selected by the international Academic Board of CyberLabs by consulting its Board of Consultants based on their personal contributions to the internet development at different stages, and in particular, the social impact of their contributions. Each Internet Pioneer’s oral testimony starts with a video recording of a first-person account with an interviewer from CyberLabs, who share the conscious intention of creating permanent oral history in the purpose of better understanding the internet’s past and future. All the interviews will be posted online so that they are available to the public around the world through the internet. The oral history made out of the due process is then preserved and made available in various forms to internet researchers and members of the public.

The Significance

OHI records and preserves diverse historical perspectives of the internet history from global Internet Pioneers in the hope of advocating the collaborative effort of building up the internet. The oral history produced could be used as a powerful tool for bridging divides, improving engagement, and facilitating historical understanding in terms of internet governance, policy making, and cybersecurity. OHI thus welcomes individuals and institutions who share the values of creating and preserving the oral history of the internet to join us to in promoting excellence in the collection, preservation, dissemination and uses of the oral testimonies for current and future users. In this sense, OHI should help foster better communication among global communities who are increasingly interact on the internet.

Guidelines for OHI Interviews

The OHI interviews seek an in-depth account of Internet Pioneers’ personal contribution and reflections on the internet development at different stages. An OHI interview is different from most interviews conducted by news media organizations as the former offers sufficient time to our invited Internet Pioneers to tell their stories the fullness they desire. The content of oral history interviews is grounded in reflections on the past as opposed to commentary on purely contemporary events.

In the OHI interviews, Internet Pioneers are reminded that they must voluntarily give their consent to be interviewed and understand that they can withdraw from the interview or refuse to answer any question at any time. Before the interview, they may choose to give the consent by signing a consent form or recording an oral statement of consent. All interviews are conducted in accord with the stated aims and within the parameters of the consent.

Interviewees hold the copyright to their interviews until and unless they transfer those rights to OHI. This is done by the interviewee signing a release form or recording an oral statement to the same effect. The invited Internet Pioneers also have the right to put restrictions on the use of their interviews. All use and dissemination of the interview content must follow any restrictions they place upon it.

OHI respects its invited Internet Pioneers as well as the integrity of the research. Interviewers are obliged to ask historically significant questions, reflecting careful preparation for the interview and understanding of the issues to be addressed. Interviewers respect the Internet Pioneers’ equal authority in the interviews and honor their right to respond to questions in their own style and language. During the OHI interviews, both interviewers and interviewees (Internet Pioneers) should strive for intellectual honesty and the best application of the skills of their discipline, while avoiding stereotypes, misrepresentations, or manipulations of the narrators’ words.

In keeping with the goal of long term preservation and access, OHI should use the best recording equipment available within the limits of their financial resources to reproduce the voice accurately and, if appropriate, other sounds as well as visual images. The OHI interviewers must avoid making any promises that cannot be met, such as guarantees of control over interpretation and presentation of the interviews beyond the scope of restrictions stated in informed consent forms, or suggestions of material benefit outside the control of the interviewer.

Contacts：

Dr. Fang Xingdong

President and CEO, CyberLabs

Email: 98837@qq.com

 

Dr. Bu Zhong

Senior Research Fellow, CyberLabs

Email: zhongbu@gmail.com

 

Ms.  Fan Yuanyuan

Director of International Cooperation, CyberLabs

Email: fanyuanyuan@chinalabs.com


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  • Wolfgang Kleinwachter

    Wolfgang Kleinwächter, Professor for International Communication Policy and Regulation at the Department for Media and Information Sciences of the University of Aarhus in Denmark

  • Jovan Kurbalija

    Jovan Kurbalija, Founding Director of DiploFoundation and the Head of the Geneva Internet Platform

  • Anriette Esterhuysen

    Anriette Esterhuysen, a human rights defender and computer networking pioneer from South Africa.

  • Bertrand de La Chapelle

    Bertrand de La Chapelle, co-founder and Executive Director of Internet & Jurisdiction

Oral History interview of Jeff Moss

Jeff Moss is the founder and creator of both the Black Hat Briefings and DEF CON, two of the most influential information security conferences in the world, attracting thousands of people from around the world to learn the latest in security technology from those researchers who create it. In the interview, Jeff Moss shared his early life in San Francisco where he was intrigued and enlighted by the rudimentary internet, as well as how the unplanned creation of DEF CON arised from a farewell party for a soon-be-gone bulletin board users, and also the rise and fall of its business version Black Hat. He also explained on the public misunderstanding about the hacker culture and what it was really about. He showed concern on the infringement of personal data and fragility of current internet ecosystem.

Oral History interview of Vinton Cerf

Vinton Gray Cerf is an American internet pioneer, who is recognized as one of "the fathers of the Internet", sharing this title with TCP/IP co-inventor Bob Kahn. His contributions have been acknowledged and lauded, repeatedly, with honorary degrees and awards that include the National Medal of Technology, the Turing Award, the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the Marconi Prize and membership in the National Academy of Engineering. In this interview, Vinton discusses his thoughts about “Fathers of Internet”, his childhood, his study experiences, his career development and his opinion about the future.

Oral History interview of David Conrad

David Conrad is a long-time and active participant in Internet infrastructure, development, and operations. Highlights of his career include leading the team that developed one of the first TCP/IP packages for the original IBM PC, helping to start one of the first commercial Internet Service Providers in Japan, establishing and becoming the first Director General of APNIC, founding and being the CTO and co-VP of Engineering of Nominum, Inc., being the “Internet Janitor” at CloudFlare, Inc., and performing a number of roles at ICANN, including General Manager of the IANA, Vice President of IT and currently, CTO.

Oral History interview of Lawrence G. Roberts

Lawrence G. Roberts is an American scientist who received the Draper Prize in 2001 and the Principe de Asturias Award in 2002 "for the development of the Internet". As a program manager and office director at the Advanced Research Projects Agency, Roberts and his team created the ARPANET using packet switching techniques invented by British computer scientist Donald Davies. The ARPANET was a predecessor to the modern Internet. In this interview, Roberts talks about his childhood, his family, his study experiences, his career development, his leadership at the ARPANET as well as at subsequent companies that he helped co-found, and about networks security and leading edges on the internet.

Oral History interview of Fadi Chehadé

Mr. Chehadé was born in Beirut of Egyptian parents who had lived in various parts of the world before they settled in Lebanon. He went to America for study when he was 18 alone where he learned computer science in Community colleges, artificial intelligence and management in Stanford under the support of AT&T. In this interview, Fadi discusses his family—His family is from a Coptic Catholic minority in Egypt, and he identifies as such. In Beirut, he attended a French Catholic school, speaking French at school and Arabic afterwards, until at the age of 13 his father decided to send him to Damascus due to violent tensions and the Lebanese civil war. He discusses his work in ICANN and his future plan.

Oral History interview of Lynn St. Amour

Lynn St. Amour is President & CEO of Internet-Matters, and is active in many matters of Internet development and governance. Lynn served from 2001 - 2014 as President & CEO of the Internet Society (ISOC). Lynn joined ISOC in 1998 as Executive Director of its Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA) operations, following senior positions in Europe and the US with AT&T and Digital Equipment Corp. (DEC). She was based in Europe from 1984 - 2011. In the interview, Lynn discusses her study, her family, her work as Chair of the United Nations Internet Governance Forum (IGF) Multi-stakeholder Advisory Committee (IGF-MAG).

Oral History interview of Anriette Esterhuysen

Anriette Esterhuysen is a human rights defender and computer networking pioneer from South Africa. She has pioneered the use of Internet and Communications Technologies (ICTs) to promote social justice in South Africa and throughout the world, focusing on affordable internet access. She has been the Executive Director of the Association for Progressive Communications since 2000 until April 2017, when she became APC's Director of Policy and Strategy.

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